Dear honrabel Sir,
I would wish to ask you Sir, if you would Be pleased to give
me and my wife a littel poor close. I was going in the Bay
to cut some wood. But I am all amost blind and cant Do much
so if you would spear me some Sir I should Be very thankfull
to you Sir.
* * * * *
I got Bad splotches all over my Body and i dont know what
the cause of it is. Please Have you got anything for it. i
Have'nt got any money to Pay you now for anything But i wont
forget to Pay you when i gets the money.
* * * * *
doctor--i have a compleant i ham weak with wind on the chest,
weaknes all all over me up in my harm.
* * * * *
Dear Dr. Grenfell.
I would like for you to Have time to come Down to my House
Before you leaves to go to St. Anthony. My little Girl is
very Bad. it seems all in Her neck. Cant Ply her Neck
forward if do she nearly goes in the fits, i dont know what
it is the matter with Her myself. But if you see Her you
would know what the matter with Her. Please send a Word By
the Bearer what gives you this note and let me know where
you will have time to come down to my House. i lives down
the Bay a Place called Berry Head.
"What have you been doing since?" Dr. Grenfell has not been idle.
There is now a mission hospital at St. Anthony, near the extreme
northeast point of the Newfoundland coast. There is another,
well-equipped and commodious, at Battle Harbour--a rocky island lying
out from the Labrador coast near the Strait of Belle Isle--which is
open the year round; when the writer was last on the coast, it was in
charge of Dr. Cluny McPherson, a courageous young physician,
Newfoundland-born, who went six hundred miles up the coast by dog-team
in the dead of winter, finding shelter where he might, curing whom he
could--everywhere seeking out those who needed him, caring not a whit,
it appears, for the peril and hardship of the long white road. There
is a third at Indian Harbour, half-way up the coast, which is open
through the fishing season. It is conducted with the care and
precision of a London hospital--admirably kept, well-ordered,
efficient. The physician in charge is Dr. George H. Simpson--a wiry,
keen, brave little Englishman, who goes about in an open boat,
whatever the distance, whatever the weather; he is a man of splendid
courage and sympathy: the fishing-folk love him for his kind heart and
for the courage with which he responds to their every call. There is
also the little hospital steamer _Strathcona_, in which Dr. Grenfell
makes the round of all the coast, from the time of the break-up until
the fall gales have driven the fishing-schooners home to harbour.
[Illustration: "APPEARED WITH A LITTLE STEAM-LAUNCH, THE PRINCESS MAY"]