Grenfell: Knight-Errant of the North

Almost under the windows of Dr. Grenfell's hospital at Battle Harbor two men started with sled and dogs to get fire-wood. They were rounding a headland, when the sled went into the water, taking not merely the dogs but the drivers with it. One man got under the ice, and was seen no more. The other clung to the edge of the ice, too weak to crawl out.

His sister saw what happened, and came running over the ice. Men further away who were bringing a boat shouted to her: "For God's sake, don't go near the hole." She did not heed their warning. Instead, she threw herself flat, so as to distribute her weight, and dragged herself along till she was close enough to reach her brother's hand.

She could not quite pull him out. He was so benumbed that he could not help in the rescue. She lifted his body part way over the edge of the ice-sheet and held on.

Nearer and nearer the boat came with the rescuers shouting encouragement. "We're a-comin', girl.' Don't let go!" Her strength was almost gone. But she was bound to be faithful unto death—if the sea claimed her brother it must take her too.

She did not cry out. She wasted no energy in words upon the frosty air. The boat seemed ages in coming, though the rowers plied the oars with might and main.

One of her legs had broken through the ice. At any instant she might find herself struggling in the sea, and her agony of effort would have been in vain.

At what seemed the last second of the last moment for the pair, the brawny arms of the fishermen hauled them over the gunwale.

She told the story simply, and as though it were all in the day's work.

"What made you go on?" Grenfell asked her.

"I couldn't see him drown, could I?" was all her reply.

XII

WHEN THE BIG FISH "STRIKE IN"

"Doctor, how do you catch the codfish? Do you use a hook and line, the same as father and I do when we go fishing in Long Island Sound?"

The speaker was a New York boy who hadn't been north of Boston, until one summer his father let him go to St. John's for the sea-trip. There by great good luck he ran into the Doctor, who had come from St. Anthony in his little steamer the Strathcona.

"You can catch codfish with a hook and line," explained the Doctor, "but it would take too long for the fishermen who have to get their living from the sea.

"Most of the time they use a great big net, called a 'cod-trap.'

"It's like a room of network without a roof. It has a door, and the cod are steered in at the door by another net which reaches from the cod-trap to the rocks."

"I should think the whole business would float away out to sea the minute it got the least bit rough," said Harry.

"It might," the Doctor admitted. "But you see they have heavy anchors, or they tie big stones to the net at the bottom to hold it down."

"I'd love to see those cod coming in!" exclaimed Harry. "They must push and shove like anything. But what do they want to go in for? I s'pose o' course they must use some kind of bait."

"They use the squid, or octopus," said the Doctor.

"Are those the funny things that wave their arms around and throw out ink when they get mad?" asked Harry.

"Yes."

"Are they very big?"

"They come in all sizes. There's even such a thing as a giant squid. For a long time people laughed at the idea that there was any such monster. They thought he was a myth, like the sea-serpent.

"But one day two fishermen were plying their trade when two great arms rose out of the sea and clasped their boat and tried to drag it under.

"Luckily, they had a big knife, and they hacked away at the arms till they cut them off.

"The cuttlefish—that's another name for it—made the sea about them as black as tar. But it did not try again.

"They took the arms ashore, and sold them to a man named Dr. Harvey. Everybody had been making fun of Dr. Harvey because he said there was such a thing as the giant squid.

"The Doctor hated strong drink, and so the clerks at the store of Job Brothers here in St. John's were very much surprised when Dr. Harvey rushed in and shouted: 'I want a barrel of rum!'

"Then he told them what he wanted it for—he wanted to send the giant squid to the Royal Society in London. The parts of the arms cut off were nineteen feet long.

"Later on, somebody who heard about it brought him an octopus that was lying dead on the water, whose reach was forty feet from tip to tip."

"How do they catch the octopus for bait?" asked Harry.

"It's exciting work. You see, besides having arms like a windmill, with curious sucking saucers on them, the octopus has a beak like a parrot, with awful teeth, and it can bite like anything.

"You'll see a cluster of rowboats anchored close together, and the fishermen are jigging up and down a little bright red leaden weight, bristling with spikes.

