[Illustration: Map to illustrate the route of MR. H. HESKETH PRICHARD AND
MR. GATHORNE-HARDY in LABRADOR 1910.]
THROUGH TRACKLESS LABRADOR
_By the same Author._
HUNTING CAMPS IN WOOD AND WILDERNESS
WITH A FOREWORD BY
F. C. SELOUS
(Uniform with this Volume. Cr. 4to. Price 15s. net.)
_The Times_ (London):
“A sound sportsman, an experienced traveller, a good writer.”
Sir Harry Johnston in _Nature_:
“Altogether this is one of the most attractive and informative
works on the big game of the New World which the present
reviewer has had the pleasure of reading.”
_Field and Stream_ (the official organ of the Camp-Fire Club of America):
“The work ... should be in the library of every sportsman. It
is in every way a trustworthy account of big adventures.”
LONDON:
WILLIAM HEINEMANN, 21 Bedford St., W.C.
[Illustration: When the Caribou come too late.]
THROUGH TRACKLESS
LABRADOR
BY
H. HESKETH PRICHARD, F.R.G.S.
AUTHOR OF
“HUNTING CAMPS IN WOOD AND WILDERNESS,”
“THROUGH THE HEART OF PATAGONIA,” ETC.
WITH A CHAPTER ON FISHING
BY
G. M. GATHORNE-HARDY, F.R.G.S.
ILLUSTRATED WITH A FRONTISPIECE BY LADY HELEN GRAHAM,
A MAP OF THE ROUTE, AND FROM PHOTOGRAPHS
[Illustration]
LONDON
WILLIAM HEINEMANN
1911
_Copyright: London, 1911, by William Heinemann._
TO MY MOTHER
CONTENTS
CHAP. PAGE
PREFACE xi
I. THE LABRADOR 1
II. LONDON TO LABRADOR 9
III. ON THE EVE OF INLAND 25
IV. NUNAINGOAK BAY AND THE FRASER RIVER 36
V. BEAR RAVINE 55
VI. OVER THE GREAT PLATEAU 64
VII. THE KINGDOM OF BEELZEBUB 75
VIII. THE HEART OF THE WILDERNESS 86
IX. AT INDIAN HOUSE LAKE 101
X. THE EASTWARD MARCH 112
XI. THE HEROES OF THE LABRADOR 129
XII. THE ESKIMO 146
XIII. THE WINTER MASTERS OF THE LABRADOR 165
XIV. THE SETTLERS OR LIVEYERES 182
XV. THE INDIANS OF THE LABRADOR 192
XVI. THE CARIBOU OF THE LABRADOR 204
XVII. A CHAPTER ON FISHING 221
XVIII. NEWFOUNDLAND AND LABRADOR _v._ NORWAY 232
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
WHEN THE CARIBOU COME TOO LATE _Frontispiece_
TO FACE PAGE
SPRING 2
SUMMER 2
AUTUMN 4
WINTER 4
A NASCAUPEE INDIAN OF THE BARREN GROUNDS 6
THE _HARMONY_ 16
THE _HARMONY_ IN THE ICE 16
THE HUNTER’S GRAVE 20
THE BREAK-UP OF THE ICE AT NAIN 20
THE ARRIVAL OF THE _HARMONY_ 22
ESKIMO _KAYAKS_ IN NAIN BAY 22
A CURIOUS ICEBERG 26
OKAK 26
BISHOP MARTIN 28
BROTHER SCHMITT 28
CAPT. J. C. JACKSON 34
FILIPUS 34
DESERTED TEPEES 36
THE MORNING OF THE START 36
AT THE HEAD OF THE LONG LAKE 38
THE FIRST LUNCH 38
BOAZ IS INTERESTED 40
TRACKING 40
A NASTY PLACE 42
THE CLIFFS OF THE FRASER 42
THE VALLEY OF THE FRASER 44
WHERE THE FRASER BEGINS TO GROW SHALLOW 44
HARDY CROSSING THE UPPER FRASER 46
DOWN THE FRASER 48
WE _CACHE_ THE FIRST CANOE 50
THE BEGINNING OF THE LAST NAVIGABLE STAGE 52
DRYING OUT 52
BLACK BEAR, SHOT AUGUST 5TH 56
THE BEAR’S CAVE 56
THE CANOE 1,000 FEET UP 58
HARDY AND PORTER NEARING MOSQUITO GLEN 58
CARIBOU CROSSING-PLACE 60
TAKING A “SPELL” 60
“HARD LIES THE PATH” 62
BEAR RAVINE 62
ROBERT PORTER 62
BEAR RAVINE BROOK 62
“TIRED AND IRRITABLE” 64
HARDY PREPARED AGAINST THE MOSQUITOES 68
