Down North on the Labrador by Wilfred Grenfell

A collection of stories from Wildred Grenfell’s career as a missionary on the Labrador Coast. My thanks to Redcliffe College for providing me with a copy of the book to digitise. This title is in the Public Domain.

Sir Wilfred T. Grenfell [1865-1940], Down North on the Labrador. London: James Nisbet & Co. Ltd., 1912. Hbk. pp.229. [Click to download complete book in PDF]

Contents

1. The Silver Fox
2. The Regeneration of Johnnie Elworth
3. How Jimmy Hampton Made Good
4. A Venture In Economics
5. Given To Hospitality
6. Remedy For Worry
7. On His Beam Ends
8. A Partial Conversion
9. The Sources of Pleasure
10. Suzanne
11. “Brin”
12. Rube Marvin’s Confession
13. “The Spars of the Rose of Torridge

Chapter 1: The Silver Fox

The capture of a fox would not be considered a matter of extreme importance in most countries, but in Labrador it may be and has been more than once the event of a lifetime. If the fox is red, or white, or blue, or cross, or patch, even in Labrador it means little enough, but if it is a silver, and especially if it be black beyond the shoulders, then it looms very large on the horizon of a northern settler’s economy.

And Anthony Dyson had really caught one. Yes, there it was. He had just taken it out of his “nonny” bag, and it lay on the floor of his humble home, a mass of frozen hair and ice. A solid ball like a real Christmas cake, only with dark black hairs protruding through the frosting. For the ice must be thawed off carefully, not to injure the beautiful long hairs. The veriest tenderfoot would not try to knock it off with a tomahawk, as from a common skin. [Continue reading]