14 



LABRADOR: PHYSICAL CHARACTERISTICS AND 

 DISTRIBUTION OF POPULATION. 



CHARACTER OF THE COUNTRY. 



The Labrador peninsula is divided, roughly speaking, into 

 three main districts: (1) the Atlantic coast, commonly known 

 as the Labrador coast; (2) the Ungava district, comprising 

 Ungava bay and the land drained by the rivers emptying into 

 it; and (3) the east coast of Hudson bay with its several large 

 tributary streams, which forms the west coast of the peninsula. 

 By long-standing custom, initiated by the Newfoundland 

 fishermen, the use of the term "Labrador" has come to be 

 restricted to the Atlantic coast, so I shall continue to use it in 

 that sense in this paper, referring to the second section as Ungava, 

 and the third as the east coast of Hudson bay. In dealing 

 with the Labrador Eskimo, we are concerned only with the 

 coast (they are seldom found farther than 30 miles from the 

 shore-line, except during summer hunting trips into the interior), 

 so it appears better to adopt current divisions, even though 

 they may be a little confusing, than to substitute new terms 

 which would be meaningless until generally adopted. 



The Atlantic coast of the Labrador peninsula extends from 

 the Strait of Belle Isle at the mouth of the Gulf of St. Lawrence, 

 to Cape Chidley, at the western entrance of Hudson strait, 

 a distance of some 700 miles. The entire shore is rough and 

 rocky, rising from a height of 1,000 feet in southern Labrador 

 to lofty cliffs and ranges from 3,000 to 5,000 feet high in the 

 northern section 1 . Deep inlets and narrow fiords, fringed by 

 groups of little islands, extend almost continuously up the coast, 

 offering ideal hunting and fishing grounds to the Eskimo. We 

 find them gathered mainly about the trading posts and mission 

 stations situated at the head of the larger inlets and bays. 



The Eskimo formerly inhabited the entire Atlantic seaboard 

 of Labrador, but at present are found only north of Hamilton 



1 Near Cape Chidley, in the extreme northern portion of the peninsula, are the Tornga'it, 

 or "Spirit Mountains," a wild and impressive group, believed by the Eskimo to be the abode 

 of To'rngak, or Tornga'rsoak, "the great To'rngak," the chief spirit consulted by their shamans 

 (see map). 



