the steamer, the lively skipper, a very tender-hearted father
of a family, threw both arms around me with a mighty hug and
exclaimed, "Thank God, we all thought you were gone. A schooner picked
up your flagpole at sea." Poor fellow, he was a fine Christian seaman,
but only a year or two later he perished with his large steamer while
I still rove this rugged coast.

That summer we visited the stations of the Moravian Brethren, who were
kindness personified to us. Their stations, five in number, dated back
over a hundred and thirty years, yet they had never had a doctor among
them. It would scarcely be modest for me to protest that they were the
worse off for that circumstance. Each station was well armed with
homoeopathic pills, and at least those do no harm; while one old
German house-father had really performed with complete success
craniotomy and delivery of a child _en morcellement_, in the case of a
colleague's wife. During our stay they gave us plenty of work among
their Eskimos, and were good enough to report most favourably of our
work to their home Committee.

As there was no chart of any use for the coast north of Hopedale, few
if any corrections having been made in the topographic efforts of the
long late Captain Cook, of around-the-world reputation, one of the
Brethren, Mr. Christopher Schmidt, joined the Princess May to help me
find their northern stations among the plethora of islands which
fringe the coast in that vicinity. Never in my life had I expected any
journey half so wonderful. We travelled through endless calm fjords,
runs, tickles, bays, and straits without ever seeing the open sea, and
with hardly a ripple on the surface. We passed high mountains and
lofty cliffs, crossed the mouths of large rivers, left groves of
spruce and fir and larches on both sides of us, and saw endless birds,
among them the Canada goose, eider duck, surf scoters, and many
commoner sea-fowl. As it was both impossible and dangerous to proceed
after dark, when no longer able to run we would go ashore and gather
specimens of the abundant and beautiful sub-arctic flora, and
occasionally capture a bird or a dish of trout to help out our
diminutive larder.

[Illustration: ESKIMO WOMAN AND BABY]

[Illustration: ESKIMO MAN]

Among the Eskimos I found a great deal of tuberculosis and much eye
trouble. Around the Moravian Mission stations wooden houses had
largely replaced the former "tubiks," or skin tents, which were