-floes, where people gather round cheery Christmas fires with
"one for his nob," "two for his heels," and "a double run of three,"
these ivory crib-boards are sold for from seventy-five to one hundred
dollars each. We have two among our most treasured trophies, and with
them an ivory ring beautifully formed which we saw made. Set in the ring
is a blue stone of irregular shape which was fitted into its ivory niche
with a nicety of workmanship that few jewellers could attain. I had
fashioned for me also a gavel in the shape of a sleeping seal, made of
fossil ivory from the Little Diomedes. The contrast of the weathered
brown of the outside of the ivory with the pure white of the inner
layers, when worked up into a carved design, gives the effect of cameo
and intaglio combined.

We tasted many new Eskimo dishes. When, on our return, we confessed that
the brain of the seal served here is a delicious dish, we ran against
the sensibilities of refined natures. But why is it cruder to enjoy
seal's brains _a la vinaigrette_, than to tickle our taste with brains
of the frolicking calf? The seal furnished a more equivocal dinner than
this, nothing less than entrails _au naturel_, which our hostess draws
through her fingers yard by yard in pure anticipative delight, each
guest being presented with two or three feet of the ribbon-like _piece
de resistance_. The scene that jumps to our memory as we watch this
feast of fat things is connected with food-manipulations in Chicago. It
was down at Armour's in the stockyards that we had seen Polacks and
Scandinavian girls preparing in the succulent sausage a comestible that
bore strange family semblance to that which our friends are now eating
before us, this linked sweetness long drawn out.

[Illustration: Useful Articles Made by the Eskimo

A--Eskimo soapstone lamp which burns seal-oil. The wick is of reindeer
moss.

B--Eskimo knife of Stone Age.

C--Its modern successor, fashioned from part of a steel saw, with handle
of ivory. This is the knife used by the women; note how the old shape is
retained.

D--Eskimo Tam O'Shanter. The band is of loonskins, the cap proper being
carefully constructed from swans' feet. This admirably shows the
cleverness of the Eskimo in adapting natural forms to economic use, each
foot of the swan being a true sector of a circle.

E--Old-time stone hatchet.

F and G--Knives filed from saw-blades, with bone handles.

H--Mortar for pulverising tobacco i