A Little Ship With a Big Record.

Hokitika Guardian, 18 April 1922, Page 4

A Little Ship With a Big Record.

Which is the smallest ship that j crosses the Atlantic;-' Well, she lias | recently arrived in the Thames alter a i very stormy voyage. Hefure this trip she had made her usual journey up the Labrador const, for upon this ship depend the lives of several small communities. Her name is the Harmony, and she is owned by the Moravian Missionary Society. It very June site starts out Irom London and battles her way across the Atlantic. taking food and the necessities of life to the settlements of .Vlakkovik. Hupcdale, Nairn, Hebron, and killinek. j that strange spot where summer lasts j only six weeks. j

She is mi old whaler of 2(H) tons burden, with auxiliary steam, but . she , I mostly makes the journey straight to ; Labrador under sail. I When I crossed in her (in order to , i arrive early in Labrador for purposes ol j : shooting) she lay for eight days within j sight of the coast of Ireland, and took ' in all five weeks and two days to find j her way across the two thousand odd ! miles tiiat separate London from Hopcj dale. She often takes longer, for it is I rare that on her outward journey she ' is not beset h.v the ice as she ap- ! proaeltos the Labrador coast. I ||er captain, one of the finest ic--5 sailors of onr time, has spent nut in ! years of his life in taking cargo after j eurgo up the most dangerous coast m ' the world. ! Sometimes for days Captain -Jackson ' 1 will find his way ‘‘hy smell,” as they say, through the fogs and up the h' rd mid channels, or "tickles,” ol that most : rocky coast, lie is far safer indeed il ' |m trusts to his own instinct. than il i !;e- tises what charts there are. When I was on hoard, he was steaming for once hy the chart, and the consoqucnce was he struck a 'ridden iem and carried away a great part id the ! forefoot of his vessel. Any oilier vessel : would have sunk, hut tin- Harmony is j oft thick of solid oak. and she made Naiii. and was patched up hy the Kskiimis and carried out her jtiurn-y triumphantly. The arrival of the Harmony i‘- always a great day in Labrador, v, here the settlements have h'wn without news lor nianv weary months ol vunt: r.. 1 no 1 moment an lv-!;imo sees rhe siiTp ne tires oil' his gun, and emitinues to fire it off until all his ammunition is expended. (Joiug out. the Harmony carries, as I i have said, the necessities of lil" for the j Kskimo .Mission. Cowing hack, in r ! cargo is made up purely o! what the hunter can win from the country. Manv a tine Mark fox worth as much as Sllll dollars has travelled home in | the old Harmony. White luxes, mink, ' wolf skins, tlm antlers of stags; such | is li%r cargo on her return. And can there ho any liner work than I this which is carried out by Captain j Jackson and his able lieutenant, the I mate, Mr Hush ? i On him alone denonds the lilc ol six

settlements. It lie tailed to come, there would lie hard days upon the coast. Labrador is only approachable during the four months of the year; after that ii. is cm off from the world. Did the Harmony fail to arrive, what a tragedy! lint vhe Harmony, for all her small si/.e ; has never failed to arrive these many years. Kail - weather or loul—and how loul it can he in Labrador only those who have experienced it know, with its fogs end ice and eight-day gales—she lights her way through, and one mornj ing in duly, or August, or September, i according as the station is north or south, there is a fusillade of gun shots mixed with the cries of the Eskimo whose keen eyes have seen from some promontory what may fairly be termed "Tim Ship of Life.”