AtrousT 17, ISSn.] 



SCIENCE. 



183 



The Cfivo-mon in tlioir retreat, ti<ihUy held 

 by otiier trilies or cliniutie teni[)er, wlien they 

 reached the ohler geologic furinatioiis wliieh no 

 longer gave them the welcome shelter of na- 

 ture's rude houses (the dreary caves), must 

 have looked for it from other means ; and 

 these were only stones and snow-banks. The 

 former may have been used for their more 

 permanent homes ; but the cold interiors of 

 stone huts in such a climate must soon have 

 driven them to the more comfortable and 

 easily built houses that can be excavated from 

 a snow-bank, and so greatly resemble their old 

 cave-homes. 



During the first part of their retreat, the cave- 

 men, cave-men no longer, were in a hilly, 

 half-mountainous country. — - a character of sur- 

 face favorable to the formation of snow-drifts 

 large enough to allow of pit or excavation, in 

 which a family could comfortably reside. Hero, 

 then, was the first igloo, rudely cut into some 

 protecting bank of snow, its walls knowing no 

 other construction than that of nature. >Sucli 

 rough types of arctic architecture are still to 

 be found among the mountains, where wood is 

 unknown. 



As the migrating sea of ice debouched upon 

 the shores of the Arctic Sea. and withdrew its 

 icy blanket from these more northern regions, 

 the ancient arctic man found himself, as he 

 reached those limits near llie 'W'iiite Sea and 

 the mouth of the Petchora. in a flatter country. 

 The snow-drifts no longer lay in such colossal 

 deptlis. They were direct functions of the 

 surface, and flattened with it. It was no longer 

 possil)le to construct a deep enough house by 

 simple excavation. The problem was proba- 

 bly met by digging as far as possible, and com- 

 pleting the structure with banks, witich in time 

 were made of blocks of snow ; for the snow 

 of the arctic winter is not of tiiat plastic nature 

 which will allow one to fashion it at will, as 

 schoolboys their forts and imitation-men, but 

 dense and compact from the extreme cold and 

 the packing wind. Such were the first typi- 

 cal and perfect igloos, a direct outgrowth of 

 the level barren lands of the arctic zone, — 

 features which j'et determine its geographical 

 limits. 



Arctic man stopped on the shores of the sea, 

 for in the rude means at hand he could follow 

 the ice no farther. There was another migration 

 to the north, which was to alfect the character 

 of his dwelling : this was the migration of the 

 forests. As soon as wood I'eached his door, 

 either by direct migration of the forests or by 

 drifting down the great northward-trending 

 rivers, he would naturally use it iu the con- 



struction of his permanent houses, as we see 

 to-day among the natives thus situated. The 

 igloo was probably driven from Eurojie. then 

 from Asia, and is now confined to certain local- 

 ities of North America. 



From writing of the igloos of the Innuits, 

 the natural inference is, that the geographical 

 boundaries of the two would be the same. The 

 huiuits reach from Boring Straits (and even 

 southward .ilong the Alaskan coast and out- 

 lying islands) nearly to those of IJelle Isle, 

 following the sinuous coast of North America 

 at irregular intervals. The}' populate the 

 western shores of Greenland, and once occu- 

 pied its eastern side. Yet this vast stretch of 

 ocean-line must be shorn of the greater por- 

 tion of its length before we can narrow it down 

 to the part occupied by the igloo-building In- 

 nuits. 



The data I have already given re:Jtricting the 

 igloo to the barren grounds devoiil of even 

 driftwood, and the fact that nearly all Esqui- 

 maux tribes are a seacoast-abiding people, will 

 assist us in a rough but fair approximation to 

 its Umits, — limits which can be readily made 

 clear by reference to a map of the arctic re- 

 gions of North America, The mouth of Mac- 

 kenzie is about the dividing-line of the timber 

 to the west and the barren country to the east. 

 For considerable distances on both sides of its 

 mouth, there is a good supply of driftwood. 

 Where this driftwood ceases on the east is the 

 western limit of the igloo, probably fift}" to 

 one hundred miles from the river. From this 

 point they are found all along the coast, on 

 the i)ortions of the I'arry Islands occupied 

 by Esquimaux, the shores of Hudson's Baj- 

 and Straits as far as Marble Island, of Cum- 

 berland Gulf, and many of the estuaries of 

 Haffin's B.ay. The limit on the south is, I be- 

 lieve, Hudson's Strait, and on the cast Baffin's 

 Bay. 



The time during which igloos may be built 

 depends on the length of the winter. In sum- 

 mer the natives use a tent of seal or walrus 

 skin. 



The pole of greatest cold is placed by Bent 

 to the north of the Parry Islands, nearly upon 

 the eightieth parallel, and in about 100° W. 

 longitude. I believe the thermometric obser- 

 vations made in the arctic regions, straggling 

 as the}' have beeu, go far towards' showing 

 that the magnetic and thermal poles are the 

 same. This would bring the lowest temper- 

 atures six hundred miles to the south of the 

 |)osilion assigned by Bent. Wherever it may 

 be, there would the igloo have the longest ex- 

 istence for the year. 



