A Woman's Way Through Unknown Labrador Part 13

George explained to them that I did not smoke and so had no tobacco to give them, but that I had other things I could give them. Now that we were so near the post I could spare some of my provisions for the supply was considerably more than we should now need to take us to our journey's end. There was one partly used bag of flour which was lifted out of the canoe and laid on the beach.

Then Job handed me the tea and rice bags. Two, not very clean, coloured silk handkerchiefs were spread on the beach when I asked for something to put the tea and rice in, and a group of eager faces bent over me as I lifted the precious contents from the bags, leaving only enough tea to take us to the post, and enough rice for one more pudding. An old tin pail lying near was filled with salt, and a piece of bacon completed the list. A few little trinkets were distributed among the women and from the expression on their faces, I judged they had come to the conclusion that I was not so bad after all, even though I did not smoke a pipe and so could not give them any of their precious "Tshishtemau."

Meantime I had been thinking about my photographs. Taking up one of my kodaks I said to the chief that I should like to take his picture and motioned him to stand apart. He seemed to understand quite readily and stepped lightly to one side of the little company in a way which showed it was not a new experience to him. They had no sort of objection to being snapped, but rather seemed quite eager to pose for me.

Then came an invitation to go up to the camp. As George interpreted he did not look at all comfortable, and when he asked if I cared to go I knew he was wishing very much that I would say "No," but I said, "Yes, indeed." So we went up while the other three remained at the canoes.

Even in barren Labrador are to be found little touches that go to prove human nature the same the world over. One of the young men, handsomer than the others, and conscious of the fact, had been watching me throughout with evident interest. He was not only handsomer than the others, but his leggings were redder. As we walked up towards the camp he went a little ahead, and to one side managing to watch for the impression he evidently expected to make.

A little distance from where we landed was a row of bark canoes turned upside down. As we pa.s.sed them be turned and, to make sure that those red leggings should not fail of their mission, be put his foot up on one of the canoes, pretending, as I pa.s.sed, to tie his moccasin, the while watching for the effect.

It was some little distance up to camp. When we reached it we could see northward down the lake for miles. It lay, like a great, broad river guarded on either side by the mountains. The prospect was very beautiful. Everywhere along the way we found their camping places chosen from among the most beautiful spots, and there seemed abundant evidence that in many another Indian breast dwelt the heart of Saltatha, Warburton Pike's famous guide, who when the good priest had told him of the beauties of heaven said, "My Father, you have spoken well. You have told me that heaven is beautiful. Tell me now one thing more. Is it more beautiful than the land of the musk ox in summer, when sometimes the mist blows over the lakes, and sometimes the waters are blue, and the loons call very often? This is beautiful, my Father. If heaven is more beautiful I shall be content to rest there till I am very old."

The camp consisted of two large wigwams, the covers of which were of dressed deer-skins sewed together and drawn tight over the poles, while across the doorway bung an old piece of sacking. The covers were now worn and old and dirty-grey in colour save round the opening at the top, where they were blackened by the smoke from the fire in the centre of the wigwam.

Here the younger women and the children were waiting, and some of them had donned their best attire for the occasion of the strangers' visit. Their dresses were of cotton and woollen goods.

Few wore skin clothes, and those who did had on a rather long skin shirt with hood attached, but under the shirt were numerous cloth garments. Only the old men and little children were dressed altogether in skins. One young woman appeared in a gorgeous purple dress, and on her head the black and red _tuque_ with beaded band worn by most of the Montagnais women, and I wondered if she had come to the Nascaupee camp the bride of one of its braves. There was about her an air of conscious difference from the others, but this was unrecognised by them. The faces here were not bright and happy looking as at the Montagnais camp. Nearly all were sad and wistful. The old women seemed the brightest of all and were apparently important people in the camp. Even the little children's faces were sad and old in expression as if they too realised something of the cares of wilderness life.

