too
stimulating.

[Illustration: ESKIMO DOGS.]

This has been a bright and cold Sunday for November eighteenth. Mr. H.
walked in to nine o'clock breakfast from the Home, coming by dog-team,
and looked well dressed and smiling. No service was held until evening,
so we went out for a walk upon the hill behind the house. B. and L. left
us to go and examine some wood that natives were hauling away from the
beach, thinking it was some of theirs, for each stick is marked, so they
know their own; but it proved not to be their wood, and the two then
came home another way.

While out, we walked through the small burial ground, and saw the
new-made grave of the murdered man. O, how desolate was that spot! A few
mounds, stones, snow and bleak winds forever blowing. Here we read a
headboard, upon which was the name and age of good old Dr. Bingham of
New England, who died here years ago, and whose wife planted wild roses
upon the grave. I wonder if we will see them in bloom next summer, or
will we be under the snow ourselves like these others.

For our dinner today we ate fried tom-cod, baked potatoes, tomatoes,
pickles, bread and butter, and rice pudding. I feel positive that
nothing could have tasted better to our home folks in the States who
have more fruit and vegetables than did this plain and homely meal to
us, eaten with the heartiest appetites gotten out of doors while walking
in the snow. The ice in the bay is getting firmer, and will continue to
grow thicker all winter, being in the spring at breaking-up time many
feet through, no doubt, as it was in Minnesota in the Red River of the
North when I lived there. I am glad that I am a cold climate creature,
and was born in winter in a wintry state, for I will be sure to endure
Alaska weather better than I otherwise would.

This evening we had service again in the church or schoolhouse, and the
room was quite filled. The woman doctor was there, also the storekeeper
and the United States Marshal, besides our own family, and a good many
natives. Mr. H. preached, and was interpreted in Eskimo as usual. I wish
some of my fastidious friends on the outside could have seen the
cosmopolitan company of tonight.

The refined and serious face of the storekeeper, the black-eyed doctor
(woman), the fair-faced Swedes, and the square-jawed, determined
official, made a striking contrast to the Eskimos dressed in fur
parkies, and smelling of seal oil. Many of the latter continually carr