My parents having gone, it became necessary for me to find lodgings—which I did, "unfurnished," in the house of a Portuguese widow. Her husband, who had a good family name, had gone down in the world, and had disappeared with another "lady." The eldest son, a mathematical genius, had been able to pay his way through Cambridge University by the scholarships and prizes which he had won. One beautiful little dark-eyed daughter of seven was playing in a West End Theatre as the dormouse in "Alice in Wonderland." She was second fiddle to Alice herself, also, and could sing all her songs. Her pay was some five pounds a week, poor enough for the attraction she proved, but more than all the rest of the family put together earned. At that time I never went to theatres. Acquaintances had persuaded me that so many of the girls were ruined on the stage that for a man taking any interest in Christian work whatever, it was wrong to attend. Moreover, among my acquaintances there were not a few theatre fans, and I had nothing in common with them. The "dormouse," however, used to come up and say her parts for my benefit, and that of occasional friends, and was so modest and winsome, and her earnings so invaluable to the family, that I entirely altered my opinion. Then and there I came to the conclusion that the drama was an essential part of art, and that those who were trying to elevate and cleanse it, like Sir Henry Irving, whose son I had met at Marlborough, must have the support of a public who demanded clean plays and good conditions both in front and behind the screen. When I came to London my father had asked me not to go to anything but Shakespearian or equally well-recognized plays until I was twenty-one. Only once did I enter a music hall and I had plenty to satisfy me in a very few minutes. Vaudevilles are better than in those days. The censor does good work, but it is still the demand which creates the supply, and whatever improvement has occurred has been largely due to the taste of the patrons. Medical students need all the open air they can get in order to keep body and soul fit, and our contempt for the theatre fan was justifiable.
My new lodgings being close to Victoria Park afforded the opportunity for training if one were unconventional. To practise throwing the sixteen-pound hammer requires rough ground and plenty of space, and as I was scheduled for that at the inter-hospital sports, it was necessary to work when not too many disinterested parties were around. Even an East-Ender's skull is not hammer-proof, as I had seen when a poor woman was brought into hospital with five circular holes in her head, the result of blows inflicted by her husband with a hammer. The only excuse which the ruffian offered for the murder was that she had forgotten to wake him, he had been late, and lost his job.
A number of the boys in my class were learning to swim. There was only one bathing lake and once the waters were troubled we drew the line at going in to give lessons. So we used to meet at the gate at the hour of opening in the morning, and thus be going back before most folks were moving. Nor did we always wait for the park keeper, but often scaled the gates and so obtained an even more exclusive dip. Many an evening we would also "flannel," and train round and round the park, or Hackney Common, to improve one's wind before some big event. For diet at that time I used oatmeal, milk, and eggs, and very little or no meat. It was cheaper and seemed to give me more endurance; and the real value of money was dawning on me.
Victoria Park is one of those open forums where every man with a sore spot goes out to air his grievance. On Sundays there were little groups around the trees where orators debated on everything from a patent medicine to the nature of God. Charles Bradlaugh and Mrs. Annie Besant were associated together in iconoclastic efforts against orthodox religion, and there was so much truth in some of their contentions that they were making no little disturbance. Hanging on their skirts were a whole crowd of ignorant, dogmatic atheists, who published a paper called "The Freethinker," which, while it was a villainous and contemptible rag, appealed to the passions and prejudices of the partially educated. To answer the specious arguments of their propaganda an association known as the Christian Evidence Society used to send out lecturers. One of them became quite famous for his clever arguments and answers, his ready wit, and really extensive reading. He was an Antiguan, a black man named Edwards, and had been a sailor before the mast. I met him at the parish house of an Episcopal clergyman of a near-by church, who, under the caption of Christian socialism, ran all kinds of social agencies that really found their way to the hearts of the people. His messages were so much more in deeds than in words that he greatly appealed to me, and I transferred my allegiance to his church, which was always well filled. I particularly remember among his efforts the weekly parish dance. My religious acquaintances were apt to class all such simple amusements in a sort of general category as "works of the Devil," and turn deaf ears to every invitation to point out any evil results, being satisfied with their own statement that it was the "thin edge of the wedge." This good man, however, was very obviously driving a wedge into the hearts of many of his poor neighbours who in those days found no opportunity for relief in innocent pleasures from the sordid round of life in the drab purlieus of Bethnal Green. This clergyman was a forerunner of his neighbour, the famous Samuel Barnett of Mile End, who thought out, started, and for many years presided over Toynbee House, the first big university settlement in East London. His workers preached their gospel through phrases and creeds which they accepted with mental reservations, but just exactly in such ways as they believed in absolutely. At first it used to send a shiver down my spine to find a church worker who didn't believe in the Creed, and stumbled over all our fundamentals. At first it amazed me that such men would pay their own expenses to live in a place like Whitechapel, only to work on drain committees, as delinquent landlord mentors, or just to give special educational chances to promising minds, or physical training to unfit bodies. Yet one saw in their efforts undeniable messages of real love. Personally I could only occasionally run up there to meet friends in residence or attend an art exhibition, but they taught me many lessons.
Exactly opposite the hospital was Oxford House, only two minutes distant, which combined definite doctrinal religion with social work. Being an Oxford effort it had great attractions for me. Moreover, right alongside it in the middle of a disused sugar refinery I had hired the yard, converted it into a couple of lawn-tennis courts, and ran a small club. There I first met the famous Dr. Hensley Henson, now Bishop of Hereford, and also the present Bishop of London, Dr. Winnington-Ingram—a good all-round athlete. He used to visit in our wards, and as we had a couple of fives courts, a game which takes little tune and gives much exercise, we used to have an afternoon off together, once a week, when he came over to hospital. Neither of these splendid men were dignitaries in those days, or I am afraid they would have found us medicals much more stand-offish. I may as well admit that we had not then learned to have any respect for bishops or church magnates generally. We liked both of these men because they were unconventional and good sports, and especially in that they were not afraid to tackle the atheist's propaganda in the open. I have seen Dr. Henson in Whitechapel debating alone against a hall full of opponents and with a fairness and infinite restraint, convincing those open to reason that they were mistaken. Moreover, I have seen Dr. Ingram doing just the same thing standing on a stone in the open park. It may all sound very silly when one knows that by human minds, or to the human mind, the Infinite can never be demonstrated as a mathematical proposition. But the point was that these clergy were proving that they were real men—men who had courage as well as faith, who believed in themselves and their message, who deserved the living which they were supposed to make out of orthodoxy. This the audience knew was more than could be said of many of the opponents. Christ himself showed his superb manhood in just such speaking out.
Indelibly impressed on my mind still is an occasion when one of the most blatant and vicious of these opponents of religion fell ill. A Salvation Army lass found him deserted and in poverty, nursed and looked after him and eventually made a new man of him.
