he houses in a
settlement may be occupied; the next year none, or only one or two.

These houses are about six feet high by eight to ten feet wide by ten to
twelve feet long, and one may be constructed in a month. An excavation
is made in the earth, which forms the floor of the house; then the walls
are built up solidly with stones chinked with moss; long, flat stones
are laid across the top of the walls; this roof is covered with earth,
and the whole house is banked in with snow. The construction of the
arched roof is on the plan which engineers know as the cantilever, and
not that of the Roman arch. The long, flat stones which form the roof
are weighted and counter-weighted at the outer ends, and in all my
arctic experience I have never known the stone roof of an igloo to fall
upon the inmates. There are never any complaints made to the Building
Department. There is no door in the side, but a hole in the floor at the
entrance leads to a tunnel, sometimes ten, sometimes fifteen, or even
twenty-five, feet in length, through which the tenants crawl into their
home. There is always a small window in the front of the igloo. The
window space is not glazed, of course, but is covered with the thin,
intestinal membrane of seals, skilfully seamed together. To a traveler
across the dark and snowy winter waste, the yellow light from the
interior lamp is visible, sometimes, a long distance away.

At the farther end of the igloo is the bed platform, raised about a foot
and a half above the earthen floor. Usually this platform is not built,
but is the natural level of the earth, the standing space being dug
before it. In some houses, however, the bed platform is made of long,
flat stones raised upon stone supports. When the Eskimos are ready to
move into the stone houses in the fall, they cover the bed platform
first with grass, which they bring in by the sledge-load; the grass is
then covered with sealskins; above these are spread deerskins, or
musk-ox skins,--which form the mattress. Deerskins are used for
blankets. Pajamas are not in fashion with the Eskimos. They simply
remove all their clothes and crawl in between the deerskins.

The lamp, which stands on a large stone at the front of the bed platform
on one side, is kept burning all the time, whether the family is asleep
or awake. An imaginative person might liken this lamp to an ever-burning
sacred flame upon the stone altar of the Eskimo home. It serves also as
a stove for