One might think the seals would be wiped out by such methods, but the herd does not decrease and remains at about one million from year to year. The seals live largely on codfish, each one eating an average of four every day. The estimated consumption of cod by the seals is fourteen times greater than the number caught by the fishermen.
CHAPTER V
IRON MINES UNDER THE SEA
I have just returned from a trip through caves richer than those of Aladdin. They lie far under the ocean, and their treasures surpass the wildest dreams of the Arabian Nights. The treasures are in iron ore, from forty nine to fifty two per cent. pure, and so abundant that they will be feeding steel mills for many generations to come.
I am speaking of the Wabana iron mines, located on, or rather under, Conception Bay on the southeast coast of Newfoundland. They are on an island seven miles long, three miles in width, and three hundred feet high. Along about a generation ago deposits of rich hematite ores were discovered in veins that ran down under the water with a slope of about fifteen degrees. They were gradually developed and within the last thirty years millions of tons of ore have been taken out. The under-sea workshops have been extended more than two miles out from the shore and it is believed that the great ore body crosses the bay. The capacity yield at this time averages about five thousand tons for every working day of the year, and the location is such that the ore can be put on the steamers for export almost at the mouth of the mines. The property is owned by the British Empire Steel Company, made up of British, American, and Canadian capital.
But let me tell you of my trip. I left my hotel in St. John’s in the early morning. The rocky promontories that form the narrow entrance to the harbour were canopied in light fog, under which fishing schooners could be seen tacking back and forth, beating their way out to the open sea beyond. As we drove out over the hills the moisture gathered on the windshield of the motor-car so that we had to raise it and take the fog-soaked air full in our faces. We went through King’s Road, where many of the aristocracy of St. John’s reside in big frame houses with many bay windows and much gingerbread decoration. They were set well back from the street, and, in contrast with most of the houses of the town, were surrounded by trees.
As we reached the open country, rolling hills stretched away in the mist. They were gray with rock or red-brown with scrub. Here and there were patches of bright green, marking vegetable gardens or tiny pastures for a cow or goat. The growing season in Newfoundland is short, and the number of vegetables that can be successfully raised is limited. I saw patches of cabbages, turnips, and beets, and several fields of an acre or more that had yielded crops of potatoes. Most of the fields were small, and some no bigger than dooryards. All were fenced in with spruce sticks. The houses were painted white, and had stones or turf banked up around their foundations. A few farms had fairly large barns, but most had no outbuildings except a vegetable cellar built into a hillside or half-sunk in the ground.
Newfoundlanders follow the English fashion of driving on the left-hand side of the road. It made me a bit nervous, at first, whenever we approached another vehicle. It seemed certain that we would run into it unless we swung to the right, but of course it always moved to the left, giving us room on what an American thinks of as the “wrong side of the road.”
We met an occasional motor-car, and many buggies, but every few minutes we passed the universal vehicle of Newfoundland, the two-wheeled “long cart,” as it is called. Strictly speaking, it is not a cart at all, in our sense of the word, as it has no floor or sides. It consists of a flat, rectangular frame of rough-hewn poles, balanced like a see-saw across an axle joining two large wooden wheels. The long cart is the common carrier of all Newfoundland. It is used on the farms, in the towns, and in the fishing villages. One of these carts was carrying barrels of cod liver oil to the refinery at St. John’s, while on another, a farmer and his wife sat sidewise, balancing themselves on the tilting frame.
After a drive of ten miles we reached Portugal Cove, where I waited on the wharf for the little steamer that was to take me to Bell Island, three miles out in the Bay. The men of the village were pulling ashore the boat of one of their number who had left the day before to try his luck in the States. The boat was heavy, and seemed beyond their strength. Some one called out: “Come on, Mr. Chantey Man, give us Johnny Poker,” whereupon one of the men led in a song. On the last word, they gave a mighty shout and a mighty pull. The boat moved, and in a moment was high and dry on the beach.
This was the chantey they sang: