The citizen. (Honesdale, Pa.) 1908-1914, 1913-09-02
PART ONE
CHAPTER |.
On the Labrador.

On the EaprauO-.
( Dictated by Mr.. Jesse Smith.
Don't you write anything down yet,
cause / amt ready.
If wrote this yarn myself, I'd make
: it good and red from tip to tip, claws
out, teeth bare, fur crawling with emo
tions. 1t wouldn't be dull, no, or evil
dence.
But then it's TO please you. and
that's what I'm for.
So 1 proceeds to stroke the fur
\smooth, lay the paws down soft, fold
: up the smile, and purr. A sort OF
truthfulness steals over me- Coin to
be dull, too.
No, I dunno how TO begin. If this
yarn was a rope, I'd coil 1t down be-
! fore began to pay out. You lays the
end, so, and flemish down, ring by ring
until the bight's coiled, smooth, ready
to flake off as 1t runs. / delayed a
.lynching once to do Just that, and re-
lieve the patients mind. 1t all went
off so well!
i When we kids were good, mother
she used to own we came of pedigree
stock; but when we're bad, seems we
took after father. You see mothers
folk was the elect sort of born saved.
They allowed there'd be room in
Heaven for one hundred and forty-four
thousand just persons, mostly from
Nova Scotia, but when they took to
sorting the neighbors, they'd get eX-
elusive.
Anyway, mothers folk as a tribe, Is
nillionaires in grace and pretty we'll
fixed in Nova Scotia. Then she's found
out, secretly married among the goats.
i Her names scratched out of the fam
lily Bible, with a strong hint to the
Lord to scratch her entry from the
Book of Life. She's married a sailor
man, before the mast, Liveyere from
the Labrador, a man without dollar,
&suspected of being Episcopalian.'
In them days the Labrador amt
laid out exactly to suit mother. She's
used to luxury-coal in the lean-to,
taties in the cellar. COWS in the barn,
barter store round the corner, mails,
church. school, and a jail right handy,
j. 80 she can enjoy the ungodly getting
of their just deserts. But in our time
the Labrador was just Gods country,
T. all rocks, ice, and sea, to put the fear
into proud hearts-no need Of teach
ers. 1t kills off the weaklings-no
need of doctors. A school to raise
men-no need of preachers. The law
was work or starve"-no place for
lawyers. It's police, and court, and
hangman all complete, fire and hail,
snow and vapors, wind and storm full.
filling His word.
Fathers home was an overturned
schooner, turfed in, and he was surely
proud of having bigger place than
> any other Liveyere on the coast. There
was the hold overhead for slowing
winter fish, and room downstairs for
the family, the team of seven husky
dogs, and even a cord or two of fire
wood. We kids used to play at New
f'nlanders up in the hold, when the
winter storms were tearing the tops
off the hills, and the Eskimo devi
i howled blue shrieks outside. The hus
kies makes wolf songs all about the
fewness of fish, and we'd hear mother
give father a piece of her mind. That's
= about the first I remember, but al
what mother thought about poor ia
ther took years and years to say.
l used to be kind of sorry for father
You see he worked the bones through
his hide, furring all winter and fish
+ ing summers, and what he earned he'(
get in truck from the company. Al
us Liveyeres owed to the, Hudson Bay
but father worked hardest and h,
4 owed most, hundreds and hundreds o
skins. The company trusted him
There wasn't a man on the coas
more trusted than he was, with moth
er to feed, and SIX kids, besides sever
hushes, and fathers aunt Thessa
lonika, widow with four childrel
and a tumor, living down to Las
Hope beyond the Rocks.
There was secrets about father, an
i If mother every found outl You see
he looked like a white man. curl
yaller hair same as me. and he wa
fearful strong. But in his inside
4 don't ever telli-he was partly smal
boy sames me, and the other half O
him-don't ever let on!-was mour
taineer intun- / seen his three brott
ers, the finest feflers you ever-yes
Scotch half-breeds-and mother neve
knew.
Thar's me on fathers knee, wit
my nose in his buckskin shirt, an
a. even to this day the wood smoke 1
= camp brings back the wuff, wherea
summers his boots smelt fishy. Wha
happened first or afterwards Is a
mixed up, but there's the smoke SINE
and sister Maggie lying in the bunl
all white and froEe
There's fish smell ead Polly VIII
used to waIlop me with a slippe
lying white and froze. And yet
+ knew she couldn't get froze In sun
mer.
Then there's smoke smell, and bi
Tommy, bigger nor father. THROWN