Read Ebook: The Snow Baby: A true story with true pictures by Peary Josephine Diebitsch

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THE SNOW BABY

THE SNOW BABY

FOURTH EDITION

THE SNOW BABY

Hundreds and hundreds of miles away in the white frozen north, far beyond where the big ships go to hunt huge black whales, there is a wonderful land of snow and ice, mountains, glaciers, and icebergs; where strange little brown people called Eskimos, dressed all in the skins of animals, live in snow houses.

In summer in this wonderful land the sun never sets, but shines all the time day and night; the snow melts off the ground; blue and white and yellow flowers spring up; and soft-eyed, brown-coated reindeer wander about, cropping the short grass.

The ice breaks up and drifts out to sea; glaciers or rivers of ice push forward, creaking and groaning, into the water, till enormous icebergs break off from them and float away like white ships. The blue waves dance and sparkle in the sun, and everywhere singing brooks rush down the mountains or fall in silvery cascades over the cliffs, where millions and millions of noisy seabirds come to lay their eggs.

Big black walrus, larger than oxen, crawl out upon the ice, and sleep in the sun, or fight with their long ivory tusks, and bellow till you can hear them miles away.

Glossy mottled seals swim in the water, and schools of narwhal, which used to be called unicorns, dart from place to place faster than the fastest steam yacht; with their long white ivory horns, longer than a man is tall, flashing like spears in and out of the water.

Once in a while a fierce shaggy white bear goes running over the ice-cakes, or swimming through the water in search of a poor little seal on which to dine.

The Eskimos, paddling swiftly through the water in their strange skin boats, or kayaks, pursue all these animals, and kill them with harpoons and lances.

In winter there is no sun at all, and for four long, long months it is dark all the time, day and night, just as it is here in the night, only the moon and stars giving light. The ground is covered deep with snow, through which the poor deer have to dig with their hoofs for a few mouthfuls of grass and moss, the sea is covered with ice five or six feet thick, the birds have flown away, and the walrus and narwhal have gone far off to the open water. Only a few hungry bears and the Eskimos with their dogs are left; and the cold is so terrible that these would freeze to death in an hour if it were not for their thick warm fur coats, and the blanket of blubber underneath.

Far to the north of us, beyond the Arctic Circle, lies a land inhabited by a little tribe of Eskimos, called Arctic Highlanders. These are the most northerly known people on the globe.

They are entirely dependent on their country for everything they need, and as it is very cold, and part of the year entirely without sunshine, there is very little plant life, and they live only upon the animals, using the meat for food and the skins for their clothing. During the short summer season when the sun shines, the grass and flowers grow rapidly, the birds come back and build their nests, and, alas! the mosquitoes come forth in swarms. But this lasts only a short time.

Here in this wonderful land, in a little black house, under a great brown mountain, was found, one bright September day, a little snow-white baby girl with big blue eyes.

And such a funny house it was where she was found. It was only one story high, the outside was covered with thick, black tarred paper, the walls were more than a foot thick, and there were lots of windows for such a small house, one wide one running right across the top of the house, just like a hot-house. This was to enable the inmates to enjoy the sunshine just as long as it lasted.

All round the house was a close veranda, the walls of which were built of boxes of food, biscuits, sugar, coffee, and tea; for none of these things, in fact, nothing but meat could be bought in the country.

Inside the house the little room where the baby was found was lined with soft warm blankets, and there was a bright carpet on the floor, and lots of books, and a sewing-machine, and pictures on the walls. All these things, like the boxes of food outside, had been brought in the big ship which had brought the baby's father and mother to this strange country.

The bed on which the baby lay was covered with soft warm reindeer skins, through which even the terrible cold of the long dark night could not penetrate.

One window of the baby's room looked out upon a great glacier or river of ice, and the other upon high red and brown mountains surrounding a bay in which floated lots and lots of icebergs, of the strangest and most fantastic shapes, so that you might easily imagine some of them to be the palace of the Frost King, others white ships, and in still others you might see the cruel white face of the Frost King himself.

When the strange people of the land heard that a baby had been found in this house, and that, wonderful to relate, this baby was perfectly white, they came--men, women, and children--hundreds of miles, riding upon sledges drawn by wild shaggy dogs, which looked like wolves, to see the little stranger.

These people are brown, with black shaggy hair, and dress entirely in furs both summer and winter.

They said "OW-NAY?" and "AH-NAN-NAN" to her, at which she stared with wide-open eyes; and then they wanted to touch her to see if she was warm and not made of snow, she was so white.

And if by chance she happened to smile when looking at one of them, then there was great rejoicing, for this was counted very lucky.

So they called her "AH?-POO-MIK?-A-NIN-NY" , and brought her presents of fur mittens, little sealskin boots, walrus tusks, baby bear and seal skins, and many other things.

It was near the end of the Snowland summer when the baby was born, and six weeks afterwards the sun went away to be gone all through the long winter night of four months.