Far and away the most popular of the Park speakers was the Antiguan. His arguments were so clever it was obvious that he was well and widely read. His absolute understanding of the crowd and his witty repartee used frequently to cause his opponents to lose their tempers, and that was always their undoing. The crowd as a rule was very fair and could easily distinguish arguments from abuse. Thus, on one Sunday the debate was as to whether nature was God. The atheist representative was a very loud-voiced demagogue, who when angry betrayed his Hibernian origin very markedly. Having been completely worsted and the laugh turned against him by a clever correction of some one's, he used the few minutes given him to reply in violent abuse, ending up that "ladies and gentlemen did not come out on holidays to spend their time being taught English by a damned nigger."
"Sir," Edwards answered from the crowd, "I am a British subject, born on the island of Antigua, and as much an Englishman as any Irishman in the country."
Edwards possessed an inexhaustible stock of good-humour and his laugh could be heard halfway across the Park. As soon as his turn came to mount the stone, he got the crowd so good-natured that they became angry at the interruptions of the enemy, and when some one suggested that if nature were that man's God, the near-by duckpond was the natural place for him, there was a rush for him, and for several subsequent Sundays he was not in evidence. Edwards was a poor man, his small salary and incessant generosity left him nothing for holidays, and he was killing himself with overwork. So we asked him to join us in the new house which we were fitting up in Palestine Place. He most gladly did so and added enormously to our fun. Unfortunately tuberculosis long ago got its grip upon him, and removed a valuable life from East London.
It was a queer little beehive in which we lived in those days, and a more cosmopolitan crowd could hardly have been found: one young doctor who has since made his name and fortune in Australia; another in whose rooms were nearly a hundred cups for prowess in nearly every form of athletics, and who also has "made good" in professional life, besides several others who for shorter or longer periods were allotted rooms in our house. Among the more unusual was the "C.M.," a Brahmin from India, a priest in his youth, who had been brought back to England by some society to be educated in medical missionary work, but whom for some reason they had dropped. For a short time a clever young Russian of Hebrew extraction who was studying for the Church helped to render our common-room social engagements almost international affairs.
As I write this I am at Charleston, South Carolina, and I see how hard it will be for an American to understand the possibility of such a motley assembly being reasonable or even proper. It seems to me down here that there must have been odd feelings sometimes in those days. I can only say, however, that I never personally even thought of it. East London is so democratic that one's standards are simply those of the value of the man's soul as we saw it. If he had been yellow with pink stripes it honestly would not have mattered one iota to most of us.
It so happened that there was at that time in hospital under my care a patient known as "the elephant man." He had been starring under that title in a cheap vaudeville, had been seen by some of the students, and invited over to be shown to and studied by our best physicians. The poor fellow was really exceedingly sensitive about his most extraordinary appearance. The disease was called "leontiasis," and consisted of an enormous over-development of bone and skin on one side. His head and face were so deformed as really to resemble a big animal's head with a trunk. My arms would not reach around his hat. A special room in a yard was allotted to him, and several famous people came to see him—among them Queen Alexandra, then the Princess of Wales, who afterward sent him an autographed photograph of herself. He kept it in his room, which was known as the "elephant house," and it always suggested beauty and the beast. Only at night could the man venture out of doors, and it was no unusual thing in the dusk of nightfall to meet him walking up and down in the little courtyard. He used to talk freely of how he would look in a huge bottle of alcohol—an end to which in his imagination he was fated to come. He was of a very cheerful disposition and pathetically proud of his left side which was normal. Very suddenly one day he died—the reason assigned being that his head fell forward and choked him, being too heavy for him to lift up.
In 1886 I passed my examinations and duly became a member of the College of Physicians and of the Royal College of Surgeons of England; and sought some field for change and rest, where also I could use my newly acquired license to my own, if to no one else's, benefit. Among the patients who came to the London Hospital, there were now and again fishermen from the large fishing fleets of the North Sea. They lived out, as it were, on floating villages, sending their fish to market every day by fast cutters. Every two or three months, as their turn came round, a vessel would leave for the home port on the east coast, being permitted, or supposed to be permitted, a day at home for each full week at sea. As the fleets kept the sea summer and winter and the boats were small, not averaging over sixty tons, it was a hazardous calling. The North Sea is nowhere deeper than thirty fathoms, much of it being under twenty, and in some places only five. Indeed, it is a recently sunken and still sinking portion of Europe, so much so that the coasts on both sides are constantly receding, and when Heligoland was handed over by the English to the Kaiser, it was said that he would have to keep jacking it up or soon there would be none left. Shallow waters exposed to the fierce gales which sweep the German Ocean make deep and dangerous seas, which readily break and wash the decks of craft with low freeboard, such as the North Sea vessels are obliged to have in order to get boats in and out to ferry their fish to the cutter.
There being no skilled aid at hand, the quickest way to get help used to be to send an injured man to market with the fish. Often it was a long journey of many days, simple fractures became compound, and limbs and faculties were often thus lost. It so happened that Sir Frederick Treves had himself a love for navigating in small sailing craft. He had made it a practice to cross the English Channel to Calais in a sailing lugger every Boxing Day—that is, the day after Christmas. He was especially interested in those "that go down to the sea in ships" and had recently made a trip among the fishing fleets. He told me that a small body of men, interested in the religious and social welfare of the deep-sea fishermen, had chartered a small fishing smack, sent her out among the fishermen to hold religious services of a simple, unconventional type, in order to afford the men an alternative to the grog vessels when fishing was slack, and to carry first aid, the skipper of the vessel being taught ambulance work. They wanted, however, very much to get a young doctor to go out, who cared also for the spiritual side of the work, to see if they could use the additional attraction of proper medical aid to gain the men's sympathies. His advice to me was to go and have a look at it. "If you go in January you will see some fine seascapes, anyhow. Don't go in summer when all of the old ladies go for a rest."
I therefore applied to go out the following January, and that fall, while working near the Great London docks, I used often to look at the tall East Indiamen, thinking that I soon should be aboard just such a vessel in the North Sea. It was dark and raining when my train ran into Yarmouth, and a dripping, stout fisherman in a blue uniform met me at that then unattractive and ill-lighted terminus. He had brought a forlorn "growler" or four-wheeled cab. Climbing in we drove a mile or more along a deserted road, and drew up at last apparently at the back of beyond.
"Where is the ship?" I asked.
"Why, those are her topmasts," replied my guide, pointing to two posts projecting from the sand. "The tide is low and she is hidden by the quay."
"Heavens!" I thought; "she's no tea clipper, anyhow."
