Little Folks of North America Part 8

During winter the men and boys are busy mending their nets and putting their boats in order. They also go out in the woods to cut down the trees to get fuel enough for the coming year. Yet they have much spare time, so there is a good deal of visiting between the homes, and many merry parties are held where both old folks and young dance and sing and play games.

As soon as the spring opens the fishing season begins. The boats are brought out from winter quarters, the sails are spread, and the harbors seem alive once more. There is work enough for everyone now. The men and boys are on the water from morning till night, while the women and girls are as busy as bees curing the fish after it is brought on sh.o.r.e.

The children of Newfoundland are taught to salute the English flag because they, as well as Canada, are under the rule of Great Britain.

Yet Newfoundland and the peninsula of Labrador never became a part of the Dominion of Canada.

The capital of Newfoundland is the city of St. Johns. Its deep harbor is very beautiful. High cliffs of red sandstone rise on each side and protect the ships anch.o.r.ed in the waters below from the fiercest gales.

The city is built on the slope of a hill on the northern side of the harbor. On the summit of the hill, above the rows of houses in the streets below is a beautiful cathedral where many of the people go to worship on Sunday. In good weather the children of the city, who wake early enough, can turn their eyes out towards the ocean and watch the lovely clouds of the sunrise,-fairy palaces of crimson and gold which vanish from their sight as they are looking.

After the Birds.

Great numbers of visitors come to Newfoundland every year. Many of them are hunters who have heard of the game to be found in the forests and along the sh.o.r.es of the lakes and ponds. The ptarmigan, the wild duck and goose, the plover, the curlew, and still other birds are to be found there.

The best time for bird hunting is after the flies and mosquitoes have said good-by to the country. Then it is that many strangers step off the steamer at St. Johns. With guns and game-bags they make their way towards the "barrens" of the inland country. These barrens are often stretches where there are no trees, and little else grows. The wild birds flock there in great numbers, for they have found that there are wild berries to be had for the picking even in that barren country, and they feast and feast till they are plump and fat and ready for the sportsman's game-bag.

It seems so quiet and safe out on the lonely barrens that the birds are not on the lookout for danger, when suddenly bang, bang! sounds through the air and some of the birds out of a happy flock fall to the ground, while the rest fly away in great fright.

Herds of reindeer wander over the lonely parts of the country in search of the moss that is their favorite food. They have beautiful branching horns and their short legs are very strong. They have a wonderful scent, which warns them of danger, and they easily take fright. Often, when a hunter has crept upon them ever so softly, they have discovered his nearness and away they scudded over the hills and rocks where he would not dare to venture, and he has been obliged to give up the chase for a time, at any rate.

The Indians of the island do much better than the white hunters. They know how to outwit the reindeer and to approach them from such a direction that the wind will not carry the scent. For this reason the white sportsmen have learned that if they wish to be successful they had best take an Indian guide with them. Even then they have to be so careful that they think it great sport, and are very proud when they can show their friends some fine antlers which they have brought home after a hunting trip in Newfoundland.

The Copper Mines.

On the eastern coast of Newfoundland there is a beautiful bay to which the French gave the name of Notre Dame or, Our Lady. It has many arms which reach far into the land; some of these are so deep that they make good places for ships to anchor. Others are very small and the water is so smooth that little children can paddle about in it without fear.

This bay of Notre Dame is now famous for something besides its beauty, as copper mines have been discovered on its sh.o.r.es. One of the richest of these is at Bett's Cove and many men are now at work getting the precious ore and shipping it to other lands.

CHAPTER VII-Little Folks of the United States

Canada is partly separated from the country south of it by a chain of beautiful lakes called the "Five Great Lakes." They are so large that a person can sail many days on them, pa.s.sing from one to another and sometimes losing sight of land. At times the water is so rough that the traveler becomes ill from the rolling of the big steamer and says, "I am seasick," although he is far from the ocean. The northern waters of these lakes wash the sh.o.r.es of Canada, while on the south the children of the United States play on the beaches and swim in the waves.

These children are proud of the fact that they live in the United States, and call their country "The land of the free and the home of the brave." Their people have come from many lands. French, German, Irish, Polish and Jewish boys and girls, besides those of many other countries, sit side by side in the schoolrooms and play happily together with their tops and dolls.

The United States of America, for that is the full name of this country, reaches from the Atlantic to the Pacific, and from Canada on the north to Mexico and the Gulf of Mexico on the south. It is a country of high mountains, fertile valleys, broad plains and mighty rivers. Its children know neither the terrible cold of the far north nor the burning heat of the equator, for they live in the temperate belt of the earth. No season of the year is long enough to tire them, for spring follows close upon the winter, and is soon followed by the pleasant warmth of summer. Then comes the autumn when the leaves change their color and Mother Nature makes ready for her winter's rest. At last the snow falls and covers the earth with her white mantle.

The Mound Builders.

In the long ago a strange people lived in the United States. They left no books to tell their story, but here and there through the country mounds of earth which they built are still standing. Some of them are shaped like birds with wings outspread, others have the forms of fishes, snakes, and human beings. Still other mounds show that they must have been used as altars upon which sacrifices were burned, and others, again, contain tools, dishes, idols and ornaments. Some of the ornaments and dishes were decorated with the finest carvings. Heads of people, frogs and birds are still to be seen on the pipes that have been preserved in the mounds all these years. Tools have been found to show the mound-builders, as we call these people, knew how to work metal, and other things tell the story that the men of that long ago were wise in many ways and could not have been savages. There are earthworks near some of the mounds that seem to have been built as forts, so they probably fought in wars. Yet we can only guess as to their life, for no one knows their history.

