my mouth and
eyes. From the first I had eaten the cabbages regular with my food. I
could not cook them, because I had nothing to boil the water in, and
they were rather bitter to eat raw; but they were better than nothing
with the flesh, and I knew that I must eat green food if I wanted to
keep healthy. Among the drift-wood I had luckily found a couple of
broken oars. To these I had fastened with seal sinews two sharp and
strong bones, and they made very fair spears.

"By the end of May the ground was covered deep with snow, and the cold
set in bitter. What had bothered me most of all was where I was to store
my stock of frozen meat and blubber. I knew that there was a chance of
bears coming, and that they would scent it out however I might hide it.
At last I determined to put it in a hole something like that I had made
into a den for myself. This hole was not like mine, on a level with the
ground, but was on the face of a smooth cliff about forty feet high. I
made a rope of seal-skin, fastened it to a projection in the rock over
the hole, and lowered myself down. I found the place would do well, and
was quite big enough for all my store, while the face of the rock was
too steep to climb, even for a bear. So I carried all my stock up to the
top, and climbing up and down the rope, stored it in the hole, except
what I wanted for a week's consumption.

"Well, lads, I passed the winter there. However cold it was outside--and
I can tell you it was bitter--it was warm enough in my den. At the very
coldest time I had two of my lamps burning, but most of the time one
kept it warm enough. I used to nestle down in the feathers and haul a
seal-skin over me; and however hard it blew outside, and however hard
it froze, I was warm there. I used to frizzle my meat over the lamp, and
every day, when the weather permitted, I went out and brought in a stock
of the cabbages. I always kept a good stock of blubber in the den and
several bundles of my wicks.

"One night I heard a sound of snuffing outside my cave, and knew at once
that the bears had come. I had thought over what I should do, and was
ready for them. The hole through the bank into the cave was only big
enough for me to crawl through, and I knew a bear could not come in till
he had scraped it a good bit bigger. I tied a bunch of the flax to the
end of one of my spears, poured a little melted grease from the lamp
over it, and then drew aside the seal-skin over the entrance and