TALES OF LABRADOR.

Hawera Star, Volume XLVII, 23 November 1927, Page 3

TALES OF LABRADOR.

AN ADVENTUROUS DOCTOR. DOGS ONCE SAVED HEM FROM DEATH. Stretching from Newfoundland to Greenland is a vast coastline, and within that country I have spent thirty-three adventurous years. Some of my adventures have been amusing, many exciting, and mot a few tinged with pathos, writes Sir Wilfred T. Grenfell (who was recently knighted by the King for liis fine service in Labrador), in ‘‘Pearson’s Weekly.” Those descendants of the hardy “British seamen who centuries ago crossed the Atlantic to Labrador win a meagre living from the sea. A man must do a man’s work and fight for liis living; and if he stops working he starves. When first 1 visited Labrador there was not a single doctor on the coast — and the condition in many cases were pitiable. To-day the visitor to Labrador, I am thankful to say, would find hospitals and nursing stations up and down the coast and two orphanages for children made parentless by the hungry sea. A great obstacle to successful medical practice at first was the superstition of the fishermen. Even to-day they sometimes put more faith in a charm than in my skill! A burly fisherman once came abord my schooner and said —what his swollen jaw made obvious —that he had bad toothache!

Taking out my forceps, 1 found my arm in a grip of steel. “I’ll have none of them, doctor,” said the fisherman, ‘‘l want you to charm her.” I protested that this request was absurd and that in my case I did not know how to charm, but the fisherman was not to be put off. “Very well,” I said at last, “but you will have to pay my fee just as if L had pulled the tooth out.” Feeling very small, I touched the offending molar with my finger and muttered all the magic nonsense I could remember. The fisherman handed me my fee and said : “Thank you, doctor, all the pain has gone!” A month later I again met the fisherman. He greeted me with a smile, saying “Never had any pain.” Sure enough, although the tooth was still there, the inflammation had disaappeared! The courage and powers of endurance of these folks are amazing. With my yacht I once rescued two men who had been lost at sea for a fortnight. Although almost without food and clothing, they had rowed 400 miles, and when I asked them if they were hungry, they replied to my amazement: “Well, not over much.” By watching these men one can understand the fearless spirit of adventure that made the Elizabethan seadogs famous in every sea. Their descendants in Labrador to-day are not a whit less hardy. Some time ago two of our sailors battled in an open boat against mountainous seas for a week. When at last they struggled ashore they went on with their work, not thinking their adventure worth mentioning! My greatest adventure in Labrador started one Easter Sunday some years back, when I had .set out with my dogs in response to an urgent call for help. Thinking that it would save several miles, I cut across an icebound bay, only to find on reaching the centre that the ice was cracking jill round me. Presently I was drifting out to sea on a- small “ice pan,” and, afraid that I might become entangled in the traces of my “komatik,” or sleigh, I cut it loose. I realised that the little pan wouldi soon break up in the open sea, and decided to make for a bigger one nearby But between lay yards of icy water. Tying the reins round my dogs 1 made them swim to the pan, and en. jumping into the water, which was thick with snow, reached the haven.

There seemed little chance of my being rescued. I felt frozen to death after the swim, and I had to kill several of my faithful dogs, making blankets from their skins. Feeling that I should have a mast, I improvised one out of the poor beasts’ frozen legs and flew a tiny signal. Then cuddling into the furs, I dozed off. After twenty-four terrible hours I was rescued by some fishermen who saw me from the shore. Never was tea more welcome than that they pour-, cd down my throat! I must have been a ghastly "sight—blue with cold and covered with blood, but after a few days I was none the worse for my adventure. I mourned the loss of’ those noble dogs, and a bronze tablet in my ball tells how they gave their lives for mine. “Labrador belongs to the English. There is nothing of value in it,” was the description of an old historian. Well, that is not true now. There is in it a fine race of men as are to be found anywhere, with the seafaring genius of our race. Labrador has, in addition vast untouched wealth. Hei timber is already being eagerly sought >v paper-makers, and somewhere there probably lie vast deposits of gold, coal and iron. Only recently some falls much bigger tiian Niagara were discovered in the interior. They would light a million homes. I think it safe in saying that Labrador is a corner of tlie British Empire with a great future. To conclude, I have enjoyed every hour of my years in the country.