The Indians.

When the first white men visited America they found Indians living throughout the country, along the banks of the rivers and on the sh.o.r.es of the ocean. Their homes were for the most part tents covered with bark or the skins of animals. When the boys were still tiny little fellows they learned to use bows and arrows so that as they grew up they would be good hunters and warriors like their fathers.

In some parts of the country the girls helped their mothers tend fields of maize which to this day is called Indian corn. Cakes were made of this and eaten with the fish and game killed by the men.

In other places the women and children gathered the wild rice that grew in the shallow ponds. This, together with the berries picked by the girls, the honey taken from the nests of wild bees by the boys, and the sap from the maple trees, added a good deal to the daily fare of meat and fish.

The red children were taught to bear cold and hunger without complaining. There were days when they feasted and had all the good things to eat they could wish for. But their parents did not understand the need of looking ahead. During the summer the berries and the honey, the fish and the game were plentiful, and the people did not seem to remember that winter would soon follow when the earth's mantle of snow and the ice on the rivers would make it harder for them to get food. So there were times when they and their little ones went hungry to bed and woke up in the morning with no breakfast before them.

The boys grew up with a love of war, and looked admiringly at the men when they went away from the village with hideous, painted faces, and with tomahawks and hatchets at their sides, to take other unfriendly tribes by surprise and to scalp as many of their enemies as possible.

While the boys were busy with mock battles and hunts in the forests after game with their fathers, the girls worked with their mothers weaving baskets and tanning the skins of the wild animals brought home by the men. They also got wood for the fires and helped in the simple cooking. They played games with their brothers, too, and both boys and girls were never so happy as when sitting around the lodge fire, listening to the fairy tales told by their grandmothers and to stories of war and the chase by the "braves," as they called their warriors.

The parents of these red children did not need to work so hard for food and clothing as did the Indians of Canada, because summer in the United States is longer and warmer, and winter is not so cold.

With soft moccasins on their feet the Indians stole noiselessly over the forest paths, and in their light birch canoes they glided along the streams, with never a hat on the head and with light clothing on the body. They feared nothing save the war-whoop of enemies.

There came a day when a white man and his followers appeared in the country. It was Leif, the son of Eric the Red, who had left his home in Greenland and started out in search of adventure. He steered his course southward and came in time to Newfoundland, but the country did not please him. So he continued on his way till he reached the eastern coast of the United States, and there he landed. During his stay Leif and his companions met no other people, but to their great delight they found vines from which hung large cl.u.s.ters of grapes, and for this reason they called the place Vinland. When they were ready to leave they loaded their vessel with grapes, together with lumber from the forests, which was even more precious to them than the grapes, because as you know, there were no trees in Greenland. Then they set sail for home to tell of the land they had visited which had seemed so warm and beautiful to them.

After Leif, other Nors.e.m.e.n came who settled along the sh.o.r.e of this country and lived here for a while. They met the dark-skinned natives with whom they had trouble. After a while they went away, never to come again. During their stay here a Norse baby was born, to whom the name Snorri was given, and this boy was, no doubt, the first white child born in the United States.

After Many Years.

More than four hundred years pa.s.sed by and the red men lived on in their own savage way, hunting, fishing, and making war upon each other. Then something happened which led in time to great changes for the red children. It was in the year 1492 that Columbus discovered a small island of the West Indies, lying southeast of the United States. The natives, who were gentler and less war-like than the other Indians of North America, greeted him with delight and brought him presents of fruit and gold.

Not long after the coming of Columbus many Spaniards, hearing of the rich treasures of the West Indies, followed him there and settled. One of them, named Ponce de Leon, stayed long enough to gain great riches.

But he was fast growing old and all his wealth could not keep him young.

Then he began to listen to the stories the Indians told him of a land not far away, in which there was such a wonderful fountain that a person had but to drink of its waters to live forever. They called it "The fountain of youth."

Ponce de Leon's eyes grew bright. If only he could find that fountain!

He set sail with a few followers, and one beautiful Easter Sunday he came in sight of a land rich in flowers. Such a land, he thought, must be the one to contain the fountain he was seeking.

The sails were furled and the Spaniard and his friends stepped on sh.o.r.e.

"Let us call the place Florida, for it is a land of flowers," he said, and so this peninsula, reaching out from the southeastern part of the United States, has been called Florida to this day.

Ponce de Leon remained in the country for some time, wandering about and drinking the water of stream and lake, yet as you may believe, he failed to discover the fountain he sought. And, alas! instead of youth, he met death, for, as he was about to leave, he was pierced by the poisoned arrow of an Indian who did not trust the white men like his brothers of the West Indies.

Through Ponce de Leon's discovery on that beautiful Easter Sunday other Spaniards followed him to Florida and settled there with their wives and children.

The Coming of the English.

French settlers followed the Spaniards to the New World, but except in Canada, they did not stay long.

Nearly a hundred years pa.s.sed when at last English ships began to visit the country north of Florida. They carried home wonderful stories of necklaces set with pearls as big as peas and worn commonly by the Indian maidens, of countless hares and deer in the woods, of delicious grapes, cuc.u.mbers and melons that grew wild on the vines, and of rich forests of oak trees that grew larger and better than those of England. Then, too, a strange plant grew abundantly in the fields. This plant the Indians put in pipes and smoked.

"A colony should certainly be planted in that beautiful country," Sir Walter Raleigh told the queen.

She listened thoughtfully to what he said, and not long afterwards a party of men and women sailed from England and crossed the ocean to live in Virginia, as the new home was called in honor of the virgin queen, Elizabeth. Governor Dare was the leader.