“In Summer in this Wonderful Land”
Once in a while a fierce shaggy white bear goes running over the ice-cakes, or swimming through the water in search of a poor little seal on which to dine.
The Eskimos, paddling swiftly through the water in their strange skin boats, or kayaks, pursue all these animals, and kill them with harpoons and lances.
In winter there is no sun at all, and for four long, long months it is dark all the time, day and night, just as it is here in the night, only the moon and stars giving light. The ground is covered deep with snow, through which the poor deer have to dig with their hoofs for a few mouthfuls of grass and moss, the sea is covered with ice five or six feet thick, the birds have flown away, and the walrus and narwhal have gone far off to the open water. Only a few hungry bears and the Eskimos with their dogs are left; and the cold is so terrible that these would freeze to death in an hour if it were not for their thick warm fur coats, and the blanket of blubber underneath.
“The Ice breaks up and drifts out to Sea”
Far to the north of us, beyond the Arctic Circle, lies a land inhabited by a little tribe of Eskimos, called Arctic Highlanders. These are the most northerly known people on the globe.
“Big Ships that go to hunt Huge Whales”