CHAPTER XXVI 



A LONELY LAND THE COMING OF THE SHIP OUR POSTMAN 

 VISITORS LABRADOR GARDENS THE LANGUAGE. 



EBRADOR is a lonely land. That is its 

 reputation ; but we who live and work there 

 round the year find it such a little world of its 

 own that we have no time to mope and feel 

 lonely. 



Time flies, even in lonely Labrador. 



But however absorbed we might be in our 

 work and in the people around us, however much 

 our thoughts might move in our little Labrador 

 circle, we all of us looked forward to the month of 

 July to bring the great red-letter day of the year, 

 for in the month of July we expected the ship. 

 It seems a wonderful thing that so small a ship 

 as the Harmony a barque of 222 tons, fitted 

 with steam and sails should cross the Atlantic so 

 regularly, and never fail, year after year, to link 

 us up with home and kindred; but so it is. The 

 Harmony is in skilful hands : there are the prayers 

 of God's people behind her : and perhaps that is 

 the explanation of the thing. 



We could never know the day ; but as July 

 dragged by we deserted the jetty on our daily 

 walks, and climbed the hills instead, stumbling 

 through sodden moss and patches of half-melted 

 snow for the sake of a view of the ocean. I know 



that such hill climbing was futile, for the Eskimos 



319 



