Newfoundland and Labrador

“ Newfoundland is separated from the mainland of LABRADOR on the north by the Strait of Belle Isle, and from Cape Breton Island on the south by Cabot Strait. Labrador is an immense region on the continent, where the coast (except for the deep inlet of Melville Lake) soon rises into an elevated plateau 2000 feet in height, which is strewn with almost uncountable lakes, out of which rivers flow north, south, east, and west. On the north-east corner of Labrador there are mountains from 3000 to 4000 feet, overlooking the sea. ”

“ Since the close of the glacial epoch the coasts of Newfoundland and Labrador have risen hundreds of feet, but the rate of emergence has not been uniform. The old strand line, which stands at five hundred and seventy-five feet above tide at St. John's, Newfoundland, declines to two hundred and fifty feet near the northern point of Labrador.
THE GREAT LAKES is now under-going perceptible warping. Rivers enter the lakes from the south and west with sluggish currents and deep channels resembling the estuaries of drowned rivers; while those that enter from opposite directions are swift and shallow. ”

“ Yet you are not to think of Newfoundland in visions wholly of wind and snow and ice. Newfoundland is not an Arctic country by any means. Nor does the wind blow all the while; nor is the sea all the while in a turmoil. It is a lovely coast [312] after all; and the folk who live there are simple, self-respecting, cheerful—a lovable, admirable folk. ”

“ At this point, under the guidance of an old male who had followed the southward track before, they forsook the Labrador shore-line and headed fearlessly out across the strait till they reached the coast of Newfoundland. This coast they followed westward till they gained the Gulf of St. Lawrence, then, turning south, worked their way down the southwest coast of the great Island Province, past shores still basking in the amethystine light of Indian summer, through seas so teeming with fish that they began to grow lazy with fatness. ”

“ In 1763 the coast of Labrador, from Hudson’s Strait to the river St John opposite the west end of the island of Anticosti, was attached to the governorship of Newfoundland. The population in 1785 had increased to 10,000. During the wars between England and France which followed the French Revolution, Newfoundland attained great prosperity, as all competitors in the fisheries were swept from the seas, and the markets of Europe were exclusively in the hands of the merchants of the country. ”

“ The statistical returns may show a majority of our fishermen as "able to read and write"; but as a matter of fact the illiteracy and ignorance of North Newfoundland and Labrador is the greatest handicap in the lives of the people.
My first scholar came from North Labrador, long before we aspired to a school of our own. He was a lad of Scotch extraction and name, and came aboard the hospital ship one night, as she lay at anchor among some northern islands, with the request that we would take him up with us to some place where he could get an hour's schooling a day. ”

“ Its dependency, Labrador, an undefined strip of maritime territory, extends from Cape Chidley, where the Hudson's Straits begin in the north, to Blanc Sablon in the south, and includes the most easterly point of the mainland. The boundaries between Quebec and Labrador have been a matter of keen dispute. The inhabitants are for the most part Eskimos, engaged in fishing and hunting. There are no towns, but there are a few Moravian mission stations. ”

“ The fishery on the coast is still very important at the present day, and that of Newfoundland was certainly worked soon after the first discovery by the Cabots. The English traders may have acted as middlemen, buying from the fishermen and selling in England, as they did afterwards in Elizabeth’s time. The coast of Labrador is rugged and forbidding, but at the heads of the deep inlets the climate is milder and the conditions more suitable for Europeans. ”

“ The balance of the inhabitants of the country are white men of our own blood and religion—men of the sea and dear to the Anglo-Saxon heart.
During the past years it has been the experience of many of my colleagues, as well as myself, that as soon as one mentions the fact that part of our work is done on the north shore of Newfoundland, one's audience loses interest, and there arises the question: "But Newfoundland is a prosperous island. Why is it necessary to carry on a charitable enterprise there?" ”

“ The explorers sailed on westward, changing their course gradually to the north to follow the broad curve of the Atlantic coast of Newfoundland. Jutting headlands and outlying capes must have alternately appeared and disappeared on the western horizon. May 24, found the navigators off the entrance of Belle Isle. After four hundred years of maritime progress, the passage of the narrow strait that separates Newfoundland from Labrador remains still rough and dangerous, even for the great steel ships of to-day. ”

“ That the barren and frigid shores of Labrador, and the northern parts of Newfoundland, should have been characterised as a region subject to the divine curse, is not calculated to excite so much surprise, as the disposition with every considerable change of soil and verdure, to convert it into a land of oriental fruitfulness. ”

“ The British Colony of Newfoundland lies to the north of the Gulf of St. Lawrence and to the east of the Canadian Labrador. It is so situated that the inhabitants may not escape adventures. On the map, it looks bleak and far away and inhospitable—a lonely island, outlying in the stormy water of the Atlantic. Indeed, it is all that. The interior is a vast wilderness—a waste place. The folk are fishermen all. They live on the coast, in little harbours, remote, widely scattered, not connected by roads; communication is only by way of the sea. ”

“ Every summer some twenty thousand fishermen travel "down North" in schooners, as soon as ever the ice breaks sufficiently to allow them to get along. They are the "Labrador fishermen," and they come from South Newfoundland, from Nova Scotia, from Gloucester, and even Boston. Some Newfoundlanders take their families down and leave them in summer tilts on the land near the fishing grounds during the season. ”

“ The annexation of Labrador, affected by the proclamation of October 7th, 1763, added to the area and importance of the colony.
It would be unreasonable to look for religious enlightenment in the early history of Newfoundland. "Coelum non animum mutant qui trans mare currunt": there was little tolerance in the England of the eighteenth century, and even the New England settlers had shamed their faith by outrages on the Quakers. ”

