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The shack was found to have no occupants, but it contained a sheet iron stove such as he had used in his tilts, and that night he revelled in the warmth of a fire and a feast of boiled ptarmigan and tea. "Igloosoaks every night," answered Aluktook. The following morning a westerly breeze was blowing and the Eskimos were uncertain whether to keep to the land or follow the sea ice along the shore.
When winter comes big snow drifts soon cover the igloosoaks, and the snow keeps out the wind and cold. As a further protection, snow tunnels, through which the people crawl on hands and knees, are built out from the entrance to the igloosoak, and these keep all drafts, when a gale blows, from those within.
The dwellings are of three kinds: The tupek skin tent; igloowiuk snow house; and permanent igloo, built of driftwood, stones and turf the larger ones are igloosoaks. Flesh and fish, as is the case with the Indians, form the principal food, but while the Indians cook everything the Eskimos as often eat their meat and fish raw, and are not too particular as to its age or state of decay.
The Eskimos heat their snow igloos, and in treeless regions their igloosoaks also, with lamps of hollowed stone. These lamps are made in the form of a half moon. Seal oil is used as fuel, and a rag, if there is any to be had, or moss, resting upon the straight side of the lamp, does service as the wick. Of course the snow igloos must never be permitted to get so warm that the snow will melt.
Their summer shelters are skin tents, which they call tupeks. In winter they build dome-shaped houses from blocks of snow, though they sometimes have cave-like shelters of stone and earth built against the side of a hill. The snow houses they call iglooweuks, or houses of snow; the stone and earth shelters are igloosoaks, or big igloos, the word igloo, in the Eskimo language, meaning house.
The pounded blubber is placed in zinc vats, and, when the summer comes, exposed in the vats to the sun's heat, which renders out a fine white oil. This oil is put into casks and shipped to the trade. In the depth of winter seal hunting is impossible, and during that season the Eskimo families gather in huts, or igloosoaks, at the mission stations.
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