C Ihe Ladies c cu. V'VVAN - History and Classics, Department of

41(8 In and OutThe leisured tourist is an onlooker, moving so quickly from place toplace that he has no time to look about him from a balanced stance. He is all tooready to invest whatever he may see with a glamorous light. Since we were meretourists it took us some time to discover that the north country had other aspectsthan scenery and sunsets, but in course of time we did gain an inkling of thetragedies and hardships endured by many who dwell in that lonely land.Continually we would hear the word "in" applied to the North and "out" appliedto the world we had left when we boarded the steamer; they were words indicativenot merely of space boundaries or of contrast in climate but of a difference inphysical and mental conditions. The mere isolation of families, is, in sickness, amajor problem in the North.One day we met a doctor who had been "in" for 15 years, in charge of a district600 miles long."Don't the patients die before you get to them?" we asked."They do," he replied. "Sometimes they wait for me," he added drily. "For twoyears," he said, "I didn't like it much but now I wouldn't quit the quiet life."Dentists are even more rare than doctors. The mother superior told me: "Ohyes, we have a doctor 600 miles down the river; there is no trouble aboutdentists, you see most of us have all our teeth drawn before we come in, just tomake sure."One of the Grey Nuns with whom we travelled told me her story briefly. Shehad come in 32 years ago in the days when there was no steamer service on theMackenzie and the journey was made by canoe. They had shot the rapids at the