"Suddenly there's a stir. The squids have come rushing in, and they bite at those jiggers like a terrier after a rat.

"When the squids get those spiked weights in their mouths and are being hauled aboard—look out!

"All of a sudden—just the way people squirt things in the movies—they shoot out jets of ink at the fishermen.

"It stings like anything if it gets into your eyes and it ruins your clothes."

"How much do the squid cost when you buy them for bait?" asked Harry, who had a practical mind.

"Fifteen or twenty cents a hundred for the little ones."

"That isn't much for all that work," said Harry.

Dr. Grenfell smiled. "You'll find that the fishermen do lots of hard work for very little pay, Harry," he answered.

"What other kind of bait do they use for the cod?"

"Caplin—a small fish like a sardine—and herring. Sand eels and white-fish sometimes. Bits of sea-gulls, and even rubber fish with hooks. Mussels don't hold well on the hooks."

Harry looked thoughtful. "I suppose it makes a lot o' difference, having just the right kind o' bait."

"All the difference in the world," the Doctor agreed. "If a man can't please the fish, he might as well burn his nets and boats and leave the sea.—But I was telling you about the cod-traps.

"While the fish are following their leader, like so many sheep, in at the door of the trap, along comes the man they call the trap-master. He has a tube with plain glass in the bottom, and he puts it down over the side of the boat and looks through it to see if the trap is full.

"When he thinks it's full enough, the door is pulled up so the fish can't get out, and the floor of the trap is hauled to the surface.

"As it is lifted, a big dipper is put in, and the fish are ladled into the boat.

"When the boat is full, the rest of the fish are put into big net bags. These are tied to buoys, so the fishermen may come back later and get them."

"I suppose the fishermen like to pick out the best places," said Harry.

"Yes—there's a mad race on the day the season opens. You've got to get your cod-trap anchored in four days, with the net that leads from the shore put in place: and it's a big job to do it in that time.

"Then there's what they call the cod-seine. That's worked by seven men. The seine-master, fish-glass in hand, stands in the bow: and the minute he sights the school of fish he gives orders for the nets to be dropped.

"The men row in a circle and return to a buoy, paying out the net as they go.

"The bottom rope is weighted, and they gather it round a central anchor into a bag as they row. It's not so easy as it sounds, but 'practice makes perfect.' When they've got the fish bagged in this way they may scoop them up whenever they like.

"Other kinds of nets, as well as lines, are used.

"While those who use the lines generally take great pains to put on them the bait they think Mr. and Mrs. Cod will like, some fishermen make the others very angry by 'jigging' with unbaited hooks.

"This means that two hooks, joined back to back with a bit of lead that sinks them, are dropped where the fish are most thickly crowded.

"Then the line is jerked up and down. Half a dozen fish may be hurt for one that is hooked."

"What becomes of the one that gets hurt?" asked Harry.

"Oh, the rest of the cod rush at the poor fellow and eat him up!"

"They're not good sports!" was the boy's comment. "Neither are the fishermen that hurt the fish without catching them. That's like hunters that shoot more animals than they can use for food. But I suppose fishing just for fun is a very different thing from fishing to make a living."

Dr. Grenfell's blue eyes were very serious. "It is," he said. "You have to go out with the fishermen to understand the difference."

XIII

BIRDS OF MANY A FEATHER

Harry had seen and heard many kinds of birds alongshore, of all sizes and colors, some flying in curious ways and some making very queer sounds, so he asked the Doctor to tell him about them.

"The Labrador coast is one of the finest bird-nurseries anywhere," said the Doctor. "You can find about two hundred different kinds—if your eyes are sharp enough and your patience—and your shoes—hold out!

"Of course they don't all live there the year round. Some of them are just summer boarders.

"Maybe in a very lonely spot you'll hear a bird all by himself, with a very sweet song—the hermit thrush.

"Perhaps there will be a chorus of pipits, fox and white-throated sparrows, robins, warblers and buntings.

"You might even come upon a Nashville warbler or a Maryland yellow-throat!

"If eggs are collected in Labrador, the contents aren't wasted.