Just before he went baby was taken for her first outing. It was very, very cold, the thermometer far below the freezing-point, and the ground was covered deep with snow; but baby was tucked into a little reindeer-skin bag, which covered her completely all except her head. This was covered with a little foxskin hood; then baby, bag, and all were wrapped in the stars and stripes, and taken out of doors.

Then the sun went away, and for days and weeks baby lived in the little room where a lamp was burning night and day.

Here she had her daily bath, and slept and crowed at the lamp and the pictures on the wall, and grew bigger and whiter every day. How she did enjoy these baths after she got to be a little older, when her mother closed every door in the room, put an oil stove inside the bed curtains which were drawn close, then sponged the baby with warm water, and after she was dry let her roll for a little while in the pile of soft warm bear and deer skins on the bed.

Her Eskimo friends kept coming to see her whenever they could, though they did not always come in to the room, as they were not very clean.

After a long, long time the terrible night began to draw to an end, and every clear day at noon there was an hour or two of daylight.

It was decided that when the sun did return, no matter how cold it might be, baby was to go out every day, so one of the Eskimo women was busy making a little Eskimo suit for her, all of furs.

There were only two pieces in this suit,--a little hooded coat, and a pair of little trousers and boots in one.

Boys and girls, and men and women, all wear trousers in this Snowland.

The softest and warmest fox and baby-deer skins were selected for these clothes. The little trousers or nannookies were made with the fur on the outside, and reached from her waist, where they were fastened with a drawstring to her ankles, where a fur boot made of the same warm deerskin, but with the fur on the inside, next the foot, was sewed to each leg, thus making it impossible for the cold air to get to her little feet and legs.

The kapetah, or foxskin coat, was after the same pattern as your sweaters, that is, without any opening down the front or back, and to the neck was sewed a round hood, the opening made to just fit about her little face. This coat her mother pulled on over baby's head and well down over her nannookies, so that here too no cold air could chill the little girl.

About the wrists and around the face opening of the hood, foxtails were sewed, which helped very much to keep her face and hands warm. This costume was made by a woman named AH-NI-GHI?-TO; so, when the baby was christened, she too was called AH-NI-GHI?-TO. She was also named Marie for her only aunt, who was waiting in the far-off home land to greet her little niece.

At last, one day about the middle of February, the great yellow sun popped up above the tops of the mountains and covered everything with the brightest sunlight.

Little AH-NI-GHI?-TO was asleep when the sun first looked into the room, but in a few minutes she woke up, and as the room had been specially warmed to give her a sun bath, her mother took her out of her little nest and placed her, all white and naked, in the sunlight on the bed.

How the big blue eyes did open at the strange sight. How she laughed and jumped and stretched her little hands out in the yellow light, just as if she was bathing in perfumed golden water. It was the first time she had ever seen the sun.

After this, every sunshiny day she had her sun bath, when she would try to seize the sunbeams slanting through the room, and failing in this would try to pick up bits of sunlight on the bed.

On every pleasant day she was dressed in her little fur suit, tucked into her deerskin bag, and carried out.

Do you know how the tulip and hyacinth and narcissus bulbs grow and blossom after they are brought out of the cold, dark cellar into the warm, sunny window?

Well, little AH-NI-GHI?-TO was just a little human bulb that had been kept in the cold and dark for five months and now was brought out into the bright sunlight; and she grew like a tulip, and her eyes grew brighter and bluer, and her cheeks were like "Jack" roses. So rapidly did she grow that very soon she was too heavy for mother to carry.

Then some dogs and a little Eskimo sledge were bought for her, with a knife and some biscuit and coffee, and a snug little box, just large enough for her to sit in, fastened on the sledge. After that AH-NI-GHI?-TO had a sleigh-ride every day. You should have seen her team, with their bright eyes, sharp pointed ears, and big bushy tails. There was "Lassie," and "Lady," and sometimes steady old black Panikpah, who had been far to the north here, across the "great ice," and had eaten musk-ox meat.

Sometimes they would walk along with heads and tails up, every now and then looking round at the baby.

Then at the crack of the whip they would dash off at a gallop, with the driver running beside the sledge and guiding it past the rocks and lumps of ice.

But they always seemed to understand that they were drawing a little baby, for they never attempted to run away, as they often did with their Eskimo masters.

It was very, very cold now, colder even than during the long winter night; but, wrapped up in her warm furs, little AH-NI-GHI?-TO did not feel it.

A great many of the natives came to see the little white girl. The women kissed her hands, and she made friends with all the queer little brown babies sticking their heads out of their mothers' hoods, for the Eskimo babies have no cradles or anything of the kind, but are just carried all the time by their mothers in great fur hoods on their backs.

Soon AH-NI-GHI?-TO began to talk Eskimo, and would say "Ta?koo" , "Atu?do" , and she never said yes and no, but "Ah?-py" and "Nag?-ga."

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