THE CHILDREN'S HOME
"What's that schooner bound South at this time of year for?" I asked
the skipper of a fishing vessel who had come aboard for treatment the
second summer I was on the coast.
"I guess, Doctor, that that's the Yankee what's been down North for a
load of Huskeymaws. What do they want with them when they gets them?"
"They'll put them in a cage and show them at ten cents a head. They're
taking them to the World's Fair in Chicago."
* * * * *
People of every sort crowded to see the popular Eskimo Encampment on
the Midway. The most taking attraction among the groups displayed was
a little boy, son of a Northern Chieftain, Kaiachououk by name; and
many a nickel was thrown into the ring that little Prince Pomiuk might
show his dexterity with the thirty-foot lash of his dog whip.
One man alone of all who came to stare at the little people from
far-off Labrador took a real interest in the child. It was the Rev.
C.C. Carpenter, who had spent many years of his life as a clergyman on
the Labrador coast. But one day Mr. Carpenter missed his little
friend. Pomiuk was found on a bed of sickness in his dark hut. An
injury to his thigh had led to the onset of an insidious hip disease.
The Exhibition closed soon after, and the Eskimos went north. But
Pomiuk was not forgotten, and Mr. Carpenter sent him letter after
letter, though he never received an answer. The first year the band
of Eskimos reached as far north as Ramah, but Pomiuk's increasing
sufferings made it impossible for them to take him farther that
season.
Meanwhile in June, 1895, we again steamed out through the Narrows of
St. John's Harbour, determined to push as far north as the farthest
white family. A dark foggy night in August found us at the entrance of
that marvellous gorge called Nakvak. We pushed our way cautiously in
some twenty miles from the entrance. Suddenly the watch sang out,
"Light on the starboard bow!" and the sound of our steamer whistle
echoed and reechoed in endless cadences between those mighty cliffs.
Three rifle shots answered us, soon a boat bumped our side, and a
hearty Englishman sprang over the rail.
It was George Ford, factor of the Hudson Bay Company at that post.
During the evening's talk he told me of a group of Eskimos still
farther up the fjord having with them a dying boy. Next day I had my
first glimpse of little Prince Pomiuk. We found him naked and haggard,
lying on the rocks beside the tiny "tubik."
The Eskimos were only too glad to be rid of the responsibility of the
sick lad, and, furthermore, he was "no good fishing." So the next day
saw us steaming south again, carrying with us the boy and his one
treasured possession--a letter from a clergyman at Andover,
Massachusetts. It contained a photograph, and when I showed it to
Pomiuk he said, "Me even love him."
A letter was sent to the address given, and some weeks later came back
an answer. "Keep him," it said. "He must never know cold and
loneliness again. I write for a certain magazine, and the children in
'The Corner' will become his guardians." Thus the "Corner Cot" was
founded, and occupied by the little Eskimo Prince for the brief
remainder of his life.
On my return the following summer the child's joyful laughter greeted
me as he said, "Me Gabriel Pomiuk now." A good Moravian Brother had
come along during the winter and christened the child by the name of
the angel of comfort.
In a sheltered corner of a little graveyard on the Labrador coast
rests the tiny body of this true prince. When he died the doctor in
charge of the hospital wrote me that the building seemed desolate
without his smiling, happy face and unselfish presence. The night that
he was buried the mysterious aurora lit up the vault of heaven. The
Innuits, children of the Northland, call it "the spirits of the dead
at play." But it seemed to us a shining symbol of the joy in the City
of the King that another young soldier had won his way home.
* * * * *
The Roman Catholic Church is undoubtedly correct in stating that the
first seven years of his life makes the child. Missions have always
emphasized the importance of the children from a purely propaganda
point of view. But our Children's Home was not begun for any such
reason. Like Topsy, "it just grow'd." I had been summoned to a lonely
headland, fifty miles from our hospital at Indian Harbour, to see a
very sick family. Among the spruce trees in a small hut lived a Scotch
salmon fisher, his wife and five little children. When we anchored off
the promontory we were surprised to receive no signs of welcome. When
we landed and entered the house we found the mother dead on the bed
and the father lying on the floor dying. Next morning we improvised
two coffins, contributed from the wardrobes of all hands enough black
material for a "seemly" funeral, and later, steaming up the bay to a
sandy stretch of land, buried the two parents with all the ceremonies
of the Church--and found ourselves left with five little mortals in
black sitting on the grave mound. We thought that we had done all that
could be expected of a doctor, but we now found the difference. It
looked as if God expected more. An uncle volunteered to assume one
little boy and we sailed away with the remainder of the children.
