This is the simplest kind of living to be found anywhere in the world. Every family in the world needs a certain amount of food, clothes, fuel, shelter, tools, and playthings. In different countries there are different ways of getting these things, depending on the weather, on the things that will grow, and the things that man finds in the ground, or in the woods, or in the sea. Each Eskimo family must make or get all these things for itself.

The Eskimos do not need money because they do not buy nor sell. If two Eskimos should meet and want to trade two dogs for a sled, they would just trade as two schoolboys swap knives. The Eskimos would be much more comfortable if they could trade some of their sealskins for lumber to build houses and for flour and dried fruit to eat with their never ending meat. We cannot trade with them because they are too far away for us to build railroads to their land, and the sea is so full of ice that ships cannot get through it Perhaps the aeroplane will let us see more of the Eskimo.

—J. Russell Smith.
Courtesy of the John C. Winston Co.

Questions

Glance quickly at the first paragraph. How would this do as a title or topic for it: "Doing things for yourself"?

The second paragraph connects the idea that it is very hard to do everything for yourself with the various things told about the Eskimo in the rest of the story. So that you may understand better, the Eskimo is compared with Robinson Crusoe, who had to do everything for himself but had a better chance because of the country in which he lived. A topic for the second paragraph might be, "The Eskimo's life compared with Robinson Crusoe's".

Beginning with the third paragraph, the author tells how the Eskimo lives. It is not necessary to make a topic for every paragraph. We can make a general heading under which some of his ways of living can be grouped. Arrange the heading and the sub-headings as follows:

How the Eskimo manages to live.

(a) His house.
(b) His food,
(c) His clothing.

Now look through the rest of the story, and you will see that it can be included under the following headings:

The Eskimo dog.
Eskimo games.
Why the Eskimo does not buy and sell.

In making an outline it is not necessary to put in every single idea in the piece you are outlining.

Now, after going through the selection to see how the outline is made, you can easily answer the following questions:

1. How does it happen that you do not have to depend on your own family for the things you eat and wear and use? Make a list of the people who help you to get the things necessary for every-day life. Your list might begin with the baker, the milk-man, and the shoemaker.

2. Try to draw a picture of the outside of the Eskimo's winter house as it is described here.

3. Make a list of the things you think an Eskimo boy or girl about your age would do from morning to night—his day's program, you may call it.

4. Do you think the Eskimo is glad when summer comes? Why?

5. Tell a story that a "huskie" might tell of his experiences.

6. Make a list of raw materials, such as wood, that would make the life of the Eskimo more comfortable.

[SCOTTISH BORDER WARFARE]

From your study of the way to make an outline of "The Eskimo", you will be able to make an outline of "Scottish Border Warfare" yourself.

Read the selection through, and then go back and write topics that cover the main points.

Legends of the Scottish borders tell the exciting stories of a warfare that went on for a hundred years, in the days before England and Scotland were united. The "Borders" consisted of that part of the country in the South of Scotland where the boundary was not properly fixed. The King of England might claim a piece of land that the King of Scotland thought was his, and the King of Scotland might do the same by the King of England. And so, because things were never really settled in these parts, and men thought they could do pretty much as they liked, a constant warfare sprang up between the families who lived on the English side of the border and those who lived on the Scottish side. These families formed great clans, almost like the Highland clans, and every man in the clan rose in arms at the bidding of his chief.