Ever since then it has been sometimes clear and sometimes stormy, because the old woman had only had time to clean off one-half of the sky.
HOW THE WHITE WHALES HAPPENED
Long, long ago, on St. Lawrence Island, there lived with his grandmother a little blind orphan boy. He was so blind that he could not even see a ray of light.
The grandmother was a wicked old witch, and treated him very badly.
They were frightfully poor, and had to eat muskrats, for they had no one to go hunting food for them.
One day the old woman came in very much excited because she had seen a polar bear with two cubs. Now you must understand that the bear cubs are the baby bears, and are nice and round and plump and juicy and covered with white fluffy fur. The grandmother smacked her lips at the thought of those delicious little bears.
After grumbling about for a while, and scolding the boy because he could not see to go hunting, she handed him a strong bow made from driftwood and some fine arrows tipped with bone, and told him to go out and kill those bears.
“But, Grandmother,” said he, “how can I kill the bears when I cannot see to shoot them?”
“Come out and I will show you.” And she shoved him out of the house.