A Womans Way Through Unknown Labrador | Page 9

left little time for writing; but in the early autumn of that year a vacation trip to the north shore of Lake Superior gave him two articles, "Where Romance Lingers," and "Off Days on Superior's North Shore."
In January 1903 the trip to Labrador was decided on, and his preparation for it begun. Before the winter was over his plans were made. On May 13th it was arranged with the magazine that it should go as an Outing expedition. The preparation held for him the many difficulties and trials common to such undertakings, but also, perhaps, more than the usual pleasures.
The big map of Labrador looked back from the wall of the little study in Congers. We stood before it a long time discussing plans and possibilities. Then an eager, happy face was turned to me as he told how he would write the story and how he would have grown when he came home again.
On June 20th he sailed from New York with his little party.
In January following came that short message, "Mr. Hubbard died October 18th in the interior of Labrador."
In March were received the letters containing that final record of his life, which took from the hearts of those who loved him best the intolerable bitterness, because it told that he had not only dreamed his dream--he had attained his Vision.
It was a short, full life journey, and a joyous, undaunted heart that traversed it. Almost the most beautiful of its attributes was the joyousness.
He was "glad of Life because it gave him a chance to love and to work and to play."
He never failed to "look up at the stars."
He thought "every day of Christ."
Sometimes towards evening in dreary November, when the clouds hang heavy and low, covering all the sky, and the hills are solemn and sombre, and the wind is cold, and the lake black and sullen, a break in the dark veil lets through a splash of glorious sunshine. It is so very beautiful as it falls into the gloom that your breath draws in quick and you watch it with a thrill. Then you see that it moves towards you. All at once you are in the midst of it, it is falling round you and seems to have paused as if it meant to stay with you and go no farther.
While you revel in this wonderful light that has stopped to enfold you, suddenly it is not falling round you any more, and you see it moving steadily on again, out over the marsh with its bordering evergreens, touching with beauty every place it falls upon, forward up the valley, unwavering, without pause, till you are holding your breath as it begins to climb the hills away yonder.
It is gone.
The smoke blue clouds hang lower and heavier, the hills stand more grimly solemn and sombre, the wind is cold, the lake darker and more sullen, and the beauty has gone out of the marsh.
Then--then it is night.
But you do not forget the Light.
You know it still shines--somewhere.
CHAPTER II
SLIPPING AWAY INTO THE WILDERNESS
It was on the 15th of July, 1903, that Leonidas Hubbard, Jr., my husband, with two companions, set out from Northwest River Post, near the head of Lake Melville, for a canoe trip into the interior of Labrador, which be hoped would not only afford him an interesting wilderness experience but also an opportunity to explore and map one, and perhaps both, of these rivers, the Northwest River draining Lake Michikamau to Lake Melville, and the George River draining the northern slope of the plateau to Ungava Bay.
Misled by information obtained at the post, which corresponded with the indications of the map he carried, that of the Geological Survey of Canada, Mr. Hubbard took the Susan River, which enters Grand Lake at the head of a bay five miles from its western end. The Susan River led them, not by an open waterway to Lake Michikamau, but up to the edge of the plateau, where they became lost in the maze of its lakes. When within sight of the great lake the party was forced to begin a retreat, which Mr. Hubbard did not survive to complete. He died in the far interior, and the object of his expedition was not achieved.
It seemed to me fit that my husband's name should reap the fruits of service which had cost him so much, and in the summer of 1905 I myself undertook the conduct of the second Hubbard Expedition, and, with the advantage of the information and experience obtained by the first, a larger crew and a three weeks' earlier start, successfully completed the work undertaken two years before.
My decision to undertake the completion of my husband's work was taken one day in January of 1905. That evening I began making my