APPENDIX IV 393 



stocked library. I found time to reread most of Byron's 

 "Don Juan" and Kipling's Jungle Tales. Rasmussen is 

 an omnivorous reader, his favorite sledge-companion 

 being Xenophon's Anabasis, in the original Greek. 

 When we set out together for the meteorite, he put 

 this volume in his sledge-bag, while I carried with me 

 a copy of Tegner's Fridtjofs Saga. 



We left North Star Bay with a dash. Rasmussen, 

 with some Eskimo blood in his veins, and reared to 

 adolescence in Danish Greenland, is a born dog-driver, 

 and with his eight big husky dogs he led the way. We 

 sped along rapidly over the firm, smooth ice, and in the 

 course of about eight hours reached the bear-cave near 

 Petowik glacier, where we stopped for rest and coffee. 

 The bear-cave is a historical place among the Eskimos, 

 a kind of half-way station between Akpan and Oomenak 

 — that is, between Conical Rock and North Star Bay. 

 All kinds of adventures are related as having happened 

 there in days gone by, and when I entered in through 

 the low, dark passage I did not wonder that the Eskimos 

 regarded the cave with considerable superstition, that it 

 occupied a prominent place in their legends and tradi- 

 tions. They keep a stone lamp, moss for wick, blubber 

 for oil, and other conveniences for those who stop there 

 when traveling. 



From the bear-cave to Akpan, where we stopped at 

 Koolootingwa's igloo, seemed a short ride indeed. Be- 

 cause Koolootingwa and his family lived alone here, his 

 one igloo furnished shelter for his household, our party 

 of half a dozen, and another party who had come in 

 from the east, a total of nineteen people. When the 

 time came to sleep we packed together like a big litter 

 of kittens. Koolootingwa maintained his reputation as 



