OUTPOST NURSE.

Ashburton Guardian, Volume 59, Issue 224, 5 July 1939, Page 8

OUTPOST NURSE.

WORK IN THE CANADIAN NORTH.

HUMANITY CALLS IN WINTER. ...The following message was transmitted, daring the nightly broadcast of news, to a wilderness post in Northern British Columbia recently:— “We have a message for Outpost Nurs.e Jean Bryant at Analiim Lake advising her that the Red Cross Society has decided to -establish a six-bed hospital at her post. Please arrange to get the necessary. logs out immediately. Following are. the dimensions, of the hospital.” Then' followed the specifications of' the proposed building. Radio was the only means of communication, as the little community was snowed in for the winter. Thus was. the ambition of a wilderness nurse realised. Miss Bryant, daughter of a pioneer rancher of the Northland, has been looking after the medical and dental needs of whites and Indians over a wide area.

Late in January, in the d,ead of winter, Nurse Bryant was severely frostbitten as a result of an errand of mercy to a ranch, 60 miles distant. An Indian runner brought word that a raficher was seriously ill. Though it was late in the evening she set out immediately. She made the nearest ranch that night, and was off early .in the morning, after relieving a boy if four troublesome teeth. Leading a pack horse, she arrived at her destination, to find the patient improved hut still weak. She remained until he was out of danger. Meantime she attended to a sick parade of Indians, who came in when they knew she was in the vicinity. ' As she set out on the return journey the wind rose and the temperature dropped. On the second day she ran into a blizzard that obliterated the trail. Her hosts, a rancher and his wife, had vainly tried to dissuade her from venturing forth. But an Indian had come in with word that the nurse was heeded for a maternity case. - Alternately riding and snow-shoeing, she kept on steadily. Everything ahead was s obscured by . whirling snow. She was; getting numb with cold. If she halted to build a fire at a wooded spot she might not be able to mount again. She carried on. .. Suddenly she perceived, running parallel with her, not fifty yards distant, a timber wolf. But the marauder had another scent; presently it joined a band that was trailing a moose. Mute evidence of a similar chase was forthcoming a mile further on, with the legs of a moose protruding from the snow. Night was already falling when she heal’d the welcome sound of Siwash dogs barking, and presently the soothing tones of an Indian, trapper urging her to dismount and come in. She put her feet in snow and rubbed the. frost bite out of them, and, after drinking hot coffee, pressed on. Two hours later she reached her destination, and assisted a lusty Indian boy into a troubled world.