All day long the snow sifted down in fine, dense flakes that piled up higher and higher around their house, though there was enough wind to keep it from collecting on the roof, which was very fortunate. They sat in the boat, half nestling in the straw; told stories; made Tug tell them everything he could think of about animals and shooting; invented puzzles, Aleck setting some hard sums; mended clothes—this, of course, was Katy's amusement; and guessed at conundrums. Here Jim outshone all the rest. He was sharper with his answers than any of them, and finally proposed the following:
"Ebenezer Mary Jane, spell it with two letters?"
They knit their brows over it, pronounced it impossible to solve, and gave it up.
"I-t, it," says Jim, and carried off the honors.
Tired of this, they listened while Katy read from the precious book of Norwegian stories, and then chapter after chapter out of the little red Testament.
"'Twouldn't be a bad scheme for some raven to bring us food," said Tug, thoughtfully. "I reckon Elisha's wilderness wasn't a worse one than this ice-plain."
"The Eskimos, Dr. Kane writes, eat the raven himself sometimes, in their snow-deserts, which Elisha wouldn't have done on any account, I suppose."
"No. That would have been like Æsop's fable of killing the goose that laid the golden eggs."
"Yes, so it would," Katy responded; "but the Eskimos have lots of other birds to eat—auks and guillemots, and eider-ducks, and mollemokes."