54 THE NORTH POLE 



In some places on this coast in summer, the grass 

 is as thick and long as on a New England farm. Here 

 bloom poppies, with dandelions, buttercups, and saxi- 

 frage, though to the best of my knowledge the flowers 

 are all devoid of perfume. I have seen bumblebees 

 even north of Whale Sound; there are flies and mos- 

 quitoes, and even a few spiders. Among the fauna 

 of this country are the reindeer (the Greenland car- 

 ibou), the fox — both blue and white — the arctic 

 hare, the Polar bear, and perhaps once in a generation 

 a stray wolf. 



But in the long sunless winter this whole region 

 — cliffs, ocean, glaciers — is covered with a pall of 

 snow that shows a ghastly gray in the wan starlight. 

 When the stars are hidden, all is black, void, and 

 soundless. When the wind is blowing, if a man ven- 

 tures out he seems to be pushed backward by the hands 

 of an invisible enemy, while a vague, unnamable 

 menace lurks before and behind him. It is small 

 wonder the Eskimos believe that evil spirits walk 

 upon the wind. 



During the winter these patient and cheerful 

 children of the North live in igloos, or huts, built 

 of stones and earth. It is only when they are trav- 

 eling, as sometimes during the moonlit period of the 

 month, that they live in the snow igloos, which three 

 good Eskimos can build in an hour or two, and which 

 we built at the end of every day's march on our sledge 

 journey to the Pole. In summer they live in the tupiks, 

 or skin tents. The stone houses are permanent, and 

 a good one will last perhaps a hundred years, with a 

 little repairing of the roof in summer. Igloos are 