I climbed up the bank and peered down in the darkness at the hull of a small craft, a little larger than our old Roysterer. She was just discernible by the dim rays of the anchor light. I was hesitating as to whether I shouldn't drive back to Yarmouth and return to London when a cheery voice on deck called out a hearty welcome. What big things hang on a smile and a cheery word no man can ever say. But it broke the spell this time and I had my cabby unload my bags on the bank and bade him good-night. As his wheels rumbled away into the rain and dark, I felt that my cables were cut beyond recall. Too late to save me, the cheery voice shouted, "Mind the rigging, it's just tarred and greased." I was already sliding down and sticking to it as I went. Small as the vessel was she was absolutely spotless. Her steward, who cooked for all hands, was smart and in a snow-white suit. The contrast between-decks and that above was very comforting, though my quarters were small. The crew were all stocky, good-humoured, and independent. Democratic as East London had made me, they impressed me very favourably, and I began to look forward to the venture with real pleasure.
Drink was the worst enemy of these men. The quaysides of the fisherman's quarters teemed with low saloons. Wages were even paid off in them or their annexes, and grog vessels, luring the men aboard with cheap tobacco and low literature, plied their nefarious calling with the fleets, and were the death, body and soul, of many of these fine specimens of manhood.
There was never any question as to the real object of the Mission to Deep-Sea Fishermen. The words "Heal the sick" carved in large letters adorned the starboard bow. "Preach the Word" was on the port, and around the brass rim of the wheel ran the legend, "Jesus said, Follow me and I will make you fishers of men." Thirty years ago we were more conventional than to-day, and I was much surprised to learn from our skipper that we were bound to Ostend to ship four tons of tobacco, sent over from England for us in bond, as he might not take it out consigned to the high seas. In Belgium, however, no duty was paid. The only trouble was that our vessel, to help pay its expenses, carried fishing gear, and as a fishing vessel could not get a clearance in Belgium. Our nets and beams, therefore, had to go out to the fishing grounds in a friendly trawler while we passed as a mercantile marine during the time we took on our cargo.
So bitter was the cold that in the harbour we got frozen in and were able to skate up the canals. We had eventually to get a steamer to go around us and smash our ice bonds when we were again ready for sea. During the next two months we saw no land except Heligoland and Terschelling—or Skilling, as the fishermen called it—far away in the offing. Nor was our deck once clear of ice and snow during all the time.
Our duty was to visit as many fleets as we could, and arrange with some reliable vessel to take a stock of tobacco for the use of their special fleet. The ship was to carry about six feet of blue bunting on her foretopmast stay, a couple of fathoms above her bowsprit end, so that all the fleet might know her. She was to sell the tobacco at a fixed price that just covered the cost, and undersold the "coper" by fifty per cent. She was to hoist her flag for business every morning, while the small boats were out boarding fish on the carrier, and was to lie as far to leeward of the coper as possible so that the men could not go to both. Nineteen such floating depots were eventually arranged for, with the precaution that if any one of them had to return to port, he should bring no tobacco home, but hand over his stock and accounts to a reliable friend.
These deep-sea fisheries were a revelation to me, and every hour of the long trip I enjoyed. It was amazing to me to find over twenty thousand men and boys afloat—the merriest, cheerfullest lot which I had ever met. They were hail-fellow-well-met with every one, and never thought of deprivation or danger. Clothing, food, customs, were all subordinated to utility. They were the nearest possible thing to a community of big boys, only needing a leader. In efficiency and for their daring resourcefulness in physical difficulties and dangers, they were absolutely in a class by themselves, embodying all the traits of character which make men love to read the stories of the buccaneers and other seamen of the sixteenth-century period.
Each fleet had its admiral and vice-admiral, appointed partly by the owner, and partly by the skippers of the vessels. The devil-may-care spirit was always a great factor with the men. The admiral directed operations by flags in the daytime and by rockets at night, thus indicating what the fleet was to do and where they were to fish. Generally he had the fastest boat, and the cutters, hunting for the fleet always lay just astern of the admiral, the morning after their arrival. Hundreds of men would come for letters, packages, to load fish, to get the news of what their last assignment fetched in market. Moreover, a kind of Parliament was held aboard to consider policies and hear complaints.
At first it was a great surprise to me how these men knew where they were, for we never saw anything but sky and sea, and not even the admirals carried a chronometer or could work out a longitude; and only a small percentage of the skippers could read or write. They all, however, carried a sextant and could by rule of thumb find a latitude roughly. But that was only done at a pinch. The armed lead was the fisherman's friend. It was a heavy lead with a cup on the bottom filled fresh each time with sticky grease. When used, the depth was always called out by the watch, and the kind of sand, mud, or rock which stuck to the grease shown to the skipper. "Fifteen fathoms and coffee grounds—must be on the tail end of the Dogger. Put her a bit more to the westward, boy," he would remark, and think no more about it, though he might have been three or four days looking for his fleet, and not spoken to a soul since he left land. I remember one skipper used to have the lead brought down below, and he could tell by the grit between his teeth after a couple of soundings which way to steer. It sounds strange even now, but it was so universal, being just second-nature to the men, who from boyhood had lived on the sea, that we soon ceased to marvel at it. Skippers were only just being obliged to have certificates. These they obtained by viva voce examinations. You would sometimes hear an aspiring student, a great black-bearded pirate over forty-seven inches around the chest, and possibly the father of eight or ten children, as he stamped about in his watch keeping warm, repeating the courses—"East end of the Dogger to Horn S.E. by E. ½ and W. point of the island [Heligoland] to Barkum S. ½ W. Ower Light to Hazebrough N.N.W."—and so on. Their memories were not burdened by a vast range of facts, but in these things they were the nearest imaginable to Blind Tom, the famous slave musician.
Our long round only occupied us about a month, and after that we settled down with the fleet known as the Great Northerners. Others were the Short Blues, the Rashers (because they were streaked like a piece of bacon), the Columbia, the Red Cross, and so on. Sometimes during the night while we were fishing into the west, a hundred sail or more of vessels, we would pass through another big fleet coming the other way, and some of our long trawls and warps would tangle with theirs. Beyond the beautiful spectacle of the myriads of lights bobbing up and down often enough on mighty rough seas—for it needed good breezes to haul our trawls—would be the rockets and flares of the entangled boats, and often enough also rockets and flares from friends, and from cutters. One soon became so friendly with the men that one would not return at night to the ship, but visit around and rejoin the Mission ship boarding fish next day, to see patients coming for aid. Though it was strictly against sea rules for skippers to be off their vessels all night, that was a rule, like all others on the North Sea, as often marked in the breach as in the observance. A goodly company would get together yarning and often singing and playing games until it was time to haul the trawl and light enough to find their own vessel and signal for the boat.
