Sei'tembbk 14, 1883.] 



SCIENCE. 



341) 



igloo, which had been wi'll chinked and lightly 

 banked (the whole mass nearly homogeneous 

 from long use), slowly subside from the top 

 until tliis touched the floor, and so remain 

 without tumbling in, the igloo being actually 

 inverted in its upper half or two-thirds. Here 



it would remain for a few daj-s before warm 

 weather would cause it to fall to pieces. I 

 have tried to show a cross-section through 

 such an igloo, the broken line showing its 

 original position. 



When food is readily- procured without much 

 effort, as in seasons of great plent}', the natives 

 do not wholly abandon the necessary- exercise 

 to keep them in good muscle and bodily 

 health, as is the general opinion respecting 

 these people, but have been known to keep 

 it up by various gymnastic devices, one of 

 whicii (tight-ropes made of thongs 

 of walrus-hide neatly- and strongl}' 

 lashed within an emptj- igloo) is 

 well i)ortrayed b^' Capt. Hall in 

 the illustration. 



I should like to give a few brief 

 descriptions of those appurtenan- 

 ces that might be strictlj- called 

 igloo accessories, as the native 

 stone lamp and kettle, the well 

 to fresh water through the thick 

 ice, beside the snow -hut and 

 many other minor items all grow- 

 ing out of the igloo itself; but 

 this article has already grown to 

 such dimensions that they must 

 be laid aside. 



The utility of the igloo cannot 

 be exaggerated. Habituated as my little party 

 of while men were, during our two winters in 

 tht!se desolate zones, to a constant life in these 

 simple habitations, and the many comlbrt:s 

 accruing therefrom, 1 have often marvelled 

 how white men could stand the hardships and 



privations of a spring tent-life in the man^^ 

 expeditions wherein they were used, and under 

 circumstances that would have been absolute 

 pleasure to my party. I have read so often 

 of their sufferings while journeying in tents, and 

 the discomforts and even dangers they risked 

 while living in ships 

 and other unsuitable 

 --, arctic abodes, during 



~^V^. short journeys from 



these places, under 

 such intensely low 

 temperatures as 



— .')0°, —00°, or even 



— 70° F., when under 

 almost the same con- 

 ditions my party was 

 prosecuting a com- 

 fortable sledge-jour- 

 ney four hundred to 

 five hundred miles 

 from its base of sui)- 



plics, with no provisions except such game as 

 was killed from day to day, that the conviction 

 becomes two-edged that the accessories of 

 igloos, and their constant companion of the 

 cold, the reindeer clothing, are absolutely 

 essential to a well-managed arctic sledge-joor- 

 ney. With their help, strange as it may 

 seem, the subject of temperature becomes 

 entirely of secondar}- importance, if it enters 

 the arctic travelling problem at all ; and, were 

 it not for the long dark night which accom- 

 panies these Iheriiiomotrical depressions, 1 



IXNUIT TUiHT-ltorES. 



believe that a protracted sledge-journey could 

 be carrieil successfully forward in the contipm- 

 ous cold of the lowest recorded temperature, 

 all other things lieing favorable. 



FlttDICKICK SlJUWATKA, 



Lieut. U. S. Army. 



