Le Petit Nord

A friend from the Hub of the Universe, in a somewhat supercilious manner, not long ago informed one of our local friends that his own home was hundreds of miles to the southward. "'Deed, sir, how does you manage to live so far off?" with a scarcely perceptible twinkle of one eye, was the answer.

If home is the spot on earth where one spends the larger part of one's prime, and where one's family comes into being, then for over a quarter of a century "Le Petit Nord" of this book has been my home. With the authors I share for it and its people the love which alone keeps us here. Necessity has compelled me to perform, however imperfectly, functions usually distributed amongst many and varied professions, and the resultant intimacy has become unusual. As, therefore, I read the amusing experiences herein narrated, I feel that the "other half," who know us not, will love us better even if we are not exactly as they. That is not our fault. They should not live "so far off."

The incidents told are all actual, but the name of every single person and place has been changed to afford any hypersensitive among the actors the protection which pseudonymity confers. We here who have been permitted a glimpse of these pages feel that we really owe the authors another debt beyond the love for the people to which they have testified by the more substantial offering of long and voluntary personal service.

WILFRED T. GRENFELL, M.D.

Labrador, 1919

ILLUSTRATIONS

AN AWFUL NIGHT FOR A SINNER Frontispiece

SAD SEASICK SOULS STREWN AROUND 20

THE HERRING OF HIGH ESTATE 29

"HAVE YOU A PLUG OF BACCY, SKIPPER?" 40

RHODA'S RANDY 42

TOPSY'S AMBITION IS TO BECOME LIKE A FAT PIG 53

TOPSY WAS CREEPING FROM BED TO BED WITH THE CARVING-KNIFE 54

THE PROPHET OF DOOM 59

ANANIAS HAS BROKEN YET ANOTHER WINDOW 61

NOT FAT, BUT FINE AND HEARTY 68

DELILAH BAWLING 70

MRS. UNCLE LIFE FOUND THE LEADER OF THE TEAM IN HER BED 92

"TEACHER, I HAVE A PAIN" 95

THE YOHO 100

THEY ATE THE ENTIRE BOOT 108

HE HAD TAKEN THE STRANGER IN 117

HE FROZE HIS TOE IN BED 127

A LONG WAY ON THE HEAVENWARD ROAD 131

THE SEVENTH SON 140

ITS ACTION WAS PROMPT AND POWERFUL 141

IT WAS HIS LAST BULLET 153

A PUFFIN GHETTO 180

THE BEAR BIT HIS LEG OFF 189

P.S. 199

From drawings by Dr. Grenfell

LE PETIT NORD

OR

ANNALS OF A LABRADOR HARBOUR

Off the Narrows, St. John's

June 10

DEAR JOAN

The Far North calls and I am on my way:-- There lies the port; the vessel puffs her sail. There gloom the dark broad seas. * * * * * The lights begin to twinkle from the rocks.

Why write as if I had taken a lifelong vow of separation from the British Isles and all things civilized, when after all it is only one short year out of my allotted span of life that I have promised to Mission work? Your steamer letter, with its Machiavellian arguments for returning immediately and directly from St. John's, was duly received. Of my unfitness for the work there is no possible doubt, no shadow of doubt whatever, and therein you and I are at one. But you will do me the justice to admit that I put very forcibly before those in charge of the Mission the delusion under which they were labouring; the responsibility now lies with them, and I "go to prove my soul." What awaits me I know not, but except when the mighty billows rocked me, not soothingly with gentle motion, but harshly and immoderately. I have never wavered in my decision; and even at such times it was to the bottom of Father Neptune that I aspired to travel rather than to the shores of "Merrie England."

The voyage so far has been uneventful, and we are now swaying luxuriously at anchor in a dense fog. This I believe is the usual welcome accorded to travellers to the island of Newfoundland. There is no chart for icebergs, and "growlers" are formidable opponents to encounter at any time. Therefore it behoves us to possess our souls in patience, and only to indulge at intervals in the right to grumble which is by virtue of tradition ours. We have already been here a day and a half, and we know not how much longer it will be before the curtain rises and the first act of the drama can begin.