The Audubon Reader (63 page)

July 26
. I did not write last night because we were at sea and the motion was too disagreeable, and my mind was as troubled as the ocean. We left Baie de Portage before five in the morning with a good breeze, intending to come to at Chevalier’s settlement, forty-seven miles; but after sailing thirty the wind failed us, it rained and blew with a tremendous sea which almost shook the masts out of our good vessel, and about eight we were abreast of Bonne Espérance; but as our pilot knew as much of this harbor as he did of the others, which means
nothing at all
, our captain thought prudent to stand off and proceed to Bras d’Or. The coast we have followed is like that we have hitherto seen, crowded with islands of all sizes and forms against which the raging waves break in a
frightful manner. We saw few birds with the exception of
Gannets, which were soaring about us most of the day feeding on capelings, of which there were myriads.

I had three
Foolish Guillemots thrown overboard alive to observe their actions. Two fluttered on top of the water for twenty yards or so, then dove and did not rise again for fully a hundred yards from the vessel. The third went in head foremost, like a man diving, and swam
under the surface
so smoothly and so rapidly that it looked like a fish with wings.

At daylight we found ourselves at the mouth of
Bras d’Or harbor, where we are snugly moored. Our pilot not knowing a foot of the ground, we hoisted our ensign and
Captain Billings came to us in his Hampton boat and piloted us in. Bras d’Or is the grand rendezvous of almost all the fishermen that resort to this coast
for codfish. We found here a flotilla of about one hundred and fifty sail, principally fore-and-aft schooners, a few pickaxes, etc., mostly from Halifax and the eastern portions of the United States. There was a life and stir about this harbor which surprised us after so many weeks of wilderness and loneliness—the boats moving to and fro, going after fish and returning loaded to the gunwales, others with seines, others with capelings for bait. A hundred or more were anchored out about a mile from us, hauling the poor codfish by thousands; hundreds of men engaged at cleaning and salting, their low jokes and songs resembling those of the Billingsgate gentry. On entering the port I observed a large flock of small
Gulls, which species I could not ascertain, also
Jagers of two species, one small and one large.

As soon as breakfast was over, the young men went ashore to visit Mr. Jones, the owner of the seal-fishing establishment here. He received them well—a rough, brown Nova Scotia man, the lord of this portion of
Labrador—and he gave John and the others a good deal of information. Four or five species of Grouse, the Velvet Duck, the Long-tailed Duck and the Harlequin, the Wild Goose and others breed in the swampy deserts at the headwaters of the rivers and around the edges of the lakes and ponds which everywhere abound. He also knew of my coming. John and Coolidge joined parties and brought me eight
Redpolls, old and young, which I will draw tomorrow. Query, is it the same which is found
in Europe? Their note resembles that of the Siskin; their flight that of the Siskin and Linnet combined. The young were as large as the old and could fly a mile at a stretch; they resort to low bushes along the edges of ponds and brooks; the hunters saw more than they shot. They brought also
Savannah Finches and White-crowned Sparrows. They saw a fine female
Spotted Grouse, not quite so gray as the last; the young flew well and alighted on trees and bushes and John would not allow any of them to be shot, they were so trusting. They saw a
Willow Grouse, which at sight of them, though at some distance, flew off and flew far; on being started again, flew again to a great distance with a loud, cackling note but no whirr of the wings. They were within three hundred yards of an Eagle, which from its dark color and enormous size and extent of wings, they took to be a female Washington Eagle [i.e., Audubon’s Bird of Washington, a young Bald Eagle]. I have made many inquiries, but everyone tells me Eagles are most rare. It sailed away over the hills slowly and like a Vulture.

