s of various English authors, conspicuous
among which were Shakespeare, Byron, Scott, Dickens, Cooper, and
Washington Irving. Sam Slick had a place there, and close beside him was
the renowned Lemuel Gulliver; and in science there were, beside many
others, Brewster, Murchison, and Lyell. The books all showed that they
were well used, and they embraced the principal classical stores of the
French and German tongues, beside the English and his own native Danish.
In short, the collection was precisely such as one would expect to find
in any civilized place, where means were not wanting, the disposition to
read a habit and a pleasure, and the books themselves boon companions.

A charming feature of the room was the air of refreshing _neglige_ with
which sundry robes of bear and fox skins were tossed about upon the
chairs and lounges and floor; while the blank spaces of the walls were
broken by numerous pictures, some of them apparently family relics, and
on little brackets were various souvenirs of art and travel.

"I call this my study," said the Doctor; "but in truth there is the real
shop";--and he led me into a little room adjoining, in which there was
but one window, one table, one chair, no shelves, a great number of
books, lying about in every direction, and great quantities of paper. On
the wall hung about two dozen pipes of various shapes and sizes, and a
fine assortment of guns and rifles and all the paraphernalia of a
practised sportsman. It was easy to see that there was one place where
the native-born Sophy did not come.

The chamber of this singular Greenland recluse was in keeping with his
study. The walls were painted light blue, a blue carpet adorned the
floor, blue curtains softened the light which stole through the windows,
and blue hangings cast a pleasant hue over a snowy pillow. Although
small, there was indeed nothing wanting, not even a well-arranged
bath-room,--nothing that the most fastidious taste could covet or
desire.

"And now," said my entertainer, when we had got seated in the study,
"does this present attractions sufficient to tempt you from your narrow
bunk on shipboard? You are most heartily welcome to that blue den which
you admire so much, and which I am heartily sick of, while I can make
for myself a capital 'shake-down' here, or _vice versa_. If neither of
these will suit you, then cast your eyes out of the window, and you will
observe snow enough to build a more truly Arctic lodgin