OVER THE PLATEAU 68
CANOE CAMP 70
SANDY CAMP 70
LOOKING WESTWARD 76
COOKING OUR MID-DAY MEAL BESIDE SOME UPLAND WATER 76
WE THREW OURSELVES ON OUR FACES TO AVOID THE
MOSQUITOES 76
SANDY CAMP RIVER 82
CROSSING THE LAKE 88
THE FIRST CARIBOU 94
THE GEORGE RIVER 96
THE GEORGE AT LAST 96
WHERE THE NASCAUPEES CLEAN DEERSKINS 102
INDIAN HOUSE LAKE 102
SLIPPERY BROOK 104
CAMP BESIDE SLIPPERY BROOK 104
HUNGRY DAYS AT SLIPPERY BROOK 106
TRACKS OF MIGRATING CARIBOU 106
THE LAST SPRUCE 114
A “RAISED BEACH” IN THE GEORGE VALLEY 114
RATION FOR THREE 120
OUR CHEF 120
REV. W. W. PERRETT, HOUSE-FATHER OF NAIN 130
REV. B. LENZ, HOUSE-FATHER OF HOPEDALE 130
ESKIMO BAND AT NAIN 134
NEW CHURCH BUILT BY MISSIONARIES AND ESKIMO
AT NAIN 134
SNOW-HUT CAMP OF MORAVIAN MISSIONARIES ON
A JOURNEY 138
A SUCCESSFUL WHITE WHALE HUNT 148
BREAKFAST AT A SUMMER CAMP 148
CHRISTIAN ESKIMO WOMAN 154
HEATHEN ESKIMO WOMAN 154
AN ESKIMO MOTHER 156
ESKIMO WOMAN IN WINTER COSTUME 156
ENTRANCE TO ESKIMO HOUSE IN WINTER 162
THE LABRADOR “SINBAD” 166
BY _KOMATIK_ ON LAND 184
BY _KOMATIK_ OVER THE SEA-ICE 184
CHRISTMAS AT NAIN 188
SETTLER BOYS AT PLAY 188
THE HOME OF THE NASCAUPEES 194
THE CHILDREN OF THE BARRENS 194
A MIXED MARRIAGE—NASCAUPEE AND MONTAGNAIS 198
MONTAGNAIS INDIANS 200
THE NASCAUPEE BELLE AND TWO MONTAGNAIS WOMEN 200
TYPICAL BARREN GROUND HORNS 206
LABRADOR BARREN GROUND HORNS 206
CARIBOU HEAD FROM NORTHERN QUEBEC 206
TYPICAL CARIBOU HORNS FROM NORTHERN QUEBEC 206
INTERMEDIATE TYPE BETWEEN LABRADOR BARREN GROUND
AND WOODLAND 210
ROADS CUT BY MIGRATING CARIBOU 214
A BEAR-PATH OVER THE REINDEER MOSS 216
ANTLERS OF CARIBOU KILLED BY NASCAUPEE INDIANS
AT A CROSSING-PLACE ON INDIAN HOUSE LAKE 216
PLAYING A SEA TROUT 226
A _NAMAYCUSH_ 226
CUT OFF FROM THE WORLD 234
PREFACE.
The life of the Labrador is entirely predatory. It never has been
anything else north of lat. 54, and unless mineral discoveries are made,
never can be. Its inhabitants live by the chase. The bears, the caribou,
the birds, the seals, the salmon, the trout, and the cod form the capital
of the country, and the problem of existence is solved by successful
destruction.
At the same time, the Labrador (by its own inhabitants and by
Newfoundlanders it is always spoken of as _the_ Labrador, the word
peninsula being understood) is the most God-fearing land that I have ever
visited. This, from Makkovik northwards, is due to the Moravian Mission;
in the south to the Deep Sea Mission under the well-known Dr. Grenfell;
while Mr. Stewart, of the Continental and Colonial Mission, labours among
the heathen Eskimo round the shores of Ungava Bay. If this book serves no
other end than to draw attention to the fine work being done year in year
out on the Labrador, it will not have been written in vain. The chapter
on the Moravian Mission, written from an intimate acquaintance of their
life and methods, tells the story of men and women who, with none of the
parade or the pose—not always unknown to missionary effort—are living
lives beyond all praise.
