204 THE CHILDREN OF THE COLD. 



may fall, and from the time there is 

 enough of it, the Eskimo often have to 

 wait three or four weeks before it is fit 

 for building. As it gets too cold in their 

 summer seal-skin tents before this time 

 comes, the natives generally build pre- 

 liminary houses of ice, which, singular 

 as it may seem, .are much warmer than 

 the tents, but not as comfortable as the 

 houses of snow. When the ice has 

 formed to about six inches in thickness 

 on some lake close by, they cut out their 

 big slabs of ice for the sides of the 

 house. Imagine an ordinary-sized house- 

 door to be a slab of ice about six inches 

 thick ; then take a half-dozen to a dozen 

 of these doors, and place them in a cir- 

 cle, joining them edge to edge, but lean 

 ing in slightly, and you will have formed 

 your curious house of ice. Over this 



