ight and transparent
yellow waterproof, made of the intestines of the walrus, is worn. Men
and boys wear a close-fitting cap covering the ears, like a baby's
bonnet, and have the crown and base of the skull partly shaved, which
gives them a quaint monastic appearance, while every man carries a long
sharp knife in a leather sheath thrust through his belt. The women are
undersized creatures, some pretty, but most have hard weather-beaten
faces, as they work in the open in all weathers. Many have beautiful
teeth, which, however, are soon destroyed by the constant chewing of
sealskin to render it pliable for boots and other articles. They wear a
kind of deerskin combinations made in one piece and trimmed at the neck
and wrists with wolverine, a pair of enormous sealskin moccasins, which
gives them an awkward waddling gait, completing their attire. The hair
is worn in two long plaits, intertwined with gaudy beads, copper coins
and even brass trouser buttons given them by whalemen. Unlike the men,
all the women are tattooed--generally in two lines from the top of the
brow to the tip of the nose, and six or seven perpendicular lines from
the lower lip to the chin. Tattooing here is not a pleasant operation,
being performed with a coarse needle and skin thread--the dye (obtained
from the soot off a cooking-pot moistened with seal oil) being sewn in
with no light hand by one of the older squaws. Teneskin's daughter,
Tayunga, was not tattooed, and therefore quite good-looking, but even
the prettiest face here is rendered unattractive by the unclean
personality and habits of its owner. So filthy are these people that
even the _parkas_ of both sexes are made so that the hand and arm can be
thrust bodily inside the garment, not, as I at first imagined, for the
sake of warmth, but to relieve the incessant annoyance caused by
parasites. Hours of idleness were often passed by a couple of friends in
a reciprocal hunt for vermin.

[Illustration: TENESKIN'S DAUGHTERS.]

I was naturally anxious to avoid the close companionship with the
natives, which residence in a _Yarat_ would have entailed. Teneskin's
hut was the cleanest in the village, but even this comparatively
habitable dwelling would have compared unfavourably with the foulest den
in the London slums. The deep, slushy snow made it impossible to fix up
a tent, but Teneskin was the proud possessor of a rough wooden hut built
from the timbers of the whaler _Japan_, which was wrecked