Ver to the Nain Mission, expecting to obtain there the supplies they
needed. "I'm sorry," said the missionary, "but I can spare you very
little--almost nothing. The seal hunt was a failure with the people all
down north, and they are starving, and I must take care of them. This
year there are so many needy ones our stock will go only a little way.
I'll divide it the best way I know how, but, God help the poor folk, it
won't go far, and I'm praying God to send caribou or send seals." "We'll
get on somehow," said Skipper Ed. "The timber is back of us and we'll
get rabbits and partridges, and make out. Give the Eskimos what you
have. They're on barren ground and don't have the chance we have.
There'll be better luck for us all by and by. Better luck." And with
only a half barrel of flour and some tea they returned to Abel's Bay to
face the winter and make their fight against nature without complaint.
For no truly brave man will complain when things go wrong in the game of
life. And up there on The Labrador the game of life is a man's game and
every man who wins must play it like a man, with faith and courage. The
weeks that followed were trying and tedious ones. Sometimes there was
not much to eat, when the hunting was poor, but they thanked God there
was always something. But when February came at last there was not food
enough to render it possible for them to make the long journey to the
ice edge with safety. Living now was from hand to mouth. Each day they
must hunt for what they would eat that day. Grouse and rabbits were the
game upon which they usually relied, but Fate had cast this as one of
those years when the rabbits disappear from the land as it is said they
do every nine years. Be that as it may, not one was kil
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