Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1892-01-24

| they lash the summer skin tent. These
| houses are as transparent as glass, and when
| finished one can look through and see what
his or her neighbor is about without the
trouble of getting down on his hands and
knees and crawling in the low entrance to
find out.
The house of ice, while warmer than a
skin tent, will not compare with one OF
snow for comfort and as soon as this ma
terial is of proper texture an 'fgloo," or
snow house, is constructed. If you take an
egg and cut it in two in the middle and put
the two shells rims down, you have good
miniature representation of O couple of
Eskimo snow houses. The fuller shell will
represent an igloo during the coldest
weather, when the snow is frozen hard, and
it can be fat on top without danger of
falling in. The pointed shell will repre-
sent an igloo built in the early fall or late
spring.
Plans OF the Arctic Architect.
The boreal builder, with himself as cen
ter, and his extended arm and hand grasp
ing the snow-knife, draws circle on thu
snow of diameter of from 8 to II feet, ac-
cording to the intended number of the occu-
pants of the house This circle indicates
where the base course of snow blocks is to
rest as soon as they are cut from some
neighboring snow drift. These snow blocks
are about the size of large pillow, but, of
course, squared, and weigh about IL to Is
pounds. They are never laid fat-wise, as
generally surmised, but are placed on their
edges, the thickness of the igloo being the
thickness of the snow-blocks, six to eight
inches Another popular error regarding
the igloo is that the sIow-blocks are laid in
courses, as we construct brickwork, when in
reality there is but one course winding in
o1 = fhat ION To ttn hnff Nf fha
structure. The blocks ascend the spiral
from the base, where they are rectangular
to the top, where they become trapezoidal,
the top side getting less and less until it
disappears at the summit of the dome,
where the blocks are triangular.
The snow blocks, which are upright at
the base, lean more and more as the top of
the house is reached until the last one, the
key-block, if so we can call it, is perfectly
horizontal and firmly wedges in and binds
the whole, which has become dome-like
half eggshell placed on its rim.
A Bedstead Made of Snow.
Inside the, snow workman makes plat
form of snow, Is to 80 inches high, from the \
ground, which takes up fully three-fourths
of the interior of the house, and this is the
bedstead, so to speak, and on this rude bed
are spread the soft, warm reindeer skins
that form the bedding. On the south side
OF the igloo hole is cut which answers the
purpose of door, and anyone wanting ad-
mission must get down on his hands and |
knees and crawl in. To prevent the snow
from the top of the doorway brushing off |
and falling down the neck and back, each |
Eskimo puts his skin hood, which is at
tached to his reindeer coat, over his head
before entering, and just as soon as his
shoulders are we'll in the house he shoves
his legs back and begins to straighten up, SO
as to prevent running his nose into the snow
of which his bed is made.
You will see by this that the igloo is Lack