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Updated: June 19, 2025
She peeked out of the window at the Avenue, as quiet as a country lane at this hour, save for the motors that slid by as on skees and the jog-trot of an occasional hansom-horse. She was crooning when she turned to see her husband come in in a great bath-robe; he might have been a solemn monk, save for the big cigar he smoked.
Numerous Lapp sleighs were scattered here and there, skees were lying on the ground in different directions. Quarters and other large pieces of reindeer meat, out of the reach of wolves, foxes, and dogs, were suspended to the branches of trees. On two racks about eight feet high above the ground were pieces of reindeer meat piled upon each other.
The smooth white expanse suggested a wish that he had brought the skees he was learning to use; then the sight of the line of boulders he would have had to steer around made him rejoice that he had not. Far ahead of him rose the glittering wall of inland ice, that mysterious frozen sea that covers all of Greenland except its very border, and never advances and never recedes.
I replied, "I am certainly coming, for I have never seen such a game before, and I like fun. Yes, boys, I like fun." They laughed heartily when they heard me say this. We made ready, and started on our skees, and after a run of about four miles the Lapps stopped near the edge of a long and very steep hill, at the foot of which was a plain.
Jon and the other two Lapps let their skees slip off their feet, so that they could have a stronger footing, looked round so as to recognize the deer they wanted, and then with their lassos in their hands, ready to be flung, walked very carefully towards two reindeer somewhat apart from the others.
It was a hard pull, the way back. Encumbered with pack and two pairs of skees, which they dared not use in the darkness, he could not give her a helping hand. The snow was still falling, not very thick nor savagely wind-borne, yet stinging their eyes as they crossed open moors and the wind leaped at them. Once Ruth slipped, on a rock or a chunk of ice, and came down with an infuriating jolt.
I wanted to learn as fast as I could, and I thought I would take lessons every day. When he returned the perspiration was dripping from his face, though the cold was 39 degrees below zero. I spent several hours every day on the lake, learning and practising, and when Joseff had time he would come with me; and after three days I was able to manage the skees tolerably well.
'I don't rightly know what country they hail from, but I can truthfully add that I'm not thinkin' of takin' up homestead rights there. "'Aggh, g'long wid yer jokin', says she, as kittenish as anything. 'Yer only foolin', ye are. "'Ma'am, says I, 'if you say the word I shall at once proceed to get my fiery, untamed skees and go gallopin' over the mountains to make you the fourteenth Mrs.
When we reached the lake Joseff said, "Put your feet under the loops, and you must manage to keep them there, just as you would do if you had an old pair of slippers much too large for you. You would have all the time to push your feet forward to keep them on. Do likewise with the skees. Your sharp-pointed Lapp shoes will help you to do this, as they somewhat prevent the slipping of the skee.
When this talk was ended, Pehr Wasara said to me, "Let us take our skees and go to one of my herds near by." After a run of about two miles we came into the midst of a herd of about three thousand reindeer. "There are more," he said with pride. "Are they not fine animals?" "Yes, indeed, they are," I replied.
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