The ascent to the spot whence the approach of the ships can best be
descried is by no means so easily accomplished at Zoar as at Hopedale.
But the hour's stiff climb is richly rewarded by a magnificent
prospect. Our path lies first through the fir woods, then over a bare
plain on which tufts of beautiful and very variegated mosses alternate
with rocks and withered roots. This is evidently the site of a forest,
which at no very distant date has been killed by the terrible climate.
Up again through low thick brushwood and over great rocks, till at
last we reach the summit. Seaward we can see the course by which the
"Harmony" came in. Northward the eye ranges along the rugged coast
with its innumerable islands and deep fjords. Yonder sheet of water is
not an arm of the sea, but a great freshwater lake, long an object of
superstitious dread to the Eskimoes. Neither in summer or winter dared
they cross it, until their missionaries did so, for they believed a
monster dwelt in it, who could eat up the man and his kayak, or
sledge, dogs and driver. Inland one sees mountain after mountain,
whose wild slopes are traversed by no human foot unless the Nascopie
Indian, or "mountaineer," may pass that way in pursuit of the
reindeer. None of these natives of the great unknown interior have
visited our stations this year. In the Zoar bay beneath us the
"Harmony" is riding at anchor near the mission premises, and now we
can see the whole curve of the other great bay, which approaches Zoar
from the north. The "itiblek," as the Eskimoes call a low narrow neck
of land between two such arms of the sea, is but a few hundred yards
across. To the east of yonder waterfall is a level place on the shore
of the larger fjord, which was once thought of as a site for this
station. But it would have been too much exposed to the east wind.
What a different landscape this will be in winter, when all those
waterways among the islands are frozen! It must be very difficult even
for an Eskimo sledge driver to know his way through the snow-covered
labyrinth on so large a scale, indeed almost impossible when the
driving snow hides his landmarks. But He, to whom we are wont to
commend our travellers by land and sea, cares also for those who
traverse the ice-plains of Labrador, that they may serve Him or join
His people in worship. Not only our missionaries but the settlers have
often experienced His goodness in answer to prayer in moments of
perplexity or danger. It is indeed praiseworthy that, to gain a
blessing for their souls, the latter are willing to run the risks and
bear the expenses of a two or three days' sledge journey to the
stations, often in terrible cold. Sometimes their children are sorely
disappointed when the parents cannot venture to take them to the
Christmas or Easter Festival. Last Christmas Eve, two boys, aged
sixteen and fourteen, started from their home in Kamarsuk bay and
walked through deep snow to Zoar, which they reached after ten
laborious hours. English services are held for the settlers at this
station as well as at Hopedale, though they are more frequent at the
southern place owing to the visits of the crews from the Newfoundland
fishing schooners.