At first they stood about rather shyly watching me, with evident interest, but making no move to greet or welcome me. I did not know how best to approach them. Then seeing a young mother with her babe in her arms standing among the group, near one of the wigwams, I stepped towards her, and touching the little bundle I spoke to her of her child and she held it so that I might see its face. It was a very young baby, born only the day before, I learned later, and the mother herself looked little more than a child. Her face was pale, and she looked weak and sick. Though she held her child towards me there was no lighting up of the face, no sign of responsive interest. Almost immediately, however, I was surrounded by nearly the whole community of women who talked rapidly about the babe and its mother.

The little creature had no made garments on, but was simply wrapped about with old cloths leaving only its face and neck bare. The outermost covering was a piece of plaid shawl, and all were held tightly in place by a stout cord pa.s.sing round the bundle a number of times. It would be quite impossible for the tiny thing to move hand or foot or any part of its body except the face. As one might expect it wore an expression of utter wretchedness though it lay with closed eyes making no sound. I could make almost nothing of what they said, and when I called George to interpret for me they seemed not to want to talk.

Taking out my kodaks I set about securing a few photographs.

Already the old women were beginning to prepare for the feast they were to have. Two large black pots that stood on three legs were set out, and one of the women went into the tent and brought out a burning brand to light the fire under them. Soon interest was centred in the pots. I had a little group ranged up in front of one of the wigwams, when the lady in purple, whose attention for a time had been turned to the preparations for the feast, seeing what was taking place came swiftly across and placed herself in the very centre of the group. All apparently understood what was being done and were anxious to be in the picture.

During the stay at camp I saw little sign of attempt at ornamentation. The moccasins and skin clothing I saw were unadorned. There was but the one black and red _tuque_ with braided band, and the chief's daughter alone wore the beaded band on her hair, which was arranged as that of the women in the Montagnais camp. One woman coveted a sweater I wore. It was a rather bright green with red cuffs and collar, and the colour had greatly taken her fancy. I wished that I had been able to give it to her, but my wardrobe was as limited as I dared to have it, and so I was obliged to refuse her request. In a way which I had not in the least expected I found these people appealing to me, and myself wishing that I might remain with them for a time, but I could not risk a winter in Labrador for the sake of the longer visit, even had I been able to persuade the men to remain.

Already George was showing his anxiety to get away and I realised that it was not yet certain we should be in time for the ship. It might easily be more than five days to the post. I could not know how far the Indian mind had been influenced in gauging the distance by a desire to reduce to the smallest possible limit the amount of tobacco the men would need to retain for their own use. It was not far from the last week in August. Now I felt that not simply a day but even an hour might cost me a winter in Labrador.

When the word went forth that we were about to leave, all gathered for the parting. Looking about for something which I might carry away with me as a souvenir of the visit, my eyes caught the beaded band, which the chief's daughter wore on her hair, and stepping towards her I touched it to indicate my wish. She drew sharply away and said something in tones that had a plainly resentful ring.

It was, "That is mine." I determined not to be discouraged and made another try. Stretched on a frame to dry was a very pretty deer-skin and I had George ask if I might have that. That seemed to appeal to them as a not unreasonable request, and they suggested that I should take one already dressed. The woman who had wanted my sweater went into the wigwam and brought out one. It was very pretty and beautifully soft and white on the inside. She again pleaded for the sweater, and as I could not grant her request I handed her back the skin; but she bade me keep it. They gave George a piece of deer-skin dressed without the hair, "to line a pair of mits," they said.

As they stood about during the last few minutes of our stay, the chief's arm was thrown across his little daughter's shoulders as she leaned confidingly against him. While the parting words were being exchanged he was engaged in a somewhat absent-minded but none the less successful, examination of her head. Many of the others were similarly occupied. There was no evidence of their being conscious that there was anything extraordinary in what they were doing, nor any attempt at concealing it. Apparently it was as much a matter of course as eating.

When I said, "Good-bye," they made no move to accompany me to the canoe.

"Good-bye," said George. "Send us a fair wind."

