Work and play in the Grenfell mission; extracts from the letters and journal of Hugh Payne Greeley, M.D., and Floretta Elmore Greeley

Front matter

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Introduction

STILL frozen in, and with the ice in the bays broken by a heavy eea in a late blizzard, and the rivers swollen and dangerous from a sudden rain and "mild," we are completely cut off from the world. I am therefore obliged to write a foreword for Dr. and Mrs. Greeley's book without the pleasure of making myself familiar with the contents.

Dr. and Mrs. Greeley worked in conjunction with us in our endeavor to solve the problem of the "wounded man'^ on a, ^oas^ where a Good Samaritan is badly needed, and without whom he must lie untended. A skillful physician himself, together with Dr. Harrison Webster, a surgeon of very considerable ability, they started and practically built with tlieir own hands not only the clinic, but the actual hospital at the little village of Pilley's Island. It is the centre of many thousands of fishermen, who had sent a deputation North to ask us to try and arrange for them a somewhat similar help to that which was being given by our hospitals.

As the people of Notre Dame Bay are among the friends whom I have most learned to love and respect I personally owe to Dr. Greeley and his wife a very great debt of gratitude for the good

6 Introduction

wprk which they did there. The keen minds of both Dr. and Mrs. Greeley, endowed with all the blessings of modern civilization, should certainly qualify them to write a book of intense interest on their somewhat unique experiences. We shall all be grateful that they have decided to produce a permanent record, which will be welcomed not only by ourselves, but by the large public everywhere interested as they now are in "those who do business in great waters."

Wilfred T. Gebnfell.

St Anthony^ NewfoundlancL