Jasper County Democrat, Volume 6, Number 24, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 19 September 1903 — SIMPLE FISHER FOLK [ARTICLE]

SIMPLE FISHER FOLK

THE NEWFOUNDLANDERS ARE EA9> ILY IMPOSED UPON. A Pathetic and Tragic Incident That Illustrates the Attitude of the “Upper” Classes—The Hardy Courage ot the Outportera. “St. John's, N. F., lives by Its fisheries; nothing worth while is produced there, but, according to the unsophisticated stranger, there is a noisy and vituperative wrangling over the wealth that comes down from the coasts,’’ Bays a writer in the World’s Work. “There are Borne few factories, to be sure, but they are too ingeniously managed by half. For instance, a certain brand of tobacco, made at St. John’s and' 1 exclusively consumed by fishermen, is sold in the French island of St. Pierre for half what it costs the Newfoundland ‘bay noddle,’ and the manufacturers pay $15,000 yearly to the proprietor of a rival concern to induce him to keep his plant shut down. At St. John’s, too, is the aristocracy of the colony—merchants, middlemen, lawyers, physicians, officeholders, tricky and abusive politicians and colonial knights (the visitor may observe on a signboard above a little corner store; ‘Sir Thomas Morburn, Grocer. Cheap Teas’). There is neither sympathy nor mercy for the fisherman here, though there is a most enthusiastic reception for what he takes from the sea. He is regarded as legitimate prey, Is most marvelously lied to before election and abused, ridiculed and reviled afterward. But through It all he preserves a humble faith in ‘all those set in authority over him.’ "A doctor of the outports—the incident is related because, though it may appear an extraordinary case, it yet aptly indicates what has for years been the attitude of the ‘upper* classes toward the fishermen, without whom Newfoundland would lie waste and deserted, the shame of the fair earth—a doctor of the outports was once called to a little white cottage where three children lay sick of diphtheria. He was the family physician—that is to say, the fisherman paid him so much by the year for medical attendance. But the injection of antitoxin Is a ‘surgical operation’ and therefore not provided for by the annual fee. “ ‘This,’ said the doctor, ‘will cost you $2 an injection, John.’ “ ‘Oh, iss, zur!’ was the ready reply. ‘l’ll pay you, zur. Go on, zur.’ “ ‘But you know my rule, John—no pay, no work. I can’t break it for you, you know, or I’d have to break it for half the coast’ “ ‘Oh, aye! ’Tis all right. I wants un cured. I’ll pay you when I sells me fish.’ “ ‘But you know my rule, John—cash down.’ “The fisherman had but $4, no more. Nor could he obtain any more, though the doctor gave him ample time. lam sure that he loved his children dearly, but, unfortunately, he had no more than $4, and there was no other doctor for fifty miles up and down the coast " ‘Four dollars,’ said the doctor, ‘two children. Which ones shall it be, John?* “Which ones? Why, of course, after all, the doctor had himself to make the choice. John couldn’t So the doctor chose the ‘handiest’ ones. The other one died. “ ‘Well,’ said John, unresentfully, the day after the funeral, ‘I s’pose a doctor have a right t’ be paid for what he does. But,’ much puzzled, 4 *tis kind o’ queer!* “The Newfoundland outporters are hardy, courageous, boldly adventurous, simple lived, God fearing, warm hearted—a physically splendid race of- men. Cowards and weaklings have for four hundred years been the unfit of the place; they occur, of course, in the best regulated families, but do not long survive, for exposure kills off the weaklings, and in the midst of many dangers the cowards lose their lives. Children learn to sail a punt at six or seven years old, and art every age they are encouraged to play at the highly dangerous game (called copying) of prancing about on floating ice. The skill acquired in leaping from one sinking block to another would make the trumpeted river driver look like a blundering child. As men, they know their punts as intimately as a cowboy knows his horse, and they will say of their boats in a gale, ‘I thought she’d not live through it t’day,’ with the same unconcern that a cowboy might say of his horse, ‘He nearly throwed me that time.’ The race is truly hardy and courageous. It was John Butt, with a broken collar bone and a split forehead to show for it, who survived two wild, snowy nights and a day on a twenty foot ice pan, over which for many hours broke great seas, heavy with Jagged fragments of ice, and it was a reckless Green bay skipper who let the wind blow the masts out of his schooner rather than reef her, because be bad been told that bis crew thought him ‘nervous’—a mad sort of courage, to be sure, but proof positive for all time that he'was no coward.”