SHECATICA AND JACQUES CARTIER 



the shore, a loon called as he flew overhead, 

 and above the constant murmur of the brook 

 could be heard the whistles, groans, and calls 

 of a Labrador jay in the forest. We weighed 

 anchor and drifted down slowly with the tide. 

 The men had caught in nets a couple of dozen 

 two- and three-pound trout, and we were 

 therefore well supplied with food. As we were 

 drifting, Louis Robin and his son George came 

 up to visit us from the telegraph-station at 

 the mouth of the inlet, and the talk wandered 

 from fish to Indians and from caribou to wal- 

 rus. Only this spring a walrus — une vache 

 marine — was shot on an island in Shecatica 

 Bay. They heard what they thought to be 

 a man crying for help, but found a young 

 walrus eight feet long and shot it. One was 

 caught at Harrington in seal-nets four years 

 ago, and still another at Esquimaux Point ten 

 years ago. In Cartier's time they were com- 

 mon on these shores, — he speaks of seeing 

 them near the Bay of Seven Islands, — but 

 they are now nearly restricted to much more 

 Arctic regions. 



The caribou still come down in the winter 

 from the interior to the shore and occasionally 

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