y father is living in Manitoba. My mother died in Iceland when I was
sixteen years old.

We lived near the sea-shore in Greenland. Our house was built of snow.
It was round, perhaps sixteen feet across, and coming to a point at the
top. It was lined with fur on all sides, and was carpeted with a double
thickness of fur.

The way they lined the house was to take a skin of some animal, and hold
it near a fire, which was in the centre of the room. When the skin was
heated through, they took it and pressed it against the wall. In a short
time, it stuck to the wall so tightly that it could not be pulled off
without tearing the skin.

The door was a thick curtain of fur, hung over the doorway, by heating
the upper part, and letting it stick fast to the wall. Outside of the
door was a long, narrow passageway, just high enough for one of us
little Esquimaux people to stand up straight in. That would be about
high enough for a child six years old, in this country; and it was only
wide enough for one person to go through at a time. If one wanted to go
out, and another wanted to go in, at the same time, one would have to
back out and let the other go first. This passageway was not straight;
but turned to one side, so as not to let the wind blow in.

Our fireplace was in the centre of the house. The bottom was a large,
flat stone, with other stones and whalebone put about the edge to keep
the fire from getting out into the room. When we wanted to build a fire,
we would put some whalebone and lean meat on the stone; then a little
dry moss was put in, and then my father would take a flint and a whale's
tooth, or some other hard bone, and strike fire upon the moss. Sometimes
he could do it easily, but sometimes it took a long while. After the
fire started he would put some blubber upon it.

Although it was so very cold, we would often be without a fire, for what
we made the fire of was what we had to live on, and we could not always
afford to burn it. Our fire did not warm the room very much. It was
mostly to give light, so that it might be a little more cheerful in the
room. When we had no fire it was very dark.

There was no chance to play round and romp inside the snow-house. We
just had to sit with our arms folded and keep still. It was in this way
that my arms came to have such a different shape from people's arms in
this country. Where their muscle is large and strong, I have but very
little; and instead of that, I have a