"You bore a hole in the side of the egg, put in a blowpipe with a rubber bulb, and force the contents into a frying-pan. You can make fine omelet from the eggs of eiders, gulls, puffins and cormorants. Or you can mix flour with the eggs, add salt and butter, and make a nice pancake browned on both sides.

"It tastes rather fishy, of course, but it's very filling, and when you come in after a long, hard run behind the dogs, or soaked to the skin from a boat-ride, it certainly is fine to fill up on cormorant omelet while you pleasantly roast yourself before the leaping flames of a driftwood bonfire.

"A Labrador baby thinks that a gull's egg is as good as a stick of candy.

"Puffins are lots of fun. You've read about the penguins in the Antarctic, where they have almost no other animals—how the penguins dive and swim and carry stones about, looking like solemn old gentlemen at a club in their dress suits. Well, the puffins are to Labrador what penguins are to the South Pole country.

"Their burrows are two or three feet long, and the mother sits on a single dirty white egg in a straw nest. The birds have red, parrot-like bills, and they have pale grey faces with markings that make them look as if they were wearing spectacles.

"Their bodies are chunky, and they shuffle about very clumsily. They don't like it a bit when people come where they have their nests.

"But the razor-billed auk doesn't make any nest—it just lays its egg on the bare rock in the biting cold. There are very few auks left to-day, but there were lots of them when Audubon the naturalist visited Labrador ninety years ago. Audubon tells how a band of 'eggers' started out just like pirates.

"All they cared about was to plunder every nest.

"They went sneaking along from cove to cove, turning in sometimes at the little caves or finding shelter in an angle of the rocks when the sea ran too high.

"While they were waiting they would fight and swear and drink. It's a wonder that the eggers didn't get drowned oftener, for their boats would be mended with strips of sealskin and the sails were patched like an old suit, and it looked as if a puff of wind would blow them over.

"These eggers got out of their sailing ship into a rowboat they towed, so as to go to an island of sea-pigeons, or guillemots—because they couldn't get near enough in the larger vessel.

"As they came to the rocks, the birds rose up in a screaming white cloud. The air was full of them, just as you've seen the gulls creaking and crying about the hull of an ocean steamer, hoping to pick up food thrown overboard.

"But the mother birds stuck faithfully to the nests. It was the fathers and brothers that rose up in the air and made the noisy fuss.

"All of a sudden—bang! the eggers discharged their guns in a volley right into the middle of the wheeling, screaming cloud of feathers overhead.

"Some fell into the water, and the rest in terror flew about not knowing where to go or what to do.

"The eggers picked up the birds that lay in rumpled, bloody heaps on the water. They made toothsome pies, and what they couldn't eat they left behind. They didn't care how many birds they killed, because there were plenty left.

"They weren't shooting just for food—they were shooting mostly for fun. As they trampled about the island they crushed with their heavy boots more eggs than they picked up.

"No one would have blamed hungry men for killing enough birds and taking enough eggs to supply their families. But the eggers saw red, and just went on shooting and trampling without excuse.

"Years of that kind of thing turned many an island into a graveyard.

"Well, when they had gathered some eggs and smashed the rest, they picked up the dead birds they wanted and carried them back to the boat.

"They jerked off the feathers and broiled the sea-pigeons. Then they brought out big, black bottles of rum to take away the oily, fishy flavor, and filled themselves with strong drink and bird-flesh.

"They fell asleep, snoring drunk, and dawn found them piled about the deck helplessly.

"But when they got back to the island from which they started on their journey, they found that rivals had landed there, and were killing birds which they looked on as their own.

"There was a fight at once.

"The men who were coming back home fired a volley and then took their guns as if they were clubs and rushed toward their enemies.

"Then, man to man, they fought like wild beasts. One man was carried to the boat with his skull fractured: another limped off with a bullet in his leg: a third was feeling his jaw to learn how many of his teeth had been driven through a hole in his cheek.

"So they fought till they tired of it, and then they pulled out the rum-bottles, and drank themselves into forgetfulness of their fierce battle.

"With the next morning came a hundred honest fishermen who wanted nothing more from the islands than the birds and the eggs they actually needed for their hungry wives and little ones at home.

