A LABRADOR SPRING 



pleasant to my palate as beaver steaks, which 

 were delicious and suggested goose. As we 

 were eating I suddenly remembered it was 

 Friday, and feared our good friends were com- 

 mitting a grievous sin. Not so, however, for, 

 as Mathias explained, beaver is poisson,as is also 

 the moynak or eider and other sea ducks, but 

 one may not eat of river ducks on Friday, for 

 they are viands. There are more ways than 

 one of whipping the devil around the stump. 

 Of eggs, however, there was no question, and 

 my companion was an ardent collector of egg 

 shells. With a drill he carefully bored a hole 

 in one side of the egg into which a small blow- 

 pipe was inserted; now this blow-pipe was 

 connected with a rubber bulb, which, on com- 

 pression by the hand, forced out through the 

 same hole the contents of the egg. These con- 

 tents were not wasted, far from it, but 

 were received into the frying-pan, and we had, 

 with a clear conscience and as the result of 

 scientific activity on our parts, omelets of 

 eiders', great-black-backed gulls', puffins' and 

 even cormorants' eggs. The last named we let 

 Mathias prepare after a Labrador receipt : flour 

 in generous proportion was mixed with the eggs, 



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