Our little exploring trip from the Atlantic Coast to the George River
over an unknown route may be taken as simply a phase in the predatory
life, since in order to accomplish it my companions and I adopted the
life of nomad hunters, carrying a bare ration and living by the chase,
killing caribou and sinking the carcases in the snow-fed lakes upon the
great plateau so as to secure a line of retreat.
During the last few years, since my first visit in 1903, a number of
books have been published dealing with the Labrador. These works have,
however, treated either of the coast or of the North and South course of
the George River, and I feel that, as almost from the day we left Nain
to the day on which we returned to it, we were on entirely unexplored
ground, this volume must introduce its readers to a new aspect of the
country.
The conditions we had to face while crossing the great plateau which lies
between the Atlantic and the George River were entirely unforeseen by
us, and such hardships as we endured on our march with packs across this
stony, mosquito-haunted desolation, were largely due to this fact.
No amount of forethought could have revealed what lay ahead of us, as
even at Nain local knowledge only extended to the Fraser lake-head behind
Nunaingoak Bay; and as soon as we left the Eskimo deer-hunters’ route,
we entered a tract of country which has probably remained untrodden by
white foot or red since the beginning of things. It is a difficult matter
to describe this menacing wilderness, lying 2,000 feet above sea-level,
swept by arctic winds, dotted with marshes and strewn with quartzite
boulders of the most ancient of all formations. I have tried with all too
small a skill to bring some pictures of this abomination of desolation
before the reader’s eye.
It would be quite absurd, however, to judge the whole country by
the conditions which prevail upon the high plateau. Recently great
interest has been taken in the pulp industry of Labrador, for which a
brilliant future is prophesied. In the southern half of the country and
in some river valleys these forecasts may materialise; but it should
be remembered that in central Labrador thousands of square miles show
nothing but patches of dwarf birch, few and far between, of which the
stems are no more than finger-thick, hardly substantial enough to boil a
kettle.
The death, by starvation, of Leonidas Hubbard has given the interior
of the Labrador a bad name which has not been removed by the fine
journeys of Mr. and Mrs. Tasker, Mrs. Hubbard, Mr. Wallace and Mr.
Cabot. Hubbard’s objective was our own—Indian House Lake; his plan to
reach it by way of Hamilton Inlet, the Nascaupee and George Rivers—a
route afterwards successfully traversed by Mrs. Hubbard and by Dillon
Wallace—was entirely different. As is well known, he and his party went
up the Susan River, and after many disasters were forced to turn back. On
the retreat, in spite of the efforts of his companions, Hubbard died of
starvation. I do not think that some of the more critical of geographers
yet appreciate the remorseless ill-luck that pursued Hubbard. I can only
say this. Everyday that Gathorne-Hardy and I spent in battling with
Labrador nature, increased our respect and admiration for Hubbard. Luck
was with us as it was against him, and in wilderness travel it is a
truism to say that luck decides the issue.
One of the main interests of our journey lay, I think, in the fact that
we adopted as nearly as might be the methods of the Indians. It has
been said and written again and again that to travel with the speed
and lightness of an Indian is beyond the powers of the white, and is a
certain road to disaster. We did not find it so. Of course, had we failed
to kill the final caribou we should in another day have found ourselves
empty-handed in the heart of a country “where many have starved.”
Even then I fancy that with rod and rifle we would have won our way
out without much hardship. As it was, with the venison to keep up our
strength, we rivalled, if we did not actually surpass, the average speed
of Indian travel. On August 30th, at eight in the morning, we left our
camp on the George, and by September 10th, at four in the afternoon,
we were at Nain. Of these eleven days, a whole one was spent in relay
packing, and on three occasions repairs to boots and other wilderness
exigencies only allowed us half-a-day’s march. In addition to the
ordinary work of camping and breaking camp, we _cached_ our canoe against
the winter on the uplands. Nor did we abandon any of our outfit on the
journey, and never at any time did our packs average under 50 lbs. in
weight. As we had to find our way (for the Indians’ single line to the
coast is well known to them) and so went many miles out of our course,
I think it may fairly be inferred that white men can attain results
in wilderness travel which will bear some kind of comparison with the
achievements of the red.