Smilingly they a.s.sured him that they would. In a minute we were in the canoe and pushing off from sh.o.r.e. As we turned down the lake, all eager to be shortening the distance between us and the post, I looked back. They were still standing just as we had left them watching us. Taking out my handkerchief I waved it over my head.

Instantly the shawls and kerchiefs flew out as they waved a response, and with this parting look backward to our wilderness friends we turned our faces to Ungava.

CHAPTER XVII

THE RACE FOR UNGAVA

Five days to Ungava!

Seated in' the canoe with time to think I could not seem to realise the situation. Indian House Lake! Five days to Ungava!

Oh! how I wanted it to be true. Ungava, in spite of hopes and resolves, had seemed always far away, mysterious, and unattainable, but now it had been suddenly thrust forward almost within my reach.

If true, this would mean the well-nigh certain achievement of my heart's desire--the completion of my husband's work. Yet there were the rapids, where the skill and judgment of the men were our safeguards. One little miscalculation and it would take but an instant to whelm us in disaster. Still we had come so far on the way with success, surely it would be given to us to reach the goal in safety. But here inevitably thought flew to one who had been infinitely worthy but who had been denied.

Five days to Ungava! and because I so much wished it to be true I was afraid, for the hard things of life will sometimes make cowards of its pilgrims.

The Barren Grounds Water was very fair in the morning sunshine. It was as if, while exploring some great ruin, we had chanced into a secret, hidden chamber, the most splendid of them all, and when after lunch the promised fair wind sprang up, and the canoes with well-filled sails were speeding northward, the lake and its guardian hills became bluer and more beautiful than ever.

Nowhere did we find the lake more than two miles wide. Long points reaching out from either sh.o.r.e cut off the view and seemed to change the course; but in reality they did not, for it was always northward. To right and left there were the hills, now barren altogether, or again with a narrow belt of "greenwoods"--spruce, balsam, tamarack--along the sh.o.r.e. In many places skeleton wigwams marked the site of old Nascaupee camps. The hills on the east in places rose abruptly from the water, but on the west they stood a little back with sand-hills on terraces between and an occasional high, wedge-shaped point of sand and loose rock reached almost halfway across the lake. Often as I looked ahead, the lake seemed to end; but, the distant point pa.s.sed, it stretched on again into the north till with repet.i.tion of this experience, it began to seem as if the end would never come. Streams entered through narrow openings between the hills, or roared down their steep sides. At one point the lake narrowed to about a quarter of a mile in width where the current was very swift. Beyond this point we saw the last caribou of the trip.

It was a three-year-old doe. She stood at the sh.o.r.e watching us curiously as we came towards her. Then stepping daintily in, she began to swim across. We soon caught her up and after playing round her in the canoe for a time the men with shouts of laughter headed her insh.o.r.e and George, in the bow, leaning over caught her by the tail and we were towed merrily in the wake. Every minute I expected the canoe to turn over. However, George was soon obliged to relinquish his hold for the doe's feet touched bottom and in a moment she was speeding up the steep hillside stopping now and then to look back with wondering frightened eyes at the strange creatures she had so unexpectedly encountered.

Here where the caribou were rare, George River mosquitoes made life miserable for us. The flies, which in the Nascaupee country had been such a trial to me, had not driven the men to the use of their veils except on rare occasions; but now they were being worn even out on the lake where we were still tormented. Backs and hats were brown with the vicious wretches where they would cling waiting for a lull in the wind to swarm about our heads in such numbers that even their war song made one shiver and creep. They were larger by far than any Jersey mosquitoes ever dreamed of being, and their bite was like the touch of a live coal. Sometimes in the tent a continual patter on the roof as they flew against it sounded like a gentle rain.

The foot of the lake was finally reached on Monday evening, August 21st, at sunset, and we went into camp fifty-five to sixty miles from where we had entered it, and within sound of the first pitch in the one hundred and thirty miles of almost continuous rapids over which we were to travel. That night Job had a dream of them.