The relation of my new friends to religion was a very characteristic one. Whatever they did, they did hard. Thus one of the admirals, being a thirsty soul, and the grog vessels having been adrift for a longer while than he fancied, conceived the fine idea of holding up the Heligoland saloons. So one bright morning he "hove his fleet to" under the lee of the island and a number of boats went ashore, presumably to sell fish. Altogether they landed some five hundred men, who held up the few saloons for two or three days. As a result subsequently only one crew selling fish to the island was allowed ashore at one time. The very gamble of their occupation made them do things hard. Thus it was a dangerous task to throw out a small boat in half a gale of wind, fill her up with heavy boxes of fish, and send her to put these over the rail of a steamer wallowing in the trough of a mountainous sea.
But it was on these very days when less fish was sent to market that the best prices were realized, and so there were always a number of dare-devils, who did not care if lives were lost so long as good prices were obtained and their record stood high on the weekly list of sales which was forwarded to both owners and men. I have known as many as fourteen men upset in one morning out of these boats; and the annual loss of some three hundred and fifty men was mostly from this cause. Conditions were subsequently improved by the Board of Trade, who made it manslaughter against the skipper if any man was drowned boarding fish, unless the admiral had shown his flags to give the fleet permission to do so. In those days, however, I often saw twenty to thirty boats all tied up alongside the cutter at one time, the heavy seas every now and again rolling the cutter's sail right under water, and when she righted again it might come up under the keels of some of the boats and tip them upside down. Thus any one in them was caught like a mouse under a trap or knocked to pieces trying to swim among the rushing, tossing boats.
As a rule we hauled at midnight, and it was always a fresh source of wonder, for the trawl was catholic in its embrace and brought up anything that came in its way. To emphasize how comparatively recently the Channel had been dry land, many teeth and tusks of mammoths who used to roam its now buried forests were given up to the trawls by the ever-shifting sands. Old wreckage of every description, ancient crockery, and even a water-logged, old square-rigger that must have sunk years before were brought one day as far as the surface by the stout wire warp. After the loss of a large steamer called the Elbe many of the passengers who had been drowned were hauled up in this way; and on one occasion great excitement was caused in Hull by a fisher lad from that port being picked up with his hands tied behind his back and a heavy weight on his feet. The defence was that the boy had died, and was thus buried to save breaking the voyage—supported by the fact that another vessel had also picked up the boy and thrown him overboard again for the same reason. But those who were a bit superstitious thought otherwise, and more especially as cruelty to these boys was not unknown.
These lads were apprenticed to the fishery masters largely from industrial or reformatory schools, had no relations to look after them, and often no doubt gave the limit of trouble and irritation. On the whole, however, the system worked well, and a most excellent class of capable seamen was developed. At times, however, they were badly exploited. During their apprenticeship years they were not entitled to pay, only to pocket money, and yet sometimes the whole crew including the skipper were apprentices and under twenty-one years of age. Even after that they were fitted for no other calling but to follow the sea, and had to accept the master's terms. There were no fishermen's unions, and the men being very largely illiterate were often left victims of a peonage system in spite of the Truck Acts. The master of a vessel has to keep discipline, especially in a fleet, and the best of boys have faults and need punishing while on land. These skippers themselves were brought up in a rough school, and those who fell victims to drink and made the acquaintance of the remedial measures of our penal system of that day were only further brutalized by it. Religion scarcely touched the majority; for their brief periods of leave ashore were not unnaturally spent in having a good time. To those poisoned by the villainous beverages sold on the sordid grog vessels no excess was too great. Owners were in sympathy with the Mission in trying to oust the coper, because their property, in the form of fish, nets, stores, and even sails, were sometimes bartered on the high seas for liquor. On one occasion during a drunken quarrel in the coper's cabin one skipper threw the kerosene lamp over another lying intoxicated on the floor. His heavy wool jersey soaked in kerosene caught fire. He rushed for the deck, and then, a dancing mass of flames, leaped overboard and disappeared.
Occasionally skippers devised punishments with a view to remedying the defects of character. Thus one lad, who through carelessness had on more than one occasion cooked the "duff" for dinner badly, was made to take his cinders on deck when it was his time to turn in, and go forward to the fore-rigging. Then he had to take one cinder, go up to the cross-tree, and throw it over into the sea, come down the opposite rigging and repeat the act until he had emptied his scuttle. Another who had failed to clean the cabin properly had one night, instead of going to bed, to take a bucketful of sea water and empty it with a teaspoon into another, and so to and fro until morning. On one occasion a poor boy was put under the ballast deck, that is, the cabin floor, and forgotten. He was subsequently found dead, drowned in the bilge water. It was easy to hide the results of cruelty, for being washed overboard was by no means an uncommon way of disappearing from vessels with low freeboards in the shallow water of the North Sea.
A very practical outcome in the mission work was the organization of the Fisher Lads' Letter-Writing Association. The members accepted so many names of orphan lads at sea and pledged themselves to write regularly to them. Also, if possible, they were to look them up when they returned to land, and indeed do for them much as the War Camp Community League members are to-day trying to accomplish for our soldiers and sailors. As every practical exposition of love must, it met with a very real response, and brought, moreover, new interests and joys into many selfish lives.
I remember one lady whose whole care in life had been her own health. She had nursed it, and worried over it, and enjoyed ill health so long, that only the constant recourse to the most refined stimulants postponed the end which would have been a merciful relief—to others. The effort of letter-writing remade her. Doctors were forgotten, stimulants were tabooed, the insignia of invalidism banished, and to my intense surprise I ran across her at a fishing port surrounded by a bevy of blue-jerseyed lads, who were some of those whom she was being blessed by helping.
The best of efforts, however, sometimes "gang aft agley." One day I received a letter, evidently written in great consternation, from an elderly spinster of singularly aristocratic connections and an irreproachableness of life which was almost painful. The name sent to her by one of our skippers as a correspondent who needed help and encouragement was one of those which would be characterized as common—let us say John Jones. By some perverse fate the wrong ship was given as an address, and the skipper of it happened to have exactly the same name. It appeared that lack of experience in just such work had made her letter possibly more affectionate than she would have wished for under the circumstances which developed. For in writing to me she enclosed a ferocious letter from a lady of Billingsgate threatening, not death, but mutilation, if she continued making overtures to "her John."
I have dwelt at length upon the experiences of the North Sea, because trivial as they appear on the surface, they concern the biggest problem of human life—the belief that man is not of the earth, but only a temporary sojourner upon it. This belief, that he is destined to go on living elsewhere, makes a vast difference to one's estimate of values. Life becomes a school instead of a mere stage, the object of which is that our capacities for usefulness should develop through using them until we reach graduation. What life gives to us can only be of permanent importance as it develops our souls, thus enabling us to give more back to it, and leaves us better prepared for any opportunities than may lie beyond this world. The most valuable asset for this assumption is love for the people among whom one lives.
