“What kind of traps?” I asked her.

“Them as is big nets leadin’ inter a pocket where the cod gets jest shut in,” she informed me.

“Wasn’t it horrid to go on such a long trip and stay on a boat so long?” I enquired.

“Sure, but we mostly gets landed there.  They has shacks or little houses, an’ flakes built up, in some places.”

“It must be very disagreeable,” I said.

“Laws, ma’am.  They is allers some hard things about workin’ the best one knows how ter make a livin’ an’ help one’s folks.  The worst of it was havin’ no other wimmin folks ter talk to.”

“Do you mean that you were alone with the crew?”

“Sure, ma’am.  They wouldn’t have no use fer a lot o’ wimmin.  They was a chap once as wanted ter kiss me an’ I hove th’ back of me fist ter his jaw, most shockin’ hard.  It give me sore knuckles, too, but I reckon a girl kin allers take care of herself an’ she has a mind ter.”

I looked at her vigorous shoulders and was disposed to agree with her statement.  It is a splendid thing, Aunt Jennie, for girls to be strong and sturdy enough to help themselves, sometimes, as well as to help others.  I have a notion that it is a good thing that the day is passing away of the girls of the fainting sort who were brought up to backboards and mincing manners.  That girl has self-reliance and willingness stamped all over her, and it is good to see.

The men were going well.  At first I had been surprised at the slowness of their gait, but I soon realized that they could keep it up all day, in spite of their loads.  Yet once an hour they stopped for a breathing spell of a few minutes, during which they wiped their foreheads and sometimes had a pull at their pipes.  We no longer had any view of the sea.  Below us and to one side, Sweetapple River was brawling over rapids, resting in pools, or riffling over shallows.  It wound its way through a little wooded valley, fairly well grown with small spruces and firs whose somber greens were often relieved by the cheery, lighter hue of birches.  The junipers, as they call tamaracks in Newfoundland, were beginning to shed their yellowing needles, and many of them were quite bare, or else dead, with gnarled limbs fantastically twisted.

Several times we put up ptarmigans, that flew away with the curious “brek-kek-kex” that is their rallying cry, showing white spots on their dull-hued plumage, which would soon grow into the pure, snowy livery of winter days.  A few snipe flew up from the side of water-holes, with shrill cries and twisting flights.  Far away on the marsh we saw a flock of geese, pasturing like so many sheep, while one of their number played sentinel, perched high up on a hummock.

“When deer gets alongside o’ geese they is happy,” Sammy informed me.  “Th’ caribou knows nothing kin get nigh so long as the honkers is keepin’ watch.”

After this we were walking on one of many paths we had followed, well-trodden and some inches below the level of the grey moss.