248 LABRADOR 



In relation to ignorance: where once scarcely a single 

 settler could read or write, and where ignorance always 

 meant serious disadvantage in economic relations, travel- 

 ling loan libraries have been established, small schools 

 helped, and now and again, as it was possible, teachers 

 supplied. Indifference and apathy had to be met with 

 education as the corrective message of affection. 



To the absolute helplessness of orphan childhood there 

 can be only one Christian sermon; that was first preached 

 by carrying the child to another country where it could 

 be fed and clothed by an orphanage with a volunteer nurse 

 to mother the children. 



Some of the poverty caused by the impossibility of 

 obtaining remunerative work has been relieved through 

 the industry of the lumber mill, through the industries 

 of schooner, barge, and boat building, sealskin boot mak- 

 ing, and through other small efforts to use the country's 

 own resources. It is hoped that in digging and drying peat, 

 in working the local clay, and in weaving homespuns, 

 much may yet be done; experiments in all these lines are 

 in progress. 



Open hostility to the liquor traffic has always been the 

 attitude of the Mission. In the most populous areas pro- 

 hibition has been secured. Illicit rumsellers have been 

 ferreted out and fined, or otherwise punished. In St. 



punishment, but the debt or balance still holds good in spite of sup- 

 plies having been given, and can be sued for. Also, if in the absence 

 of shops or passing suppliers necessaries of life have to be given by 

 employees, they must be at cost price for cash, the price for outfits 

 being a definite percentage above St. John's prices to cover cost of 

 freight and charges. The trouble is, however, we have good laws 

 but bad customs, and poor execution of law." 