After drawing two figures of the female
White-winged Crossbill I paid a visit to the country seat of Mr. Jones. The snow is still to be seen in patches on every hill around us; the borders of the watercourses are edged with grasses and weeds as rank of growth as may be seen in the Middle States in like situations. I saw a small brook filled with fine trout; but what pleased me best, I found a
nest of the
Shore Lark; it was embedded in moss so much the color of the birds that when these sit on it, it is next to impossible to observe them; it was buried to its full depth, about seven inches—composed outwardly of mosses of different sorts; within, fine grass circularly arranged and mixed with many large, soft Duck feathers. These birds breed on high tablelands, one pair to a certain district. The place where I found the nest was so arid, poor and rocky that nothing grew there. We see the high mountains of Newfoundland, the summits at present far above the clouds. Two weeks since, the ice filled the very harbor where we now are and not a vessel could approach; since then the ice has sunk and none is to be seen far or near.

July 27
. It has blown a tremendous gale the whole day; fortunately I had two
Lesser Redpolls to draw. The adult male alone possesses those rich colors on the breast; the female has only the
front head crimson. They resemble the Crossbills, notwithstanding Bonaparte, Nuttall, and others to the contrary. John kept me company and skinned fourteen small birds. Mr. Jones dined with us, after which the captain and the rest of our party went off through the storm to
Blanc Sablons, four miles distant. This name is turned into “Nancy Belong” by the fishermen, who certainly tell very strange tales respecting this country.

Mr. Jones entertained us by his account of traveling with dogs during winter. They are harnessed, he says, with a leather collar, a belly and back band, through the upper part of which passes the line of sealskin, which is attached to the sledge and acts for a rein as well as a trace. An odd number of dogs always form the gang, from seven up, according to the distance of the journey or the weight of the load; each dog is estimated to draw two hundred pounds at a rate of five or six miles an hour. The leader is always a well-broken dog and is placed ahead of the pack with a draught line of from six to ten fathoms’ length, and the rest with gradually shorter ones, to the last, which is about eight feet from the sledge; they are not, however, coupled, as often represented in engravings, but are each attached separately, so that when in motion they are more like a flock of Partridges, all flying loosely and yet in the same course. They always travel at a gallop, no matter what the state of the country may be, and to go downhill is both difficult and dangerous; and at times it is necessary for the driver to guide the sledge with his feet or with a strong staff planted in the snow as the sledge proceeds; and when heavily laden and the descent great, the dogs are often taken off and the sledge glides down alone, the man steering with his toes and lying flat on his face, thus descending head-foremost like boys on their sleds. The dogs are so well acquainted with the courses and places in the neighborhood that they never fail to take their master and his sledge to their destination, even should a tremendous snowstorm occur whilst underway; and it is always safer to leave one’s fate to the instinct which these fine animals possess than to trust to human judgment, for it has been proved more than once that men who have made their dogs change their course have been lost, and sometimes died, in consequence. When travelers meet, both parties come circuitously and as slowly as possible towards each other, which gives the
separate packs the opportunity of observing that their masters are acquainted, when they meet without fighting, a thing which almost always occurs if the dogs meet unexpectedly. Mr. Jones lost a son of fourteen a few years ago in a snowstorm owing to the servant in whose care he was imprudently turning the dogs from their course; the dogs obeyed the command and struck towards Hudson’s Bay; when the weather cleared the servant perceived his mistake, but alas! too late; the food was exhausted and the lad gradually sank and died in the arms of the man.