My thanks are due to my friend and companion, Geoffrey Gathorne-Hardy
for his chapter on Fishing, for the map illustrating our route, for many
of the photographs, and, most of all, for the intangible daily help
which comes under the head of good comradeship. To Captain Jackson for
much valuable assistance, for he spared no trouble on our behalf; I am
indebted to Mr. Schmitt of the Moravian Brethren for some excellent
photographs, also to the Rev. Mr. Lenz and Rev. Mr. Perrett, also to the
parent Moravian Mission for kindly lending me several others, and to all
whom we met for the efforts made on every occasion to forward the object
of our trip.
I thank Lady Helen Graham for the spirited frontispiece she has
contributed to my book. More than all, I wish to acknowledge my
indebtedness to my mother for her interesting contribution on the
inner life of the Moravian Mission and the Eskimo attached to their
settlements. She spent a summer and early autumn among them at Hopedale
and Nain, and, naturally, a woman’s testimony upon and her viewpoint with
regard to places so remote and an existence so remarkable are doubly
valuable.
Lastly, I should like to point out that, although we had excellent
opportunities for promiscuous nomenclature, the map of our route is
not disfigured by Hardy Lake or Prichard River or Sister-in-law Emmy’s
Mountain. Of late years some _poseurs_ have been busy ‘discovering’
geographical features (sometimes even in districts well known to local
guides) and labelling them with their own names. The Royal Geographical
Society has protested strongly against this absurd practice, and it is
really time that such antics were killed with laughter.
H. HESKETH PRICHARD.
PRAE WOOD, ST. ALBANS. _7th July, 1911._
CHAPTER I.
THE LABRADOR.
Legend has it that in the year 986 Bjarni Herjulfson sailed back from
his voyagings to Iceland, desiring to spend Yuletide at his home. But
on arrival he found that his father was absent, having taken ship for
Greenland in the company of Eric the Red. Bjarni decided to follow the
adventurers. He fell in with fog and ill-weather, drifted through it for
many days almost in the dark, and at length ran out into clear air to see
the sun shining upon an unknown and wooded land. Bjarni turned northwards
and skirted the coasts; presently the low shores with their forests gave
place to mountains and glaciers; then a fair wind arose and the Norse
sea-king swept back across the Atlantic in safety. Such is the tradition
of the discovery of Labrador. More than nine hundred years have passed
since the visit of the Viking ship, and to-day the country lying just
behind the coast-line remains to a large extent as unknown and unexplored
as it was then.
If you take a map and draw a line due west from Glasgow, the line, after
passing across two thousand miles of the Atlantic Ocean, will strike the
coast of the Labrador peninsula. Carry on that line some fifty or even
thirty miles inland and it will enter upon absolutely virgin country.
There are few large areas less known to geographers than this, and it is
a curious fact that such a tract should exist under the British flag,
within a comparatively short distance from our shores, and moreover
situated actually next door to our oldest colony of Newfoundland. The
great Atlantic liners would cover the distance that separates us from
Labrador in a little over three days, but as a matter of fact only two
vessels set sail regularly from England for that chilly region,—the
_Pelican_ of the Hudson’s Bay Company, and the _Harmony_ belonging to the
Mission of the Moravian Brethren; it was by the latter that my companions
and I travelled.
The differences of climate between the West of Scotland and the land
which directly faces it across the sea are enormous, for while we
possess the genial warmth brought from the tropics by the Gulf Stream,
the Labrador is frozen for the greater part of the year owing to the
influence of the mighty current that sweeps down its coasts from the
Pole. It is only possible to approach the shores of the peninsula
during five months of the year. She enjoys open water from July to late
November, and her summer lasts no more than two brief months. Frost
continues till the end of June and begins again on the inland heights
during the closing days of August; thus the deer shot in November keep as
in a refrigerator till the following June.
The intrinsic interests of the Labrador settle, in the first place, round
its people, who almost without exception are for ever locked, with the
shortest of breathing-spaces, in a death-struggle with Nature.
The main endeavour of life is the effort to secure a bare subsistence by
the capture or slaughter of things on the earth “or in the waters under
the earth.” Thus the folk of the Labrador are entirely predatory people.
