November seventeenth: We have had our first lady visitor today who came from White Mountain about fifteen miles away. She is the lady doctor who brought Miss J. through typhoid fever last fall, and is much at home here. She was sent for by a sick woman in the hotel, and will spend the night with Miss J., who is very kind to her. The visiting preacher left for the Home this morning very early, going with a native and reindeer. Mr. L. and B. were called in to the jury trial of the murderer who killed the man in the hotel the other night, and they got home late. The girls were out upon the ice in the evening for exercise, getting tired of being indoors all day long, and needing fresh air. When all were in at half-past eleven in the evening, coffee and crackers were taken by all but me, but I have had to leave off drinking coffee, taking hot water with cream and sugar instead. B. says he thinks the latter too stimulating. [Illustration: ESKIMO DOGS.] This has been a bright and cold Sunday for November eighteenth. Mr. H. walked in to nine o'clock breakfast from the Home, coming by dog-team, and looked well dressed and smiling. No service was held until evening, so we went out for a walk upon the hill behind the house. B. and L. left us to go and examine some wood that natives were hauling away from the beach, thinking it was some of theirs, for each stick is marked, so they know their own; but it proved not to be their wood, and the two then came home another way. While out, we walked through the small burial ground, and saw the new-made grave of the murdered man. O, how desolate was that spot! A few mounds, stones, snow and bleak winds forever blowing. Here we read a headboard, upon which was the name and age of good old Dr. Bingham of New England, who died here years ago, and whose wife planted wild roses upon the grave. I wonder if we will see them in bloom next summer, or will we be under the snow ourselves like these others. For our dinner today we ate fried tom-cod, baked potatoes, tomatoes, pickles, bread and butter, and rice pudding. I feel positive that nothing could have tasted better to our home folks in the States who have more fruit and vegetables than did this plain and homely meal to us, eaten with the heartiest appetites gotten out of doors while walking in the snow. The ice in the bay is getting firmer, and will continue to grow thicker all winter, being in the spring at breaking-up time many feet through, no doubt, as it was in Minnesota in the Red River of the North when I lived there. I am glad that I am a cold climate creature, and was born in winter in a wintry state, for I will be sure to endure Alaska weather better than I otherwise would.