hman who had gone
to Labrador as a sailor lad on a fishing schooner to serve a
three-years' apprenticeship. He did not go home with his ship, and
year after year postponed his return, until at last he married an
Eskimo and bound himself fast to the cold rocks of Labrador, where he
will spend the remainder of his life, eking out a miserable existence,
a lonely exile from his native England.

After he had greeted us, Lloyd asked: "Is all the world at peace, sir?"
He had heard of the Boer war, and was pleased when we told him that it
had ended in a victory for the British arms. His hunger for news
touched us deeply, and we told him all that we could recall of recent
affairs of public interest. I have said that his hunger for news
touched us. As a matter of fact, few things have impressed me as being
more pathetic than that old man's life up there on that isolated and
desolate island, where he spends most of his time wistfully longing to
hear something of the great world, and painfully recalling the pleasant
memories of his childhood's home and friends, and the green fields and
spring blossoms he never will know again. And Lloyd's story is the
story of perhaps the majority of the settlers on The Labrador.

The old man had a fresh-caught salmon, and we bought it from him. We
then sat for a few minutes in his cabin. This was a miserable affair,
not exceeding eight by ten feet, and, like Steve's home, so low we
could not stand erect in it. The floor was paved with large, flat
stones, and the only vent for the smoke from the wretched fireplace was
a hole in the roof. Midway between the fire and the hole hung a trout
drying. In this room Lloyd and his Eskimo wife live out their life.
During our visit the wife sat there without uttering a word. Her
silence was characteristic; for, somewhat unlike our women, the women
of Labrador talk but little.

When we had bidden Lloyd farewell, we carried the salmon we had
obtained from him back to camp, where Hubbard tried to plank it on a
bit of wreckage picked up on the shore. It fell into the fire, and
there was great excitement until, by our united efforts, we had rescued
it, and had seen part of it safely reposing in the frying pan, while
Steve set to work boiling the remainder in our kettle with slices of
bacon. As the gale continued to blow, it was decided that we should
remain in camp until early morning. Hubbard directed Steve to pull the
boat around to a place where