July 28
. At daylight this morning the storm had abated and although it was almost calm, the sea was high and the
Ripley
tossed and rolled in a way which was extremely unpleasant to me. Breakfast over, we all proceeded to Mr. Jones’ establishment with a view to procuring more information and to try to have some of his men make Esquimaux boots and garments for us. We received little information and were told no work could be done for us; on asking if his son, a youth of about twenty-three, could be hired to guide some of us into the interior some forty miles, Mr. Jones said the boy’s mother had become so fearful of accidents since the loss of the other son that he could not say without asking her permission, which she would not grant. We proceeded over the tablelands towards some ponds. I found three young
Shore Larks just out of the nest and not yet able to fly; they hopped pretty briskly over the moss, uttering a soft
peep
, to which the parent bird responded at every call. I am glad that it is in my power to make a figure of these birds in summer, winter and young plumage. We also found the breeding place of the
Harlequin Duck in the corner of a small pond in some low bushes. By another pond we found the nest of the Velvet Duck, called here the White-winged Coot; it was placed on the moss among the grass, close to the water; it contained feathers but no down as others. The female had six young, five of which we procured. They were about a week old and I could readily recognize the male birds; they all had the white spot under the eye. Four were killed with one shot; one went on shore and squatted in the grass, where Lincoln caught it; but I begged for its life, and we left it to the care of its mother and of its Maker. We also found the breeding place of a
Long-tailed Duck by a very large pond; these breed in companies and are shyer than in the States. The
Pied
Duck breeds here on the top of the low bushes, but the season is so far advanced we have not found its nest. Mr. Jones tells me the
King Duck passes here northwards in the early part of March, returning in October, flying high and in lines like the
Canada Goose. The
Snow Goose is never seen here; none, indeed, but oceanic species are seen here. (I look on the White-winged Coot as an oceanic species.) Mr. Jones has never been more than a mile in the interior and knows nothing of it. There are two species of Woodpecker here and only two, the
Three-toed and the
Downy. When I began writing it was calm, now it blows a hurricane, rains hard, and the sea is as high as ever.

July 29
. Another horrid, stormy day. The very fishermen complain. Five or six vessels left for further east, but I wish and long to go west. The young men, except Coolidge, went off this morning after an early breakfast to a place called
Port Eau, eighteen miles distant, to try to procure some Esquimaux dresses, particularly moccasins. I felt glad when the boat which took them across the bay returned, as it assured me they were at least on terra firma. I do not expect them till tomorrow night and I greatly miss them. When all our party is present, music, anecdotes and jokes, journalizing and comparing notes make the time pass merrily; but this evening the captain is on deck, Coolidge is skinning a bird and I am writing that which is scarcely worth recording, with a horridly bad patent pen.

I have today drawn three young
Shore Larks, the first ever portrayed by man. I did wish to draw an adult male in full summer plumage but could not get a handsome one. In one month all these birds must leave this coast or begin to suffer. The young of many birds are full-fledged and scamper over the rocks; the Ducks alone seem backward, but being more hardy can stay till October when deep snows drive them off, ready or not for their laborious journey. I saw this afternoon two, or a pair, of the Brown Phalarope; they were swimming in a small freshwater pond, feeding on insects, and no doubt had their nest close by, as they evinced great anxiety at my approach. I did not shoot at them and hope to find the nest or young; but to find nests in the moss is a difficult job, for the whole country looks alike.

“The
Curlews are coming”; this is as much of a saying here as
that about the
Wild Pigeons in Kentucky. What species of Curlew I know not yet, for none have been killed, but one of our men who started with John and party broke down and was sent back; he assured me that he had seen some with bills about four inches long and the body the size of a Wild Pigeon. The accounts given of these Curlews border on the miraculous, and I shall say nothing about them till I have tested the fishermen’s stories! It is now calm, for a wonder, but as cold as vengeance on deck; we have a good fire in the stove and I am roasting on one side and freezing on the other. The water of our harbor is actually coated with oil and the bottom fairly covered with the refuse of the
codfish; the very air I breathe and smell is impregnated with essence of codfish.

July 30
. It was a beautiful morning when I arose, and such a thing as a beautiful morning in this mournful country almost amounts to a phenomenon. The captain and myself went off to an island and searched for a
Shore Lark and found a good number of old and young associated, both equally wild. The young were led off with great care by the adults and urged to squat quietly till nearly within gunshot, when at a
tweet
from the parent they took to the wing and were off. These birds are very pugnacious and attack a rival at once, when both come to the scratch with courage and tenacity. I saw one beautiful male in full summer dress which I secured and have drawn with a portion of moss. I intend to add two drawn in winter plumage.

This afternoon we visited Mr. Jones and his wife, a good motherly woman who talked well. Our young men returned from
Port Eau fatigued and, as usual, hungry; complained, as I expected, of the country, the climate and the scarcity of birds and plants and not a pair of moccasins to be bought; so Lincoln and Shattuck are now barefooted.