tern coast, and those of Mr. William Cabot on the
section of the northeastern coast between Hopedale and Nain. In this
year of 1912 a new little yacht appeared, the Sybil, brought down from
Boston by her owner, Mr. George Williams. I had promised that if ever
he would sail down to see us in his own boat, we would escort him up
a salmon river for a fishing expedition--a luxury which we certainly
never anticipated would materialize. But on arriving North, there was
the beautiful little boat; and in it we sailed up into the fine salmon
stream in the bay close to the hospital. Subsequently Mr. Williams
came year after year, pushing farther North each time. The Sybil he
eventually gave to the Mission, and built a large boat, the Jeanette,
in which I had the pleasure later of exploring with him and roughly
charting three hitherto unrecorded bays.

One unusual feature of our magisterial work in 1912 was the settlement
of a fisherman's strike "down North." It would at first seem difficult
to understand how fishermen could engineer a strike, they are so
good-natured and so long-suffering. But this time it was over the
price of fish, naturally a matter of immense importance to the
catcher. The planters, or men who give advances to come and fish
around the mouth of Hamilton Inlet, were to ship their fish on a
steamer coming direct from England and returning direct--thus saving
delay and very great expense. But the price did not please the men,
and they knew if they once put the fish on board at $3.50 per quintal,
the amount offered, they would never recover the $5, which was the
price for which fish was selling in St. John's that year. The more
masterful men decided that not only would they not put the fish on
board till they had cash orders or Revillon agreements for their
price, but they would not allow any of the weaker brethren to do so
either. There were but few hard words and no violent deeds, but when
one blackleg was seen to go alongside the waiting steamer, which was
costing a hundred dollars a day to the fish-carrying merchant, a crowd
of boats dashed out from creeks and corners and pounced like a vulture
on the big boat, fat with a fine load of fish, and not only towed her
away and tied her up, but hauled her out of the water with the cargo
and all in her, and dragged her so far up the side of a steep hill
that the owner was utterly unable without assistance to get her down
again.

Each day we had a conference with on