THE LABRADOR JOURNAL 407 



and also of the enormous destruction of everything here, 

 except the rocks; the aborigines themselves melting away 

 before the encroachments of the white man, who looks 

 without pity upon the decrease of the devoted Indian, from 

 whom he rifles home, food, clothing, and life. For as the 

 Deer, the Caribou, and all other game is killed for the 

 dollar which its skin brings in, the Indian must search in 

 vain over the devastated country for that on which he is 

 accustomed to feed, till, worn out by sorrow, despair, and 

 want, he either goes far from his early haunts to others, 

 which in time will be similarly invaded, or he lies on the 

 rocky seashore and dies. We are often told rum kills the 

 Indian ; I think not ; it is oftener the want of food, the loss of 

 hope as he loses sight of all that was once abundant, before 

 the white man intruded on his land and killed off the wild 

 quadrupeds and birds with which he has fed and clothed 

 himself since his creation. Nature herself seems perish- 

 ing. Labrador must shortly be depeopled, not only of 

 aboriginal man, but of all else having life, owing to man's 

 cupidity. When no more fish, no more game, no more 

 birds exist on her hills, along her coasts, and in her rivers, 

 then she will be abandoned and deserted like a worn-out 

 field. 



July 22. At six this morning, Captain Bayfield and 

 Lieutenant Bowen came alongside in their respective boats 

 to bid us farewell, being bound westward to the " Gulnare." 

 We embarked in three boats and proceeded to examine a 

 small harbor about a mile east, where we found a whaling 

 schooner of fifty-five tons from Cape Gaspe in New Bruns- 

 wick. When we reached it we found the men employed 

 at boiling blubber in what, to me, resembled sugar boilers. 

 The blubber lay heaped on the shore in chunks of six 

 to twenty pounds, and looked filthy enough. The cap- 

 tain, or owner, of the vessel appeared to be a good, sensi- 

 ble man of that class, and cut off for me some strips of 

 the skin of the whale from under the throat, with large 