He believed in dreams a little and it troubled him. He thought we were running in rapids which were very difficult, and becoming entrapped in the currents were carried over the brink of a fall.

In the morning he told his dream, and the others were warned of danger ahead. My canoe was to lead the way with George in the bow and Job in the stern, while Joe and Gilbert were to follow close behind. When we left our camp an extra paddle was placed within easy reach of each canoe man so that should one snap at a critical moment another could instantly replace it.

This was a new att.i.tude towards the work ahead and as we paddled slowly in the direction of the outlet where the hills drew together, as if making ready to surround and imprison us, my mind was full of vague imaginings concerning the river.

Far beyond my wildest thought, however, was the reality.

Immediately at the outlet the canoes were caught by the swift current and for five days we were carried down through almost continuous rapids. There were long stretches of miles where the slope of the river bed was a steep gradient and I held my breath as the canoe shot down at toboggan pace. There was not only the slope down the course of the river but where the water swung past long points of loose rocks, which reach out from either sh.o.r.e, a distinct tilt from one side to the other could be seen, as when an engine rounds a bend. There were foaming, roaring breakers where the river flowed over its bed of boulder shallows, or again the water was smooth and apparently motionless even where the slope downward was clearly marked.

Standing in the stern of the canoe, guiding it with firm, unerring hand, Job scanned the river ahead, choosing out our course, now shouting his directions to George in the bow, or again to Joe and Gilbert as they followed close behind. Usually we ran in the shallow water near sh.o.r.e where the rocks of the river bed looked perilously near the surface. When the sun shone, sharp points and angles seemed to reach up into the curl of the waves, though in reality they did not, and often it appeared as if we were going straight to destruction as the canoe shot towards them. I used to wish the water were not so crystal clear, so that I might not see the rocks for I seemed unable to accustom myself to the fact that it was not by seeing the rocks the men chose the course but by the way the water flowed.

Though our course was usually in shallow water near the sh.o.r.e, sometimes for no reason apparent to me, we turned out into the heavier swells of the deeper stronger tide. Then faster, and faster, and faster we flew, Job still standing in the stern shouting his directions louder and louder as the roar of the rapid increased or the way became more perilous, till suddenly, I could feel him drop into his seat behind me as the canoe shot by a group of boulders, and George bending to his paddle with might and main turned the bow insh.o.r.e again. Quick as the little craft had won out of the wild rush of water pouring round the outer end of this boulder barrier, Job was an his feet again as we sped onward, still watching the river ahead that we might not become entrapped.

Sometimes when it was possible after pa.s.sing a particularly hard and dangerous place we ran into a quiet spot to watch Joe and Gilbert come through. This was almost more exciting than coming through myself.

But more weird and uncanny than wildest cascade or rapid was the dark vision which opened out before us at the head of Slanting Lake. The picture in my memory still seems unreal and mysterious, but the actual one was as disturbing as an evil dream.

Down, down, down the long slope before us, to where four miles away Hades Hills lifted an uncompromising barrier across the way, stretched the lake and river, black as ink now under leaden sky and shadowing hills. The lake, which was three-quarters of a mile wide, dipped not only with the course of the river but appeared to dip also from one side to the other. Not a ripple or touch of white could be seen anywhere. All seemed motionless as if an unseen hand had touched and stilled it. A death-like quiet reigned and as we glided smoothly down with the tide we could see all about us a soft, boiling motion at the surface of this black flood, which gave the sense of treachery as well as mystery. As I looked down the long slope to where the river appeared to lose itself into the side of the mountain it seemed to me that there, if anywhere, the prophecy of Job's dream must be fulfilled. Cerberus might easily be waiting for us there. He would have scarcely time to fawn upon us till we should go shooting past him into the Pit.

But after all the river was not shallow up in the mountain. It only turned to the west and swifter than ever, we flew down with its current, no longer smooth and dark, but broken into white water over a broader bed of smooth-worn boulders, till three miles below we pa.s.sed out into a quiet expansion, where the tension relaxed and with minds at ease we could draw in long, satisfying breaths.

