iameter; on three sides it was open to the bay;
the fourth was enclosed by an elevation about a hundred and twenty
feet high; this could be ascended only by steps cut in the ice. This
seemed a proper place for a solid building, and it could be easily
fortified; nature had adapted it for the purpose; it was only
necessary to make use of the place. The doctor, Bell, and Johnson
reached this place by means of steps cut in the ice. As soon as the
doctor saw the excellence of the place, he determined to dig away the
ten feet of hardened snow which covered it; the buildings had to be
built on a solid foundation.

During Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday, work went on without
relaxation; at last the ground appeared; it consisted of a hard, dense
granite, with the angles as sharp as glass; it contained, moreover,
garnets and large crystals of feldspar, against which the pickaxe
struck fire.

[Illustration]

The doctor then gave them the dimensions and plan of the snow-house;
it was to be forty feet long, twenty broad, and ten deep; it was
divided into three rooms, a sitting-room, a bedroom, and a kitchen;
more was not needed. To the left was the kitchen, to the right the
bedroom, in the middle the sitting-room. For five days they worked
busily. There was no lack of material; the ice walls were thick enough
to resist thawing, for they could not risk being wholly without
protection, even in summer. In proportion as the house rose, it became
agreeable to see; there were four front windows, two in the
sitting-room, one in the kitchen, another in the bedroom; for panes of
glass they substituted large sheets of ice, in the Esquimaux fashion,
which served as well as unpolished glass for the passage of light. In
front of the sitting-room, between two windows, there ran a long entry
like a tunnel, which gave admission to the house; a solid door,
brought from the _Porpoise_, closed it hermetically. When the house
was finished, the doctor was delighted with his handiwork; it would
have been impossible to say to what school of architecture the
building belonged, although the architect would have avowed his
preferences for the Saxon Gothic, so common in England; but the main
point was, that it should be solid; therefore the doctor placed on the
front short uprights; on top a sloping roof rested against the granite
wall. This served to support the stove-pipes, which carried the smoke
away. When the task was completed, they began to arrange