Skipper Tom lived in one of the snuggest and coziest of the cottages.  I remember the cottage and I remember Skipper Tom well.  I happened into the settlement one evening directly ahead of a winter blizzard, and Skipper Tom and his good family opened their little home to me and sheltered me with a hospitable cordial welcome for three days, until the weather cleared and the dogs could travel again and I pushed forward on my journey.

Skipper Tom stood an inch or two above six feet in his moccasins.  He was a broad-shouldered, strong-limbed man of the wilderness and the sea.  His face was kindly and gentle, but at the same time reflected firmness, strength and thoughtfulness.  When he spoke you were sure to listen, for there was always the conviction that he was about to utter some word of wisdom, or tell you something of importance.  The moment you looked at him and heard his voice you said to yourself:  “Here is a man upon whom I can rely and in whom I can place absolute confidence.”

If Skipper Tom promised to do anything, he did it, unless Providence intervened.  If he said he would not do a thing, he would not do it, and you could depend on it.  He was a man of his word.  That was Skipper Tom—­big, straight spoken, and as square as any man that ever lived.  That is what his neighbors said of him, and that is the way Doctor Grenfell found him.

Now and again the Methodist missionary visited Red Bay in his circuit of the settlements, and when he came he made his headquarters in the home of Skipper Tom.  On the occasion of these visits he conducted services in the chapel on Sunday, and on week days visited every home in Red Bay.  Skipper Tom was class leader, and looked after the religious welfare of the little community, presiding over his class in the chapel, on the great majority of Sundays, when the missionary was engaged elsewhere.

The people looked up to Skipper Tom.  The folk of Red Bay, like most people who live much in the open and close to nature, have a deep religious reverence and a wholesome fear of God.  As their class leader Skipper Tom guided them in their worship, and they looked upon him as an example of upright living.  So it was that he had a great burden of responsibility, with the morals of the community thrust upon him.

In one respect Skipper Tom was fortunate.  He did not inherit a debt, and all his life he had kept free from the truck system under which his neighbors toiled hopelessly, year in and year out.

He had, in one way or another, picked up enough education to read and write and figure.  He could read and interpret his Bible and he could calculate his accounts.  He knew that two times two make four.  If he sold two hundred quintals[C] of fish at $2.25 a quintal, he knew that $450.00 were due him.  No trader had a mortgage upon the product of his labor, as they had upon that of his neighbors, and he was free to sell his fur and fish to whoever would pay him the highest price.