“If that’s what you call a merry tale,” said Ranolf, “then the one I’m going to tell you of Newfoundland will make your eyes drop ‘weeping tears.’ It concerns the fate of—
‘BEN CHRISTIE’S BULL CARIBOU.’
“Ben Christie was first mate of the little coasting steamer Garnet, of the Newfoundland Coastal Service. Born in one of those narrow ‘out-harbors’ that wedge themselves in somehow between the cliffs and the gray sea, his eyes had been bent seaward from the beginning. Inland all was mystery to him—alluring mystery.
“He had never been out of sight of the sea, except when the fog was too thick for him to distinguish it as he leaned over the vessel’s rail. He had grown up with a codline in his hands, in his eyes the alternation of fog and flashing sunlight, in his ears the scream of the seafowl, and the shattering thunder of the surf upon the cliffs.
“Of his native island he knew little but the seaward faces of her rocky ramparts, over which he had often climbed to gather the eggs of puffin and gannet. Of towns he knew but the wharves and water-fronts of St. John’s and Halifax and Harbor Grace. But he was at home in his dory as it climbed the sullen purple-green slopes of the great waves on ‘the Banks,’ and he knew how to follow the seal, and triumph over the perils of the Floating Fields.
“One day in Halifax, in a little inn on Water Street, Ben Christie saw the stuffed and mounted head of a well-antlered bull caribou. It fired his fancy; and from that day forth to shoot a bull caribou became his consuming ambition.
“When he had been serving as mate of the Garnet for about two years, the boiler of that redoubtable craft refused to perform its functions, and she was laid up in St. John’s harbor for repairs.
“Christie’s opportunity had come. He furbished up his old muzzle-loading sealing-gun, long of barrel and huge of bore, and took passage on a little coasting-schooner bound for the West Shore and the mouth of the Codroy River.
“Arrived at the Codroy, he remained in the settlement for a few days, looking for a suitable comrade to go with him into the interior.
“When his errand became known,—which was right speedily, seeing that he could talk of nothing but bull caribou,—he found plenty of practised hunters ready to accompany him on his quest; but none of these were quite to his liking. They all knew too much. They seemed to him to be impressed with the idea that he did not know anything about caribou hunting, and they talked about ‘getting him the finest pair of horns on the barrens.’