Bobby of the Labrador

by Dillon Wallace

Jimmy was imaginative and emotional, and when they were in peril he could see only the peril, and picture the possible dire results. Bobby, on the other hand, concentrated his attention upon some practical method by which they might extricate themselves, losing sight, seemingly, of what the result might be should they fail to do so.

Bobby had doubtless inherited from his unknown ancestors the peculiar mental qualities that made him a leader. From Abel he had absorbed the Eskimo's apparent contempt of danger. Abel, like all Eskimos, was a fatalist. If he was caught in a perilous position he believed that if the worst came it would be because it was to be. If he escaped unharmed, so it was to be. Therefore why be excited? Bobby had as completely accepted this creed as though he, too, were an Eskimo, for his life and training with Abel was the life and training of an Eskimo boy.

And so the years passed, and Bobby grew into a tall, square-shouldered, alert, handsome, self-reliant youth. He was in nearly every respect, save the color of his skin and the shade of his hair, an Eskimo. He spoke the language like an Eskimo born, his tastes and his life were Eskimo, his ambition to be a great hunter—the greatest ambition of his life—was the ambition of an Eskimo, and he bore the hardships, which to him were no hardships at all, like an Eskimo. He was much more an Eskimo, indeed, than the native half-breeds of the coast farther south.

In one respect, however, Bobby was highly civilized. He was a great reader and an exceptional student. Skipper Ed had seen to this with singleness of purpose.

To him and Jimmy study was recreation. Mathematical problems were interesting to them, just as the solution of puzzles interests the boy in civilization. Just as the boy in civilization will work for hours upon the solution of a mechanical puzzle, they worked upon problems in arithmetic and geometry, and with the same gusto. They studied grammatical construction much as they studied the tracks and the habits of wild animals. They read the books in Skipper Ed's library with the feelings and sensations of explorers. In the first reading they were going through an unknown forest, and with each successive reading they were retracing their steps and exploring the trail in minute detail and becoming thoroughly acquainted with the surrounding country.

This may seem very improbable and unnatural to the boy whose studies are enforced and, because they are compulsory, appeal to him as tedious duties which he must perform. But nevertheless it was very natural. Human nature is obstinate and contrary. Tom Sawyer's friends derived much pleasure from whitewashing the fence, and even paid for the privilege. Had their parents set them to whitewashing fences they would have found it irksome work, and anything but play.

Bobby, indeed, had developed two distinct personalities. In his every-day living he was decidedly an Eskimo; but of long winter evenings, reading or studying Skipper Ed's books, at home in Abel's cabin, or in one of the easy chairs in Skipper Ed's cabin, when Skipper Ed explained to him and Jimmy the things they read, Bobby was as far removed from his Eskimo personality as could be.

Abel and Mrs. Abel never wavered in their belief that God had sent Bobby to them from the Far Beyond, through the place where mists and storms were born. They believed he had been sent to them direct from heaven.

But Bobby was very human, indeed. No one other than Abel and Mrs. Abel would ever have ascribed to him angelic origin, and as he developed it must have caused a long stretch of even their imagination to continue the fiction. There was nothing ethereal about Bobby. His big, husky frame, his abounding and never-failing appetite, and his high spirits, were very substantial indeed.

And as Bobby grew, and more and more took part in the bigger things of life, his adventures grew from the smaller adventures of the boy to the greater ones of the man.