[Illustration: Spring.]
[Illustration: Summer.]
The settlements on the coast are few and far between and the country has
always shown herself a bitter stepmother to those who entrust themselves
to her keeping. These are, as I have said above, with scarcely an
exception, hunters and fishers, against whom land and sea combine. The
rigours of cold and hardship bear upon them without mercy. As the Emperor
Caligula spoke of the sea as a tyrant, so once I heard a settler speak
of the Labrador as of a woman. “Terrible hard and cruel she is.” And the
words brought before the mind’s eye the seemingly endless leagues of
that vast unmapped interior—a vista of snow, cloud, wind and cold during
winter; of scorching Northern sunshine in summer, that hatches out into
their malignant life myriads of flies for the torture of all things
living; of rushing rock-rent rivers and of barrens rolling ever upward to
the Height of Land.
Were it not that Labrador, the stepmother, is cruel to her own children,
the Indians of the barren-grounds and the Eskimo of the coast, one might
be tempted to believe that the white men who set foot on her shores are
still pursued by her vengeance, still paying the inexorable penalty for
the great crime of which the first navigators of white race were guilty.
At that date the traffic in humanity had reached terrible dimensions, and
one of the earliest adventurers to Labrador, the Portuguese Corte Real,
decoyed aboard his vessel some three-score natives, whether Indians or of
some other race is a moot-point, and sent them to Lisbon. Their arrival
caused much satisfaction, for the King and his Court at once leaped to
the conclusion that Corte Real had discovered a land of great resources
in the north—a second Africa whence they might draw brown slaves instead
of black. But to the Court of Portugal, Labrador supplied no more
slaves, for on a subsequent voyage Corte Real was lost, or rather he and
his ship were never heard of again; nor did his brother, who went in
quest of him, ever come back from that mist-hidden shore.
The present population of Labrador falls naturally into four divisions.
The first is the permanent white community, which includes the Moravian
Brethren and their families, the Hudson’s Bay Company’s factors, and the
_liveyeres_ (live heres) as the white settlers are called. These all
dwell by the salt water.
The second division is made up of the men belonging to the
fishing-fleets, who are summer visitors only, coming up through the ice
from Newfoundland and the south in the early days of July and leaving in
October. The lives of these men are hard and stern, and in them again
we find the predatory record. From the day on which they put out from
Newfoundland in their schooners to that on which they return, they toil
savagely, catching and curing fish, living meanwhile in wooden shanties
on the barren wind-swept islands or on the shores of lonely inlets.
Captain Bartlett sprang from this hardy stock, and he proved the fine
qualities of his training by his pioneer work with Peary.
Nor must it fail to be understood that every voyage taken to the Labrador
is in a sense a stake in the huge sea-game or gamble for existence, for
95 per cent. of the schooner crews are hired for the season on the share
system by the captains of the fishing stations. The same system holds
good in the seal-fishery, where from master to boy, each individual
aboard draws, instead of pay, a certain defined and allotted share in the
profits (if any) of the venture. Some hint of the chances of this life
may be gathered from a newspaper extract, dated May 3rd, 1910. Under the
head “Newfoundland Fishery” comes the following:—
“The seal fishery ended last Saturday and the remainder of the fleet are
returning to-day. The _Adventure_, which arrived this morning, narrowly
escaped being lost with all hands in Belle-isle Straits on Friday last.
The steamer _Aurora_, which was the subject of a sensational report in
the Press last week, namely, that she had struck an iceberg and had sunk
with the whole of the crew, has passed Cape Bonavista to-day, looking
deeply laden, having probably secured a large catch of seals in Northern
Labrador.”
[Illustration: Autumn.]
[Illustration: Winter.]
If the _Aurora_ was so lucky as above reported, her captain stood to
make a comfortable sum, and each of her crew their share in proportion.
But the other side of the picture is dark enough. When there comes a
failure in the year’s fisheries of seal or cod, it means that months of
labour and hardship have been spent for which no return can be found, and
the _personnel_ of such unlucky vessels must depend for their winter’s
provision upon an advance from some merchant, who looks to recoup himself
from the result of the next or a future season’s success. At one period
it would hardly be an exaggeration to say that many of the fishermen were
born, lived and died in almost hopeless debt; but the present generation
has seen a great improvement in this respect.
