Chapter I

freeze shaggy Eskimos cliffs
noisy icebergs enormous hoofs

Hundreds and hundreds of miles away in the white frozen north, there is a wonderful land of snow and ice. There strange little yellow people, called Eskimos, live in snow houses, and dress in the skins of animals.

In summer, in this wonderful land, the sun never sets, but shines all the time, day and night. Flowers spring up, and soft-eyed reindeer wander about cropping the short grass.

The ice breaks up and drifts out to sea. Great rivers of ice push forward into the water. Enormous icebergs break off from them and float away like white ships.

The blue waves dance and sparkle in the sun. Singing brooks rush down the mountains. Thousands of noisy sea birds come to the rocky cliffs to lay their eggs.

Glossy seals swim in the water, and once in a while a shaggy white bear goes running over the floating ice in search of seals.

The Eskimos, paddling swiftly through the water in their strange skin boats, hunt these animals for food and clothing.

In winter there is no sunshine at all in Eskimo land. For four long, long months it is dark all the time, just as it is here in the night. The ground is covered deep with snow, and the poor deer must dig through it with their hoofs for grass and moss.

The sea is covered thick with ice, and the birds fly away. The cold is so terrible that the Eskimos would freeze to death were it not for their thick, warm fur coats.

II.

hooded blankets veranda bushy
coffee sealskin September sugar

Here in this wonderful land there was found, one September day, a snow-white baby with big blue eyes.

And such a funny little house it was where she was found. It was only one story high. The walls were more than a foot thick, and the outside was covered with heavy black paper. All around the house was a veranda. Its walls were built of boxes of biscuit, sugar, coffee, and tea.

Inside the house, the little room where the baby lived was lined with soft warm blankets. There was a bright carpet on the floor and pictures on the walls.

All these things, like the boxes of food outside, came in the ship which brought the baby's father and mother to this strange country.

One window of the baby's room looked out upon a great river of ice. From the other window you could see high red and brown mountains. And here was the sea in which strange-looking icebergs floated.