The best teachers in life are far from being those who know most, or who think themselves wisest. Show me a schoolmaster who does not love his boys and you show me one who is of no use. Our faith in our sonship of God is immensely strengthened by the puzzling fact that even God cannot force goodness into us, His sons, because we share His nature.
These convictions, anyhow, were the mental assets with which I had to begin work, and no others. A scientific training had impressed upon me that big and little are very relative terms; that one piece of work becomes unexpectedly permanent and big, while that which appears to be great, but is merely diffuse, will be temporary and ineffective. Experience has taught me that one human life has its limits of direct impetus, but that its most lasting value is its indirect influence. The greatest Life ever lived was no smaller for being in a carpenter's shop, and largely spent among a few ignorant fishermen. The Scarabee had a valid apologia pro vita sua in spite of Dr. Holmes. Tolstoy on his farm, Milton without his sight, Bunyan in his prison, Pasteur in his laboratory, all did great things for the world.
There is so much that is manly about the lives of those who follow the sea, so much less artificiality than in many other callings, and with our fishermen so many fewer of what we call loosely "chances in life," that to sympathize with them was easy—and sympathy is a long step toward love. Life at sea also gives time and opportunity for really knowing a man. It breaks down conventional barriers, and indeed almost compels fellowship and thus an intelligent understanding of the difficulties and tragedies of the soul of our neighbour. That rare faculty of imagination which is the inspiration of all great lovers of men is not alone indispensable. Hand in hand with this inevitably goes the vision of one's own opportunity to help and not to hinder others, even though it be through the unattractive medium of the collection box—for that gives satisfaction only in proportion to the sacrifice which we make.
In plain words the field of work offered me was attractive. It seemed to promise me the most remunerative returns for my abilities, or, to put it in another way, it aroused my ambitions sufficiently to make me believe that my special capacities and training could be used to make new men as well as new bodies. Any idea of sacrifice was balanced by the fact that I never cared very much for the frills of life so long as the necessities were forthcoming.
The attention that Harold Begbie's book "Twice-Born Men" received, was to me later in life a source of surprise. One forgets that the various religions and sects which aimed at the healing of men's souls have concerned themselves more with intellectual creeds than material, Christ-like ends. At first it was not so. Paul rejoiced that he was a new man. There can be no question but that the Gospels show us truly that the change in Christ's first followers was from men, the slaves of every ordinary human passion, into men who were self-mastered—that Christ taught by what he was and did rather than by insistence on creeds and words. It has been seeing these changes in men's lives, not only in their surroundings, though those improve immediately, that reconcile one to our environment, and has induced me to live a life-time in the wilds.
Another movement that was just starting at this time also interested me considerably. A number of keen young men from Oxford and Cambridge, having experienced the dangers that beset boys from big English public schools who enter the universities without any definite help as to their attitude toward the spiritual relationships of life, got together to discuss the question. They recognized that the formation of the Boys' Brigade in our conservative social life only touched the youth of the poorer classes. Like our English Y.M.C.A., it was not then aristocratic enough for gentlemen. They saw, however, that athletic attainments carried great weight, and that all outdoor accomplishments had a strong attraction for boys from every class. Thus it happened that an organization called the Public School Camps came into being. Its ideal was the uplift of character, and the movement has grown with immense strides on both sides of the Atlantic.
An integral part of my summer holidays during these years was spent as medical officer at one of these camps. For many reasons it was wise in England to run them on military lines, for besides the added dignity, it insured the ability to maintain order and discipline. Some well-known commandant was chosen who was a soldier also in the good fight of faith. Special sites were selected, generally on the grounds of some big country seat which were loaned by the interested lord of the manor, and every kind of outdoor attraction was provided which could be secured. Besides organized competitive games, there was usually a yacht, good bathing, always a gymkhana, and numerous expeditions and "hikes." Not a moment was left unoccupied. All of the work of the camp was done by the boys, who served in turn on orderly duty. The officers were always, if possible, prominent athletes, to whom the boys could look up as being capable in physical as well as spiritual fields. There was a brief address each night before "taps" in the big marquee used for mess; and one night was always a straight talk on the problems of sex by the medical officers, whom the boys were advised to consult in their perplexities. These camps were among the happiest memories of my life, and many of the men to-day gratefully acknowledge that the camps were the turning-point of their whole lives. The secret was unconventionality and absolute naturalness with no "shibboleths." The boys were allowed to be boys absolutely in an atmosphere of sincere if not omniscient fervour. On one occasion when breaking up camp, a curly-headed young rascal in my tent, being late on the last morning—unknown to any one—went to the train in his pajamas, hidden only by his raincoat. At a small wayside station over a hundred miles from London, whither he was bound, leaving his coat in the carriage, he ventured into the refreshment stall of the waiting-room. Unfortunately, however, he came out only to find his train departed and himself in his nightclothes on the platform without a penny, a ticket, or a friend. Eluding the authorities he reached the huge Liverpool terminus by night to find a faithful friend waiting on the platform for him with the sorely needed overgarment.
No one was ever ashamed to be a Christian, or of what Christ was, or what he did and stood for. However, to ignore the fact that the mere word "missionary" aroused suspicion in the average English unconventional mind—such as those of these clean, natural-minded boys—would be a great mistake. Unquestionably, as in the case of Dickens, a missionary was unpractical if not hypocritical, and mildly incompetent if not secretly vicious. I found myself always fighting against the idea that I was termed a missionary. The men I loved and admired, especially such men as those on our athletic teams, felt really strongly about it. Henry Martyn—as a scholar—was a hero to those who read of him, though few did. Moreover, who does not love Charles Kingsley? Even as boys, we want to be "a man," though Kingsley was a "Parson Lot." It always seemed that a missionary was naturally discounted until he had proved his right to be received as an ordinary being. Once after being the guest of a bank president, he told me that my stay was followed by that of their bishop, who was a person of great importance. When the bishop had gone, he asked his two boys one day. "Well, which do you like best, the bishop or the doctor?" "Ach," was the reply, "the bishop can't stand on his head." On another occasion during a visit—while lecturing on behalf of the fishermen—and doing my usual evening physical drill in my bedroom, by a great mischance I missed a straight-arm-balance on a chair, fell over, and nearly brought the chandelier of the drawing-room down on the heads of some guests. That a so-called "missionary" should be so worldly as to wish to keep his body fit seemed so unusual that I heard of that trifle a hundred times.
The Church of Christ that is coming will be interested in the forces that make for peace and righteousness in this world rather than in academic theories as to how to get rewards in another. That will be a real stimulus to fitness and capacity all round instead of a dope for failures. It is that element in missions to-day, such as the up-to-date work of the Rockefeller Institute and other medical missions in China and India, which alone holds the respect of the mass of the people. The value of going out merely to make men of different races think as we think is being proportionately discounted with the increase of education.