As first come is ever first served along the Labrador coast, the
schooners, in their haste to arrive early on the fishing grounds, run
many risks in passing through the ice, which clings to these inhospitable
shores until late into the summer, yet accidents are remarkably few. For
one reason the sealers and cod-fishers are wonderful sailors, their local
knowledge has been won in small boats, so that they know the position,
depth and contour of almost every reef; for another reason the coast is
fortunately well provided with harbours. They are fine men, these “slaves
of the sea.” Yet they are but summer migrants, they never penetrate the
interior or pass beyond sight of sea-water, and, after all, the chief
interest of this forbidding land lies with those who remain when the days
are dark and snow and ice cover land and sea alike.
With the third division we reach the real children of the coast, the
Eskimo tribes. All along the eastern littoral, from Makkovik northwards,
they exist, cared for and preserved by the Moravian Brethren, whose wise
policy it is to encourage them to live as nearly as possible on the lines
that Nature intended. The Moravians have done a great and heroic work, to
which I have tried to bear witness in the latter part of this book.
The Eskimo are altogether predatory, a race of hunters and fishers. Fish
in the summer, fur in the winter, and seal, walrus and white whale are
their quarry from one year’s end to another. In the early springtime
also, while ice still holds the land iron-bound, they make long journeys
by _komatik_, or dog-sledge, after the herds of Barren-ground caribou,
the branch of the vast reindeer family which inhabits the barren uplands
of North and Central Labrador.
[Illustration: A Nascaupee Indian of the Barren Grounds.]
Now we are left with the fourth, the Indians of the interior. Their
numbers were, some time ago, computed to be four thousand in all, but
the large majority of these hunt and trap in the southern part of the
peninsula, massing at various points, and coming out with their furs
to the waters of the St. Lawrence. More to the north, in the central
country are the lodges of two tribes, the Montagnais and the Nascaupees.
Here we find the dominant instinct of Labrador, the predatory instinct,
at its fullest development. These tribes owe their food, clothing and
their habitations to the creatures of the chase, and they live a life of
hardship and freedom such as was more common in the world of a hundred
years ago.
Horses and cattle there are none on the peninsula, except at Hamilton
Inlet, but all along the coast, at every Eskimo encampment and about the
cabins of the _liveyeres_, are numbers of husky dogs. In winter these
animals pull the sledges and form the sole means of communication between
the settlements. During the summer they are in many cases not fed by
their owners, but are left to seek sustenance as they can. Hence the
hungry brutes range the land near the coast and add to the problems of
Labrador, as they permit no creature to live that they can pull down.
Unfortunately the brief delicious summer of Labrador is rendered
terrible—I use the word advisedly—by flies of many kinds; the mosquito,
the black-fly, the bot-fly and others rise in countless swarms over the
wilderness and harass the traveller by day and by night.
The term “barrens” must now be explained. It is the name given to the
vast terraces which roll from salt water to salt water across the plateau
of the interior. In some parts of the country their monotony is broken
by groups of wind-torn trees which grow upon the shores of unnumbered
lakes and beside the waters of shallow rivers. No portion of the King’s
dominions is wilder, more inhospitable, more rugged than this land,
where the wind for ever cries and the air is filled with the sound of
upland waters lapping on stony shores.
It may be asked why any human being should wish to visit such a
wilderness as the interior. The answer is that there a man can enjoy
the true life of the open, because the land has a charm all its own;
perhaps because there is a faint feeling that in some such surroundings
our fore-fathers lived out their lives; there are, in fact, many reasons
cogent enough, for the Labrador has many very definite attractions. Her
climate is vitalising to an extraordinary degree, and the atmosphere
brilliant and clear in the summer, during which there is not usually much
rain and the dense fogs which trouble the coast further south do not in
most seasons extend to the north.
As to the scenery of the coast, nothing can well be imagined of its
grandeur and impressiveness. As the ship moves along, sometimes between
the deep fringe of islands and the mainland, sometimes opening out upon
the vast distances of the Atlantic, the outlook changes with every
moment. Round each headland and rock some fresh grouping of mighty cliff,
deep water and iceberg greets the eye. As the degrees of latitude mount,
the precipices, ever rising, tower higher and higher until they reach an
altitude of four thousand feet sheer from the sea, dwarfing Norwegian
glories.