Having no place to keep them, we wrote to a friendly newspaper in New
England and advertised for foster parents. One person responded. A
young farmer's wife wrote: "I am just married to a farmer in the
country, and miss the chance to teach children in Sunday-School, or
even to get to church, it is so far away. I think that I can feed two
children for the Lord's sake. If you will send them along, I will see
that they do not want for anything." We shipped two, and began what
developed into our Children's Home with the balance of the stock.
We had everything to learn in the rearing of children, having had only
the hygienic side of their development to attend to previously. One of
the two which we kept turned out very well, becoming a fully trained
nurse. The other failed. Both of those who went to New England did
well, the superior discipline of their foster mother being no doubt
responsible. The following fall I made a special journey to see the
latter. It was a small farm on which they lived, and a little baby had
just arrived. Only high ideals could have persuaded the woman to
accept the added responsibility. The children were as bright and jolly
as possible.
Among the other functions which have fallen to my lot to perform is
the ungrateful task of unpaid magistrate, or justice of the peace. In
this capacity a little later I was called on to try a mother, who in a
Labrador village had become a widow and later married a man with six
children who refused to accept her three-year-old little girl. When I
happened along, the baby was living alone in the mother's old shack, a
mud-walled hut, and she or the neighbours went in and tended it as
they could. None of the few neighbours wanted permanently to assume
the added expense of the child, so dared not accept it temporarily. It
was sitting happily on the floor playing with a broken saucer when I
came in. It showed no fear of a stranger; indeed, it made most
friendly overtures. I had no right to send the new husband to jail. I
could not fine him, for he had no money. There was no jail in
Labrador, anyhow. My special constable was a very stout fisherman, a
family man, who proposed to nurse the child till I could get it to
some place where it could be properly looked after. When we steamed
away, we had the baby lashed into a swing cot. It became very rough,
and the baby, of course, crawled out and was found in the scuppers. It
did everything that it ought not to do, but which we knew that it
would. But we got it to the hospital at last and the nurse received it
right to her heart.
In various ways my family grew at an alarming rate, once the general
principle was established. On my early summer voyage to the east coast
of Labrador I found at Indian Harbour Hospital a little girl of four.
In the absence of her father, who was hunting, and while her mother
lay sick in bed, she had crawled out of the house and when found in
the snow had both legs badly frozen. They became gangrenous halfway to
the knee, and her father had been obliged to chop them both off. An
operation gave her good stumps; but what use was she in Labrador with
no legs? So she joined our family, and we gave her such good new limbs
that when I brought her into Government House at Halifax, where one
of our nurses had taken her to school temporarily, and she ran into
the room with two other little girls, the Governor could scarcely tell
which was our little cripple Kirkina.
The following fall as we left for the South our good friend, the chief
factor of the Hudson Bay Company, told me that on an island in the
large inlet known to us as Eskimo Bay a native family, both hungry and
naked, were living literally under the open sky. We promised to try
and find them and help them with some warm clothing.
Having steamed round the island and seen no signs of life, we were on
the point of leaving when a tiny smoke column betrayed the presence of
human life--and with my family-man mate we landed as a search party.
Against the face of a sheer rock a single sheet of light cotton duck
covered the abode of a woman with a nursing baby. They were the only
persons at home. The three boys and a father comprised the remainder
of the family. We soon found the two small boys. They were practically
stark naked, but fat as curlews, being full of wild berries with which
their bodies were stained bright blues and reds. They were a jolly
little couple, as unconcerned about their environment as Robinson
Crusoe after five years on his island. Soon the father came home. I
can see him still--the vacant brown face of a very feeble-minded
half-breed, ragged and tattered and almost bootless. He was carrying
an aged single-barrelled boy's gun in one hand and a belated sea-gull
in the other, which bird was destined for the entire evening meal of
the family. A half-wild-looking hobbledehoy boy of fifteen years also
joined the group.