Our North Sea work grew apace. Vessel after vessel was added to the fleet. Her Majesty, Queen Victoria, became interested, and besides subscribing personally toward the first hospital boat, permitted it to be named in her honour. According to custom the builders had a beautiful little model made which Her Majesty agreed to accept. It was decided that it should be presented to her in Buckingham Palace by the two senior mission captains.
The journey to them was a far more serious undertaking than a winter voyage on the Dogger Bank. However, arrayed in smart blue suits and new guernseys and polished to the last degree, they set out on the eventful expedition. On their return every one was as anxious to know "how the voyage had turned out" as if they had been exploring new fishing grounds around the North Cape in the White Sea. "Nothing to complain of, boys, till just as we had her in the wind's eye to shoot the gear," said the senior skipper. "A big swell in knee-breeches opened the door and called out our names, when I was brought up all standing, for I saw that the peak halliard was fast on the port side. The blame thing was too small for me to shift over, so I had to leave it. But, believe me, she never said a word about it. That's what I call something of a lady."
At this time we had begun two new ventures, an institute at Yarmouth for fishermen ashore and a dispensary vessel to be sent out each spring among the thousands of Scotch, Manx, Irish, and French fishermen, who carried on the herring and mackerel fishery off the south and west coast of Ireland.
The south Irish spring fishery is wonderfully interesting. Herring and mackerel are in huge shoals anywhere from five to forty miles off the land, and the vessels run in and out each day bringing back the catch of the night. Each vessel shoots out about two miles of net, while some French ones will shoot out five miles. Thus the aggregate of nets used would with ease stretch from Ireland to New York and back. Yet the undaunted herring return year after year to the disastrous rendezvous. The vessels come from all parts. Many are the large tan-sailed luggers from the Scottish coasts, their sails and hulls marked "B.F." for Banff, "M.E." for Montrose, "C.N." for Campbelltown, etc. With these come the plucky little Ulster boats from Belfast and Larne, Loch Swilly and Loch Foyle; and not a few of the hereditary seafaring men from Cornwall, Devon, and Dorset. Others also come from Falmouth, Penzance, and Exmouth. Besides these are the Irish boats—few enough, alas, for Paddy is not a sailor. A good priest had tried to induce his people to share this rich harvest by starting a fishery school for boys at Baltimore, where net-making and every other branch of the industry was taught. It was to little purpose, for I have met men hungry on the west coast, who were trying to live on potato-raising on that bog land who were graduates of Father D.'s school.
There was one year when we ourselves were trying out the trawling in Clew Bay and Blacksod, and getting marvellous catches; so much so that I remember one small trawler from Grimsby on the east coast of England making two thousand dollars in two days' work, while the Countess of Z. fund was distributing charity to the poverty-stricken men who lived around the bay itself. The Government of Ireland also made serious efforts to make its people take up the fishery business. About one million dollars obtained out of the escheated funds of the Church of England in Ireland, when that organization was disestablished by Mr. Gladstone, was used as a loan fund which was available for fishermen, resident six months, at two per cent interest. They were permitted to purchase their own boat and gear for the fishery out of the money thus provided.
While we lay in Durham Harbour at the entrance to Waterford Harbour, we met many Cornishmen who were temporarily resident there, having come over from Cornwall to qualify for borrowing the money to get boats and outfit. During one week in which we were working from that port, there were so many saints' days on which the Irish crews would not go out fishing, but were having good times on the land, that the skippers, who were Cornishmen, had to form a crew out of their own numbers and take one of their boats to sea.
One day we had landed on the Arran Islands, and I was hunting ferns in the rock crevices, for owing to the warmth of the Gulf current the growth is luxuriant. On the top of the cliffs about three hundred feet high, I fell in with two Irishmen smoking their pipes and sprawling on the edge of the precipice. The water below was very deep and they were fishing. I had the fun of seeing dangling codfish hauled leisurely up all that long distance, and if one fell off on the passage, it was amusing to note the absolute insouciance of the fishermen, who assured me that there were plenty more in the sea.
It has always been a puzzle to me why so few tourists and yachtsmen visit the south and west coast of Ireland. Its marvellous wild, rock scenery, its exquisite bays,—no other words describe them,—its emerald verdure, and its interesting and hospitable people have given me, during the spring fishing seasons that I spent on that coast, some of the happiest memories of my life. On the contrary, most of the yachts hang around the Solent, and the piers of Ryde, Cowes, and Southampton, instead of the magnificent coast from Queenstown to Donegal Cliffs, and from there all along West Scotland to the Hebrides.
About this time our work established a dispensary and social centre at Crookhaven, just inside the Fastnet Lighthouse, and another in Tralee on the Kerry coast, north of Cape Clear. Gatherings for worship and singing were also held on Sundays on the boats, for on that day neither Scotch, Manx, nor English went fishing. The men loved the music, the singing of hymns, and the conversational addresses. Many would take some part in the service, and my memories of those gatherings are still very pleasant ones.
On this wild coast calls for help frequently came from the poor settlers as well as from the seafarers. A summons coming in one day from the Fastnet Light, we rowed out in a small boat to that lovely rock in the Atlantic. A heavy sea, however, making landing impossible, we caught hold of a buoy, anchored off from the rock, and then rowing in almost to the surf, caught a line from the high overhanging crane. A few moments later one was picked out of the tumbling, tossing boat like a winkle out of a shell, by a noose at the end of a line from a crane a hundred and fifty feet above, swung perpendicularly up into the air, and then round and into a trap-door in the side of the lighthouse. On leaving one was swung out again in the same fashion, and dangled over the tumbling boat until caught and pulled in by the oarsmen.
Another day we rowed out nine miles in an Irish craft to visit the Skerry Islands, famous for the old Beehive Monastery, and the countless nests of gannets and other large sea-birds. The cliffs rise to a great height almost precipitously, and the ceaseless thunder of the Atlantic swell jealously guards any landing. There being no davit or crane, we had just to fling ourselves into the sea, and climb up as best we could, carrying a line to haul up our clothing from the boat and other apparatus after landing, while the oarsmen kept her outside the surf. To hold on to the slippery rock we needed but little clothing, anyhow, for it was a slow matter, and the clinging power of one's bare toes was essential. The innumerable gannets sitting on their nests gave the island the appearance of a snowdrift; and we soon had all the eggs that we needed lowered by a line. But some of the gulls, of whose eggs we wanted specimens also, built so cleverly onto the actual faces of the cliffs, that we had to adopt the old plan of hanging over the edge and raising the eggs on the back of one's foot, which is an exploit not devoid of excitement. The chief difficulty was, however, with one of our number, who literally stuck on the top, being unable to descend, at least in a way compatible with comfort or safety. The upshot was that he had to be blindfolded and helped.