“ Indeed, so well recognized is this peril of the Newfoundland Banks, where the Labrador current in the early spring and summer months floats southward its ghostly argosy of icy pinnacles detached from the polar ice caps, that the government hydrographic offices and the maritime exchanges spare no pains to collate and disseminate the latest bulletins on the subject. ”

“ The climate is much too severe for agriculture. Summer is very short, and plagued with mosquitoes. The rivers abound in salmon; the fox, marten, otter, and other animals are trapped for their fur; iron and labradorite are plentiful. The population is largely Eskimo, christianised by the Moravians. The name Labrador specially belongs to the region along the eastern coast, between Capes St. Louis and Chudleigh, presenting a barren front to the sea, precipitous, much indented, and fringed with rocky islands. This region is governed by Newfoundland; its chief industry is cod and herring fishing. ”

“ Indeed, their riches have been coveted by many countries, and more than one battle has been fought between nation and nation to gain possession of the famous “gold-mine of the Newfoundland fishery, richer than the famous treasures of Golconda and Peru.”
There are several kinds of fishing prosecuted by the fishermen of Newfoundland, but the cod is the most profitable to the Colony, as the catch is usually worth between seven and eight million dollars a year. The fishing-grounds are not confined to the Grand Banks; they stretch from the south along the east and west coasts as far as Labrador. ”

“ Indeed, Le Petit Nord and Labrador are so much alike in climate, people, and conditions that this part of the island is often designated locally as Labrador (never has it been my lot to see a more desolate, bleak, and barren spot) . The traveller who described Newfoundland as a country composed chiefly of ponds with a little land to divide them from the sea, at least cannot be impeached for unveracity. In this northern part even that little is rendered almost impenetrable in the summer-time by the thick under-brush, known as "tuckamore," and the formidable swarms of mosquitoes and black flies. ”

“ Moreover, the polar current, entering the mouth of the Straits of Belle Isle, makes this section of land more liable to summer frosts, with a far worse climate than the Labrador bays, and gardening is less remunerative. We puzzled our brains for some way to add to our earning capacities, some coöperative productive as well as distributive enterprise.
The poverty which I had witnessed in Canada Bay in North Newfoundland, some sixty miles south of St. Anthony Hospital, had left me very keen to do something for that district which might really offer a solution of the problem. ”

“ Its spring is late, its summer short, but the frost of winter is less severe than in many parts of our own Northern States and Territories. It is only 1665 miles distant from Ireland. It possesses a large trade with various countries, including Spain, Portugal, Italy, the West Indies, and the Brazils.
“The chief wealth of Newfoundland and of the Labrador coast is to be found in their extensive and inexhaustible fisheries, in which the other Provinces also partake. The future products of these, when properly developed by human ingenuity and industry, defy human calculation. ”

“ Though for purposes of efficiency and economy the actual building of the Home is situated in the north end of the northern peninsula of Newfoundland, the children who make up the family are drawn almost entirely from the Labrador side of the Straits; unless, as is often the case, the poverty and destitution of a so-called Newfoundland family on the south side of Belle Isle makes it impossible to leave children under such conditions. ”

“ Afterward describing Newfoundland out of Ribero, he puts an Island of St. John on the east coast near Belle Isle, [282] while in a corresponding position we see on Ribero’s map, as published by Kohl, the Island of “S. Juan.” [283] Mercator’s rare map of [74] 1538 [284] exhibits Newfoundland as circumnavigated, the southern part being composed of broken islands, named “Insule Corterealis.” Canada is “Baccalearum regio,” and North America is “Americæ,” or “Hispania major, capta anno 1530.” A strait, “Fretum arcticum,” runs north of Labrador to the Pacific. ”

“ It has visited Grand Falls and "Bowdoin Canyon;" has been bitten by black flies and mosquitoes which only Labrador can produce, both in point of quality and quantity; has wandered through the carriage roads (!) and gardens of Northwest River and Hopedale; has dug over, mapped and photographed the prehistoric Eskimo settlements that line the shores, to the north of Hamilton Inlet; has made itself thoroughly conversant with the great fishing industry that has made Labrador so valuable, to Newfoundland in particular, and to the codfish consuming world in general ”

“ All ashore in search of birds, plants, shells, and all the usual et ceteras attached to our vocations; but we all were driven on board soon, by a severe storm of wind and rain, showing that Newfoundland has its share of bad weather. Whilst on shore we found the country quite rich compared with Labrador, all the vegetable productions being much larger, more abundant, and finer. We saw a flock of House Swallows that had bred about the little village, now on their passage southwest, and all gay and singing. ”

“ The hills were white with snow when the ship came to Ungava. She had run on a reef in leaving Cartwright, her first port of call on the Labrador coast; her keel was ripped out from stem to stern, and for a month she had lain in dry dock for repairs at St. John's, Newfoundland. It was October 22nd when I said good-bye to my kind friends at the post and in ten days the Pelican landed us safe at Rigolette. ”

“ The boundaries have long been in dispute between Newfoundland and Canada, and the territory has several times changed hands. The Labrador coast was first discovered by the Northmen, in the tenth century. Cabot sailed along the coast in 1498, and Corte-Real in 1500. The interior remained practically unexplored till traversed by officers of the Hudson's Bay Company about 1840. There are a few posts of the Hudson's Bay Company on the coast. The southern portion is inhabited by a primitive race of fishermen ”

“ The “card” here referred to was a rude map of the world on which, along the line of the coast of Labrador, was written the inscription in Latin, “This land was first discovered by the English.” A short time after this voyage the fisheries about Newfoundland had become well known to Frenchmen, and were being frequented by the hardy fishermen of Brittany and Normandy. ”