Grenfell visited among the vessels and made friends among the men, who
were like big boys, rough and ready. They were always prepared to go
into daring ventures. They never flinched at danger. Few of them had
ever enjoyed the privilege of going to school, and none of the men and
few of the skippers could write. They could read the compass just as
men who cannot read can tell the time of day from the clock. But they
had their method of dead reckoning and always appeared to know where
they were, even though land had not been sighted for days.

Most of these men had been apprentised to the vessels as boys and had
followed the sea all their lives. There were always many apprentised
boys on the ships, and these worked without other pay than clothing,
food and a little pocket money until they were twenty-one years of
age. In many cases they received little consideration from the
skippers and sometimes were treated with unnecessary roughness and
even cruelty.

From the beginning Doctor Grenfell devoted himself not only to healing
the sick, but also to bettering the condition of the fishermen. His
skill was applied to the healing of their moral as well as their
physical ills. Of necessity their life was a rough and rugged one, but
there were opportunities to introduce some pleasure into it and to
make it happier in many ways. Here was a strong human call that, from
the beginning, Grenfell could not resist.

Using his own influence together with the influence of other good men,
necessary funds were raised to meet the expenses of additional mission
ships, and additional doctors and workers were sent out. Those
selected were not only doctors, but men who were qualified by
character and ability to guide the seamen to better and cleaner and