One of our Council, being connected at this time with the Irish Poor-Relief Board and greatly interested in the Government efforts to relieve distress in Ireland, arranged that we should make a voyage around the entire island in one of our vessels, trying the trawling grounds everywhere, and also the local markets available for making our catch remunerative. There has been considerable activity in these waters of late years, but it was practically pioneer work in those days, the fishery being almost entirely composed of drift nets and long lines. It was supposed that the water was too deep and the bottom too uneven and rocky to make trawling possible. We had only a sailing vessel of about sixty tons, and the old heavy beam trawl, for the other trawl and steam fishing boats were then quite in their infancy. The quantity and variety of victims that came to our net were prodigious, and the cruise has remained as a dream in my memory, combined as it was with so many chances of helping out one of the most interesting and amiable—if not educated—peoples in the world. It happened to be a year of potato scarcity; as one friend pointed out, there was a surplus of Murphys in the kitchen and a scarcity of Murphys in the cellar—"Murphys" being another name for that vegetable which is so large a factor in Irish economic life. As mentioned before, a fund, called the Countess of Z.'s fund, had been established to relieve the consequent distress, and while we were fishing in Black Sod Bay, the natives around the shore were accepting all that they could secure. Yet one steam trawler cleared four hundred pounds within a week; and our own fine catches, taken in so short a while, made it seem a veritable fishermen's paradise for us, who were accustomed to toil over the long combers and stormy banks of the North Sea. The variety of fish taken alone made the voyage of absorbing interest, numbering cod, haddock, ling, hake, turbot, soles, plaice, halibut, whiting, crayfish, shark, dog-fish, and many quaint monsters unmarketable then, but perfectly edible. Among those taken in was the big angler fish, which lives at the bottom with his enormous mouth open, dangling an attractive-looking bait formed by a long rod growing out from his nose, which lures small victims into the cavern, whence, as he possesses row upon row of spiky teeth which providentially point down his throat, there is seldom any returning.
Among the many memories of that coast which gave me a vision of the land question as it affected the people in those days, one in particular has always remained with me. We had made a big catch in a certain bay, a perfectly beautiful inlet. To see if the local fishermen could find a market within reach of these fishing grounds, with one of the crew, and the fish packed in boxes, we sailed up the inlet to the market town of Bell Mullet. Being Saturday, we found a market day in progress, and buyers, who, encouraged by one of the new Government light railways, were able to purchase our fish. That evening, however, when halfway home, a squall suddenly struck our own lightened boat, which was rigged with one large lugsail, and capsized her. By swimming and manœuvring the boat, we made land on the low, muddy flats. No house was in sight, and it was not until long after dark that we two shivering masses of mud reached an isolated cabin in the middle of a patch of the redeemed ground right in the centre of a large bog. A miserably clad woman greeted us with a warm Irish welcome. The house had only one room and accommodated the live-stock as well as the family. A fine cow stood in one corner; a donkey tied to the foot of the bed was patiently looking down into the face of the baby. Father was in England harvesting. A couple of pigs lay under the bed, and the floor space was still further encroached upon by a goodly number of chickens, which were encouraged by the warmth of the peat fire. They not only thought it their duty to emphasize our welcome, but—misled by the firelight—were saluting the still far-off dawn. The resultant emotions which we experienced during the night led us to suggest that we might assist toward the erection of a cattle pen. Before leaving, however, we were told, "Shure t' rint would be raised in the fall," if such signs of prosperity as farm buildings greeted the land agent's arrival.
The mouth of Loch Foyle, one of the most beautiful bays in Ireland, gave us a fine return in fish. Especially I remember the magnificent turbot which we took off the wild shore between the frowning basalt cliffs of the Giant's Causeway, and the rough headlands of Loch Swilly. We sold our fish in the historic town of Londonderry, where we saw the old gun Mons Meg, which once so successfully roared for King William, still in its place on the old battlements. By a packet steamer plying to Glasgow, we despatched some of the catch to that greedy market. At Loch Foyle there is a good expanse of sandy and mud bottom which nurses quite a harvest of the sea, though—oddly enough—close by off Rathlin Island is the only water over one hundred fathoms deep until the Atlantic Basin is reached. The Irish Sea like the North Sea is all shallow water. Crossing to the Isle of Man, we delayed there only a short while, for those grounds are well known to the Fleetwood trawlers, who supply so much fish to the dense population of North Central England. We found little opportunity of trawling off the west of Scotland, the ocean's bottom being in no way suited to it. On reaching the Western Hebrides, however, we were once more among many old friends. From Stornaway on the Isle of Lewis alone some nine hundred drifters were pursuing the retreating armies of herring.
The German hordes have taught us to think of life in large numbers, but were the herring to elect a Kaiser, he would dominate in reality an absolutely indestructible host. For hundreds of years fishermen of all countries have without cessation been pursuing these friends of mankind. For centuries these inexhaustible hordes have followed their long pathways of the sea, swimming by some strange instinct always more or less over the same courses—ever with their tireless enemies, both in and out of the water, hot foot on their tracks. Sharks, dog-fish, wolf-fish, cod, and every fish large enough to swallow them, gulls, divers, auks, and almost every bird of the air, to say nothing of the nets set now from steam-propelled ships, might well threaten their speedy extermination. This is especially true when we remember that even their eggs are preyed upon in almost incalculable bulk as soon as they are deposited. But phœnix-like they continue to reappear in such vast quantities that they are still the cheapest food on the market. Such huge numbers are caught at one time that they have now and again to be used for fertilizer, or dumped overboard into the sea. The great bay of Stornaway Harbour was so deeply covered in oil from the fish while we lay there, that the sailing boats raced to and fro before fine breezes and yet the wind could not even ripple the surface of the sea, as if at last millennial conditions had materialized. Many times we saw nets which had caught such quantities of fish at once that they had sunk to the bottom. They were only rescued with great difficulty, and then the fish were so swollen by being drowned in the net that it took hours of hard work and delay to shake their now distended bodies out again.
The opportunities for both holding simple religious services and rendering medical help from our dispensary were numerous, and we thought sufficiently needed to call for some sort of permanent effort; so later the Society established a small mission room in the harbour.
Alcohol has always been a menace to Scotch life, though their fishermen were singularly free from rioting and drunkenness. Indeed, their home-born piety was continually a protest to the indulgence of the mixed crowd which at that time followed King Henry. Scores of times have I seen a humble crew of poor fishermen, who themselves owned their small craft, observing the Sunday as if they were in their homes, while the skippers of large vessels belonging to others fished all the week round at the beck of their absent owners, thinking they made more money in that way.