"They had been eating salt meat for months: scurvy had broken out, and they wanted a change of diet.

"But the pirate eggers were bound they shouldn't have it. The fishermen brought no guns: they weren't looking for trouble: they were taken by surprise when the eggers rushed down on them like tigers roused from their lairs.

"One of the eggers, who had not slept off the effects of the carousal of the night before, shot one of the fishermen. Then the fishermen, who outnumbered the eggers about ten to one, gave the latter the beating of their lives. Fortunately, the fisherman who had been shot was not killed.

"That was the sort of thing that happened again and again in the bad old days.

"No wonder Audubon, as a great lover of birds, was very angry at these men who were making it impossible for birds to make their homes and lay their eggs and raise their families on the Labrador. They could have had all they wanted to eat without exterminating the birds, and never giving a thought to anybody who might come after them.

"The fishermen still, in many places, out of sight and reach of any law, take all the eggs and kill all the birds they can.

"But it's not so bad as it was in Audubon's time, when men from Halifax took about 40,000 eggs which they sold for twenty-five cents a dozen. Near Cape Whittle he found two men gathering murre's eggs. They were proud of the fact that they had collected 800 dozen and they didn't intend to stop till they had taken 2,000 dozen. The broken eggs made such a dreadful smell that it almost made him sick.

"The ivory gull, known as the 'ice partridge,' is sometimes caught by pouring seal's blood on the ice. The birds swoop down to get it, and are shot. Some actually kill themselves by striking the ice too hard when they land, for they are so eager to get the blood.

"Labrador is a good place to study the diving birds, which are of two kinds.

"There are those that use their feet alone under the water—and then there are those that use only their wings.

"The feet-users clap their wings close to their sides when they dive.

"The wing-users spread out their pinions before they strike the water. The puffin uses its wings under the water, and so do the other members of the auk family.

"In the duck family, there are both wing-swimmers and foot-swimmers. The ducks of the sorts known as old squaws, scoters and eiders fly under water. But the redheads and canvas-back ducks use only their feet under water. Mergansers dive with their wings against their sides, like a folded umbrella. The cormorants are famous swimmers, and use their feet alone. You know how the Chinese use cormorants as fish-catchers, putting rings about their necks to keep them from swallowing their prey.

"Among the birds classed as game-birds, the willow grouse are so easy to kill that a true sportsman doesn't take much pleasure in going after them.

"They are often caught with nooses on the end of a stick, while they roost in the trees, and a group in this position may be killed all at once, if shot from the bottom, so that the falling bird doesn't disturb the others.

"Cartwright, an early explorer, tells how he came upon a covey of six grouse and knocked off all their heads with his rifle.

"In winter, the willow grouse bury themselves in the snow, and the 'cock of the roost' is sentinel, keeping his head above the snow to watch for an enemy.

"The Canada goose, breeding about the lakes and ponds, is a grass-eater, and so tastes better than the fishy, oily gulls and divers. You can tame the goose and use it as a decoy. When a number are shot at a time, those that can't be used right away are hung outside the house. There they freeze, and are kept fresh all winter long.

"There couldn't be a better retriever for a duck-hunt than the Eskimo dog. I've watched them dash into the waves after a bird, only to be thrown back, bruised and winded, high up on the ledges of the rock.

"Then the return wave would drag them off, and pound them against the rocks. But the dogs would hang on for dear life, till their nails were torn away and their paws were bleeding.

"Even that wouldn't make them quit. They would return to the charge, and waiting for their chance they would jump right over the breaking crest and get clear of the surf.

"When they've once got hold of a duck, nothing will make them let go. I've often been tempted to jump in and give the brave fellows a hand, when it seemed as if they couldn't keep up the struggle any longer.

"They'd sink out of sight in a bigger wave than usual—and then, sure enough, you'd see the duck again, and the dog's head after it, still true to duty even in the jaws of death. For sometimes, in spite of all his pluck and cleverness, the dog is drowned."

XIV

BEASTS BIG AND LITTLE

Both on sea and land, Labrador animals have to be as tough as Labrador people to stand the hard life they must lead.

