the girls about her there. Suddenly they heard 

 a kind of scratching noise, and a glass pane of 

 the window at tlie other end of the schoolroom 

 was broken inward, and the pieces rattled on the 

 floor. They looked up and saw the nose of some 

 large creature there, sticking in at the hole. 



Mrs. (iambell declares she did not scream, but 

 undoubtedly she, as well as the little girls, was 

 much startled. Two of her pupils hid them- 

 selves under the desk, but Tummasok, a girl be- 

 tween thirteen and fourteen years old, seized the 

 iron rod with which we poked the coal fire and 

 ran resolutely forward to repulse the beast. But 

 before she could reach the window the bear with- 

 drew its nose, and immediately afterward they 

 heard it on the other side of the house, trying to 

 dig under the sill, near where our provisions 

 were stored. Mrs. Gambell locked the door and 

 then listened. 



The beast, not succeeding in digging under the 

 house, ran several times around the schoolhouse, 

 probably in quest of food. Soon it returned to 

 the window and again thrust its nose in at the 

 hole till the sharp edges of the glass cut it — as 

 we discovered afterward. Tummasok struck at 

 it and broke a second pane. Mrs. Gambell, ven- 

 turing forward also, pulled down the curtain. 



The bear again ran around the house and be- 

 gan digging near the door. Their greatest fear, 

 however, was lest the animal should burst 

 through the window. 



Bethinking herself that wild animals are said 



to be afraid of fire, my wife took the lamp in one 

 hand and an old newspaper in the other, and ap- 

 proaching the window, posted herself there to 

 await the bear's return. 



She did not have long to wait ; the bear soon 

 came back to snuflf at the broken glass. Thei'e- 

 upon my wife set fire to the paper, threw the 

 curtain up, and let the paper flame up in front 

 of the glass. Although Tummasok nearly put 

 out the blaze by whacking away at the bear's 

 face with the poker, it probably disconcerted the 

 creature and drove him off. At any rate, when 

 I returned, fifteen or twenty ininutes later, and 

 tried to open the door, there was no bear about. 



My wife and her pupils heard me trying to get 

 in, and Tummasok, thinking that I was the bear 

 returning, whacked hard with the poker upon 

 the inside of the door to scare it away. When I 

 spoke, they cried out for joy, and made haste to ' 

 let me in. About an hour later Neewak shot a 

 polar bear, as large as a cow, near his house. The 

 two shamans had heard it digging into their 

 cache of meat just outside the door. The animal 

 had three or four little cuts in its nose, in which 

 were a bit or two of broken glass. It was the 

 same oile which had frightened my wife. 



During the first week we could hardly tell our 

 small Eskimo pupils apart; their black heads 

 and round, flat faces seemed as much alike as so 

 many peas in a pod. But in intelligence they 

 differed as much as white children do. 



By the tenth of December the men and women 



