140 PARRY'S SECOND VOYAGE. 



presented a scene no less novel than interesting. The 

 women were seated on the beds at the sides of the 

 huts, each having her little fireplace, or lamp, with all 

 her domestic utensils about her ; the children crept 

 behind their mothers, and the dogs, except the female 

 ones, which were indulged with a part of the beds, 

 slunk out past us in dismay. The construction of this 

 inhabited part of the huts was similar to that of the 

 outer apartment, being a dome formed by separate 

 blocks of snow, laid with great regularity and no small 

 art, each being cut into the shape requisite to form a 

 substantial arch, from seven to eight feet high in the 

 centre, and having no support whatever but what this 

 principle of building supplied/' 



These Esquimaux display much skill in fitting and 

 sewing their dresses, and in the manufacture of canoes, 

 weapons, and domestic implements. They eat little else 

 than animal food, and, whenever they can get it, will 

 devour from ten to twelve pounds of flesh or blubber 

 in a day. Their only domestic animal is the dog ; de- 

 prived of this useful creature, their existence would be 

 extremely precarious. On the long journeys which they 

 take in search of food, six of these dogs will draw a 

 sledge with a load of half a ton from seven to eight 

 miles an hour during a whole day. 



Captain Lyon, in the middle of March, undertook a 

 journey across a piece of land lying between the station 

 of the ships and the continent, which had been named 

 Winter Island. The party were scarcely gone, when 

 they encountered a heavy gale, bringing with it clouds 

 of drift, and a cold so intense that they could not stop 

 for a moment without having their faces covered with 

 frost bites ; and their escape with their lives during the 

 night and following day was nearly miraculous. Their 

 sledge was lost in the snow. Some began to sink into 