It was just beginning to snow, a wet sleet. Eight months of winter
lay ahead. Yet not one of the family seemed to think a whit about that
which was vivid enough to the minds of the mate and myself. We sat
down for a regular pow-wow beside the fire sputtering in the open
room, from which thick smoke crept up the face of the rock, and hung
over us in a material but symbolic cloud. It was naturally cold. The
man began with a plea for some "clodin." We began with a plea for some
children. How many would he swap for a start in clothing and "tings
for his winter"? He picked out and gave us Jimmie. The soft-hearted
mate, on whose cheeks the tears were literally standing, grabbed
Jimmie--as the latter did his share of the gull. But we were not
satisfied. We had to have Willie. It was only when a breaking of
diplomatic relations altogether was threatened that Willie was
sacrificed on the altar of "tings." I forget the price, but I think
that we threw in an axe, which was one of the trifles which the father
lacked--and in this of all countries! The word was no sooner spoken
than our shellback again excelled himself. He pounced on Willie like a
hawk on its prey, and before the treaty was really concluded he was
off to our dory with a naked boy kicking violently in the vice of each
of his powerful arms. The grasping strength of our men, reared from
childhood to haul heavy strains and ponderous anchors, is phenomenal.
Whatever sins Labrador has been guilty of, Malthusianism is not in the
category. Nowhere are there larger families. Those of Quebec Labrador,
which is better known, are of almost world-wide fame. God is, to
Labrador thinking, the Giver of all children. Man's responsibility is
merely to do the best he can to find food and clothing for them. A man
can accomplish only so much. If these "gifts of God" suffer and are a
burden to others that is kismet. It is the animal philosophy and
makes women's lives on this coast terribly hard. The opportunity for
service along child-welfare lines is therefore not surprising from
this angle also.
One day, passing a group of islands, we anchored in a bight known as
Rogues' Roost. It so happened that a man who many years before had
shot off his right arm, and had followed up his incapacity with a
large family of dependants, had just died. Life cannot be expected to
last long in Labrador under those conditions. There were four
children, one being a big boy who could help out. The rest were
offered as a contribution to the Mission. A splendid Newfoundland
fisherman and his wife had a summer fishing station here, and with
that generous open-heartedness which is characteristic of our
seafarers, they were only too anxious to help. "Of course, she would
make clothing while I was North"--out of such odd garments as a
general collection produced. "She wouldn't think of letting them wear
it till I came along South, not she." She would "put them in the tub
as soon as she heard our whistle." When after the long summer's work
we landed and went up to her little house, three shining, red, naked
children were drying before a large stove, in which the last vestige
of connection with their past was contributing its quota of calories
toward the send-off. A few minutes later we were off to the ship with
as sweet a batch of jolly, black-haired, dark-eyed kiddies as one
could wish for. Our good friend could not keep back the tears as she
kissed them good-bye on deck. The boy has already put in three years
on the Western Front. The girls have both been educated, the elder
having had two years finishing at the Pratt Institute in New York.
A grimy note saying, "Please call in to Bird Island as you pass and
see the sick," brought me our next donation. "There be something wrong
with Mrs. B's twins, Doctor," greeted me on landing. "Seems as if they
was like kittens, and couldn't see yet a wink." It was only too true.
The little twin girls were born blind in both eyes. What could they do
in Labrador? Two more for our family without any question. After
leaving our Orphanage, these two went through the beautiful school for
the blind at Halifax, and are now able to make their own living in the
world.
So the roll swelled. Some came because they were orphans; some because
they were not. Thus, poor Sammy. The home from which he came was past
description. From the outside it looked like a tumble-down shed.
Inside there appeared to be but one room, which measured six by twelve
feet, and a small lean-to. The family consisted of father and mother
and three children. The eldest boy was about twelve, then came Sam,
and lastly a wee girl of five, with pretty curly fair hair, but very
thin and delicate-looking. She seemed to be half-starved and
thoroughly neglected. The father was a ne'er-do-well and the mother an
imbecile who has since died of tuberculosis. The filth inside was
awful. The house was built of logs, and the spaces in between them
were partly filled in with old rags and moss. The roof leaked. The
room seemed to be alive with vermin, as were also the whole family.
The two boys were simply clothed in a pair of men's trousers apiece
and a dilapidated pair of boots between them. The trousers they found
very hard to keep on and had to give them frequent hoists up. They
were both practically destitute of underclothing. To hide all
deficiencies, they each wore a woman's long jacket of the oldest style
possible and green with age, which reached down to their heels. Round
their waists they each wore a skin strap. They were stripped of their
rags, and made to scrub themselves in the stream and then indoors
before putting on their new clean clothes. Sammy and the little sister
joined the family.
