180 IXTKUXATIOXAL TIJEATIES. 



.-pirits, who must not lie allowed to esca|ie torture l)y shifting 

 their ([uarters, liut In- harasseil without remorse. Hard as has 

 Ijeeii the lueasure meted to all her eoluuies hy England, to none 

 lias she been a more unnatural paivnt than to the tirst-born, the 

 ■chihl of lier youthful maternity as a liree(ler of otlier common- 

 Avealths from the liosom of her (jwn, and a ehihl, too, who lias 

 paid a tribute for nearly foui- hundred years fai' exceeding 'the 

 Avealtli of Ormu/ or (jf Ind,' — the liarve^t of the sea, more 

 precious to our inland than the dianninds of (.iolconda or the 

 gohl of Peru. 



TOILKKS OF THK SEA. 



" Xo English Homer has y,^.t arisen to tell the tale of Xew- 

 foundland, shrouded in mystei-y and romance ; the daring 

 invasion and \icissituiles of those exhaustless tisjieries ; the 

 battle of life in that seething cauldi'on of the North Atlantic — - 

 "the Western Ocean'' as the sailors say witli a shi\-ev and a 

 shrug — where the swelling billows ne\-er rest, liut cross and 

 ■criss-cross in I'oaring rivalries, anil the hurricane only slumbers 

 to bring forth the worse dangers of the fog-bank and the iceberg. 

 Eierce as have been during the four centuries the tight for the 

 fisheries by European rivals, their 2>etty racial (quarrels sink into 

 insignificance before the general struggle for the harvest. The 

 Atlantic I'oar hides all minoi- ju'pings. The bi-eed of iisher-folk 

 from tlu'se deep-sea voyagings 'onsist f)f the toughest specimens 

 •of human endurance. All other dangers whieli lure men to 

 venture everything for excitement, or for fortune, the torrid 

 beat or Arctic cold, the battle against man or l)east, the desert or 

 the jungle, all land adventurers are nothing conijiared to the 

 <laring of the hourly existence of tlie heroic souls whose lives are 

 cast U]Kin the Banks of Newfoundland. The tishermeu may 

 seem Avild and reckless, rough auil illitei-ite, Init supreme danger 

 and superlative sacrifice breed noble ([ualitios ; and beneath the 

 rough exterioi of the lisheiman you ^vill never fail to find n iiudi, 

 Ho cheap imitation of the genuine article. None but a man can 

 Jace, for the second lime, the fi'own of the Atlantic — that exhi- 