Dr. Grenfell tells of a seal family he saw killed on an ice-pan about half the size of a tennis-court.

They were surprised by four sealers, with wooden bats. Before they gave up their lives they put up a tremendous struggle. The father seal actually caught a club in his mouth and swung it from side to side with such violence that the sealers had to get off the pan.

But at last he was dealt such a blow on the head that it was supposed he was killed.

Instead of stripping off the pelt as the fallen monster lay on the pan, the sealers hoisted him aboard the steamer "unscalped." As he was being lifted over the rail—two thousand pounds of him—the strap broke, and back into the sea the huge carcass splashed.

The cold water revived him.

He swam back to the pan, which was marked by the blood stains of his slaughtered family—the mate with her young which he had fought so desperately to protect.

The pan stood about six feet out of the water. Yet the great animal managed to fling himself upon it.

The men, who had bread and tea to win for their families, could not afford to let him go.

They went back after him, and this time they did not trust to their wooden bats. They used a few of their precious cartridges and shot him. And then they "scalped" him on the spot, and hauled the skin over the rail.

It is painful to think of such a fate for the brave old warrior.

Just as the cod-traps are put out from the shore, frame nets are set for the seals along the beach where they are fairly sure to pass at certain times of the year. There is a capstan from which the doorway of the seal-trap may be closed with a few turns. The Doctor tells of one "liveyere" family that took nine hundred seals in this way: and three to four hundred is nothing unusual. One trapper named Jones was so successful at this business of trapping seals with the net that he became "purse-proud." From his land where there are no roads, he sent to Quebec for a carriage and horses, and then he had a road built on which he might parade them up and down to show his neighbors how rich he was. Then, for his dances o' winter nights, no local fiddler would serve, scraping and patting his foot on the floor. He hired a real musician from Canada, who remained all winter playing jigs and reels to a continuous round of feasts and merry-making. But, as the familiar saying goes, it is often only one generation from shirt-sleeves to shirt-sleeves. In his case, the grandchildren finally found themselves with less than the shirt-sleeves. They appealed to Dr. Grenfell, and he found some old clothes on the boat to save them from freezing.

The whale is really a land animal, which finally found the sea more amusing, and so took to "a roving, nautical life."

Since the legs were no longer useful, in the course of time they became wee things, and were enclosed in the thick, tough skin.

The "arms" were left outside, but they are nothing to boast of. They are not useful for swimming, but they help to balance the huge bulk, and mother whale seizes her baby with them when she takes alarm.

The eyes are tiny, for when a whale eats he is not particular.

It takes so many millions of little bits of creatures to give a whale a square meal, that if he misses a hundred thousand or so out of the side of his huge jaws, at the top of his narrow gullet, he need not worry. The whale never starves until he is stranded. Out of water he may continue to breathe for an hour or two—but he cannot eat.

"On a fine morning on the Labrador Coast," Dr. Grenfell tells us, "I have counted a dozen whales in a single school. Now and again a huge tail would emerge from the water and lash the surface with its full breadth, making a sound like the firing of a cannon, while the silence was otherwise broken only by the noise of their blowing, as they rolled lazily along on the surface."

The thresher whale is only about twenty feet long, but he is a fierce fellow—the pirate of the whale family, terrorizing the rest, and ready to tackle anything in sight.

He has a fin which shows where he is as he cruises along close to the surface. He readily eats other whales. Three threshers went after a big cow sperm whale and her enormous infant, in shallow water. First they killed the "calf." Then they chased the mother away, and came back and ate the young one.

In 1892 a huge sperm whale rammed the rocks near Battle Harbor, where Dr. Grenfell now has one of his hospitals.

The whale evidently wondered why the rocks didn't give way—for nearly everything else he encountered had collapsed when he butted into it. He lunged once too often, and was left high, if not dry, on the beach.

They towed him into the harbor, a prize eighty feet in length, and proceeded to pump the oil out of him. From the head one hundred and forty gallons were taken. This oil in the whale's head, which may be a third as big as his body, helps to float the great jawbones.