One of our boys is from Cape Chidley itself; others come from as far
south and west as Bay of Islands in South Newfoundland. So many
erroneous opinions seem to persist regarding the difference between
Newfoundland and Labrador that I am constantly asked: "But why do you
have a Children's Home in Newfoundland? Can't the Newfoundlanders look
out for themselves and their dependent children?" As I have tried to
make clear in a previous chapter North and South Newfoundland should
be sharply differentiated as to wealth, education, climate, and
opportunity. Though for purposes of efficiency and economy the actual
building of the Home is situated in the north end of the northern
peninsula of Newfoundland, the children who make up the family are
drawn almost entirely from the Labrador side of the Straits; unless,
as is often the case, the poverty and destitution of a so-called
Newfoundland family on the south side of Belle Isle makes it
impossible to leave children under such conditions.
It is obvious that something had to be built to accommodate the
galaxy; and some one secured who understood the problem of running the
Home. She--how often it is "she"--was found in England, a volunteer by
the name of Miss Eleanor Storr. She was a true Christian lady and a
trained worker as well. The building during the years grew with the
family, so that it is really a wonder of odds and patches. The
generosity of one of our volunteers, Mr. Francis Sayre, the son-in-law
of President Wilson, doubled its capacity. But buildings that are made
of green wood, and grow like Topsy, are apt to end like
Topsy--turvy. Now we are straining every nerve to obtain a suitable
accommodation for the children. We sorely need a brick building,
economically laid out and easily kept warm, with separate wings for
girls and boys and a creche for babies. Miss Storr was obliged to
leave us, and now for over six years a splendid and unselfish English
lady, Miss Katie Spalding, has been helping to solve this most
important of all problems--the preparation of the next generation to
make their land and the world a more fit place in which to live. Miss
Spalding's contribution to this country has lain not only in her
influence on the children and her unceasing care of them, but she has
given her counsel and assistance in other problems of the Mission,
where also her judgment, experience, and wisdom have proven
invaluable.
[Illustration: INSIDE THE ORPHANAGE]
There is yet another side of the orphanage problem. We have been
obliged, due to the lack of any boarding-school, to accept bright
children from isolated homes so as to give them a chance in life. It
has been the truest of love messages to several. The children always
repay, whether the parents pay anything or not; and as so much of the
care of them is volunteer, and friends have assumed the expenses of a
number of the children, the budget has never been unduly heavy. They
do all their own work, and thanks to the inestimably valuable help of
the Needlework Guild of America through its Labrador branch, the
clothing item has been made possible. In summer we use neither boots
nor stockings for the children unless absolutely necessary. Our
harbour people still look on that practice askance; but ours are the
healthiest lot of children on the coast, and their brown bare legs and
tough, well-shaped feet are a great asset to their resistance to
tuberculosis, their arch-enemy, and no small addition to the
attraction of their merry faces and hatless heads.
Even though Gabriel, Prince Pomiuk, never lived within its walls, the
real beginning of the idea of our Children's Home was due to him; and
one feels sure that his spirit loves to visit the other little ones
who claim this lonely coast as their homeland also.
The one test for surgery which we allow in these days is its "end
results." Patients must not be advertised as cured till they have
survived the treatment many years. Surely that is man's as well as
God's test. Certainly it is the gauge of the outlay in child life.
What is the good of it all? Does it pay? In the gift of increasing joy
to us, in its obvious humanity and in its continuous inspiration, it
certainly does make the work of life here in every branch the better.
The solution of the problem of inducing the peace of God and the
Kingdom of God into our "parish" is most likely to be solved by wise
and persevering work among the children. For in them lies the hope of
the future of this country, and their true education and upbringing to
fit them for wise citizenship have been cruelly neglected in this
"outpost of Empire."
Another menace to the future welfare of the coast has been the lack of
careful instruction and suitable opportunities for the development,
physical, mental, and spiritual, of its girls. Without an educated and
enlightened womanhood, no country, no matter how favored by material
prosperity, can hope to take its place as a factor in the progress of
the world. In our orphanage and educational work we have tried to keep
these two ideas constantly before us, and to offer incentives to and
opportunities for useful life-work in whatever branch, from the
humblest to the highest, a child showed aptitude.
Through the vision, ability, and devotion of Miss Storr, Miss
Spalding, and their helpers, in training the characters as well as the
bodies of the children at the Home, and by the generous support of
friends of children elsewhere, we have been able to turn out each year
from its walls young men and women better fitted to cope with the
difficult problems of this environment, and to offer to its service
that best of all gifts--useful and consecrated personalities.