The travelling day was a short one during this part of the trip, and I wondered often how the men stood the strain. Once I asked Job if running rapids did not tire him very much. He answered, "Yes," with a smile and look of surprise that I should understand such a thing.

The nights were made hideous by the mosquitoes, and I slept little.

The loss of sleep made rapid running trying, and after a particularly bad night I would sit trembling with excitement as we raced down the slope. It was most difficult to resist the impulse to grasp the sides of the canoe, and to compel myself instead to sit with hands clasped about my knee, and muscles relaxed so that my body might lend itself to the motion of the canoe. Sometimes as we ran towards the west the river glittered so in the afternoon sunshine that it was impossible to tell what the water was doing.

This made it necessary to land now and again, so that Job might go forward and look over the course. As the bow of the canoe turned insh.o.r.e, the current caught the stern and whirled it round with such force and suddenness, that only the quick setting of a paddle on the sh.o.r.eward side kept the little craft from being dashed to pieces against the rocks.

On Thursday, August 24th, I wrote in my diary: "Such a nice sleep last night albeit blankets and 'comfortable' so wet (the stopper of my hot-water bottle had not been properly screwed in the night before and they were soaked). Beautiful morning. Mountains ahead standing out against the clear sky with delicate clouds of white mist hanging along their sides or veiling the tops. One just at the bend is very, very fine. It reminds me of an Egyptian pyramid.

Job is not feeling well this morning and it bothers me. I asked him if it were too many rapids. He smiled and said, 'I don't know,' but as if he thought that might be the trouble.

"Later.--Just a little below our camp we found a river coming in with a wild rush from the east. It was the largest we had yet seen and we wondered if our reckoning could be so far out that this might be the river not far from the post of which the Nascaupees had told us. Then so anxious for the noon observation and so glad to have a fine day for it. Result 57 degrees, 43 minutes, 28 seconds. That settled it, but all glad to be rapidly lessening the distance between us and Ungava.

"After noon, more rapids and I got out above one of them to walk.

I climbed up the river wall to the high, sandy terrace above. This great wall of packed boulders is one of the most characteristic features of the lower river. It is thrown up by the action of ice in the spring floods, and varies all the way from twenty feet at its beginning to fifty and sixty feet farther down. One of the remarkable things about it is that the largest boulders lie at the top, some of them so huge as to weigh tons. On the terrace, moss berries and blue berries were so thick as to make walking slippery.

The river grows more magnificent all the time. I took one photograph of the sun's rays slanting down through a rift in the clouds, and lighting up the mountains in the distance. I am feeling wretched over not having more films. How I wish I had brought twice as many.

"While running the rapid George and Job were nearly wrecked. Job changed his mind about the course a little too late and they had a narrow escape. They were whirled round and banged up against a cliff with the bottom of the canoe tipped to the rock and held there for a while, but fortunately did not turn over till an unusually tempestuous rush of water reached up and lifted the canoe from its perch down into the water again. Then tying a rope at either end they clambered out to a precarious perch on a slope in the cliff. By careful manoeuvring they succeeded in turning the canoe round and getting in again, thus escaping from the trap. Joe and Gilbert came through without mishap. Practically the whole river from Indian House Lake is like a toboggan slide. I shall be glad for everyone and especially for Job, when we have left the rapids behind. He says be feels better to-night. Saw fresh caribou tracks upon the terrace. Have been finding beautiful bunches of harebell (Cornua uniflora) in the clefts of the rocks along the river. They are very lovely. Once to-day the lonely cry of a wolf came down to us from high up on the mountain side. The mountains are splendid. We are in the midst of scenes which have a decidedly Norwegian look. Have pa.s.sed one river and several good- sized streams coming in from the east and one of some size from west, but we have seen nothing from the west which could be called a river. Much more water comes in from the east.