In 1891 the present Lord Southborough, then Mr. Francis Hopwood, and a member of the Mission Board, returned from a visit to Canada and Newfoundland. He brought before the Council the opportunities for service among the fishermen of the northwest Atlantic, and the suggestion was handed on to me in the form of a query. Would I consider crossing the Atlantic in one of our small sailing vessels, and make an inquiry into the problem?
Some of my older friends have thought that my decision to go was made under strong religious excitement, and in response to some deep-seated conviction that material sacrifices or physical discomforts commended one to God. I must, however, disclaim all such lofty motives. I have always believed that the Good Samaritan went across the road to the wounded man just because he wanted to. I do not believe that he felt any sacrifice or fear in the matter. If he did, I know very well that I did not. On the contrary, there is everything about such a venture to attract my type of mind, and making preparations for the long voyage was an unmitigated delight.
The boat which I selected was ketch-rigged—much like a yawl, but more comfortable for lying-to in heavy weather, the sail area being more evenly distributed. Her freeboard being only three feet, we replaced her wooden hatches, which were too large for handling patients, by iron ones; and also sheathed her forward along the water-line with greenheart to protect her planking in ice. For running in high seas we put a large square sail forward, tripping the yard along the foremast, much like a spinnaker boom. Having a screw steering gear which took two men to handle quickly enough when she yawed and threatened to jibe in a big swell, it proved very useful.
It was not until the spring of 1892 that we were ready to start. We had secured a master with a certificate, for though I was myself a master mariner, and my mate had been in charge of our vessel in the North Sea for many years, we had neither of us been across the Atlantic before. The skipper was a Cornishman, Trevize by name, and a martinet on discipline—an entirely new experience to a crew of North Sea fishermen. He was so particular about everything being just so that quite a few days were lost in starting, though well spent as far as preparedness went. Nothing was wanting when at last, in the second week of June, the tugboat let us go, and crowds of friends waved us good-bye from the pier-head as we passed out with our bunting standing. We had not intended to touch land again until it should rise out of the western horizon, but off the south coast of Ireland we met with heavy seas and head winds, so we ran into Crookhaven to visit our colleagues who worked at that station. Our old patients in that lonely corner were almost as interested as ourselves in the new venture, and many were the good eggs and "meals of greens" which they brought down to the ship as parting tokens. Indeed, we shrewdly guessed that our "dry" principles alone robbed us of more than "one drop o' potheen" whose birth the light of the moon had witnessed.
As we were not fortunate in encountering fair winds, it was not until the twelfth day that we saw our first iceberg, almost running into it in a heavy fog. The fall in the temperature of the sea surface had warned us that we were in the cold current, and three or four days of dense fog emphasized the fact. As it was midsummer, we felt the change keenly, when suddenly on the seventeenth day the fog lifted, and a high evergreen-crowned coast-line greeted our delighted eyes. A lofty lighthouse on a rocky headland enabled us almost immediately to discover our exact position. We were just a little north of St. John's Harbour, which, being my first landfall across the Atlantic, impressed me as a really marvellous feat; but what was our surprise as we approached the high cliffs which guard the entrance to see dense columns of smoke arising, and to feel the offshore wind grow hotter and hotter as the pilot tug towed us between the headlands. For the third time in its history the city of St. John's was in flames.
The heat was fierce when we at last anchored, and had the height of the blaze not passed, we should certainly have been glad to seek again the cool of our icy friends outside. Some ships had even been burned at their anchors. We could count thirteen fiercely raging fires in various parts of the city, which looked like one vast funeral pyre. Only the brick chimneys of the houses remained standing blackened and charred. Smoke and occasional flame would burst out here and there as the fickle eddies of wind, influenced, no doubt, by the heat, whirled around as if in sport over the scene of man's discomfitures. On the hillside stood a solitary house almost untouched, which, had there been any reason for its being held sacred, might well have served as a demonstration of Heaven's special intervention in its behalf. As it was, it seemed to mock the still smouldering wreck of the beautiful stone cathedral just beside it. Among the ruins in this valley of desolation little groups of men darted hither and thither, resembling from the harbour nothing so much as tiny black imps gloating over a congenial environment. I hope never again to see the sight that might well have suggested Gehenna to a less active imagination than Dante's.
Huts had been erected in open places to shelter the homeless; long queues of hungry human beings defiled before temporary booths which served out soup and other rations. Every nook and corner of house-room left was crowded to overflowing with derelict persons and their belongings. The roads to the country, like those now in the environs of the towns in northern France, were dotted with exiles and belated vehicles, hauling in every direction the remnants of household goods. The feeling as of a rudely disturbed antheap dominated one's mind, and yet, in spite of it all, the hospitality and welcome which we as strangers received was as wonderful as if we had been a relief ship laden with supplies to replace the immense amount destroyed in the ships and stores of the city. Moreover, the cheerfulness of the town was amazing. Scarcely a "peep" or "squeal" did we hear, and not a single diatribe against the authorities. Every one had suffered together. Nor was it due to any one's fault. True, the town water-supply had been temporarily out of commission, some stranger was said to have been smoking in the hay loft, Providence had not specially intervened to save property, and hence this result. Thus to our relief it was a city of hope, not of despair, and to our amazement they were able to show most kindly interest in problems such as ours which seemed so remote at the moment. None of us will ever forget their kindness, from the Governor Sir Terence O'Brien, and the Prime Minister, Sir William Whiteway, to the humblest stevedore on the wharves.
I had expected to spend the greater part of our time cruising among the fishing schooners out of sight of land on the big Banks as we did in the North Sea; but I was advised that owing to fog and isolation, each vessel working separately and bringing its own catch to market, it would be a much more profitable outlay of time, if we were to follow the large fleet of over one hundred schooners, with some thirty thousand fishermen, women, and children which had just sailed North for summer work along the coast of Labrador. To better aid us the Government provided a pilot free of expense, and their splendid Superintendent of Fisheries, Mr. Adolph Nielsen, also accepted the invitation to accompany us, to make our experiment more exhaustive and valuable by a special scientific inquiry into the habits and manner of the fish as well as of the fishermen. Naturally a good deal of delay had occurred owing to the unusual congestion of business which needed immediate attention and the unfortunate temporary lack of facilities; but we got under way at last, and sailing "down North" some four hundred miles and well outside the land, eventually ran in on a parallel and made the Labrador coast on the 4th of August.
The exhilarating memory of that day is one which will die only when we do. A glorious sun shone over an oily ocean of cerulean blue, over a hundred towering icebergs of every fantastic shape, and flashing all of the colours of the rainbow from their gleaming pinnacles as they rolled on the long and lazy swell. Birds familiar and strange left the dense shoals of rippling fish, over which great flocks were hovering and quarrelling in noisy enjoyment, to wave us welcome as they swept in joyous circles overhead.