“Why, the older men and women look almost alike!” exclaimed Sandy.
“I’ve heard there’s little difference in the appearance of Eskimo men and women,” Dick replied, “but they say you can tell by the sizes of their hoods—the women have extra big ones so they can carry their babies in them during mild weather.”
“Well, boys,” Constable Sloan turned to Dick and Sandy, “I guess we can camp here for the night anyway. Sipsa, the man I’ve been talking to, gives us a hearty welcome, especially after I told him we had some shiny, new knives and hatchets in our packs.”
“What I’d like to do first is look around inside one of those snow houses,” said Dick. “Do you suppose Sandy and I might go into one?”
“I think I can fix that alright,” agreed Constable Sloan, and turned to Sipsa. Followed a few words in the Eskimo tongue. Sipsa seemed delighted at the opportunity to show the boys the inside of his strange home, and soon Dick and Sandy were on their hands and knees, crawling through the door of a most unusual residence.
They found the interior of the igloo to be much larger than it appeared from an outside estimation, due to the fact that it was cut down several feet into a solid snowdrift. A small, soapstone lamp, shaped like a clam shell, was burning, having a wick of moss which absorbed the seal oil fuel. The boys were surprised at the amount of heat the lamp radiated. The furniture consisted of a long bench-like lounge, covered with caribou and musk-ox hides. Here and there lay harpoons, knives, whalebone dishes and spoons, and crude implements, the use of which the boys did not know. There were two windows with panes made of opaque ice. The atmosphere was heavy with the strong smell of fresh blubber, and Dick and Sandy did not care to remain inside very long.
“Phew!” snorted Dick, as he reached the open air. “I couldn’t stand to live in a smell like that.”
“Nor I,” agreed Sandy, “but just the same I think one of those snow houses would be just the thing for us to live in while in this cold country. The camp stoves would make plenty of heat, and we ought to be cozy as anything in an igloo that was minus that awful stink.”
“Unless a skunk happened to slip into bed with us,” added Dick drolly.