[Footnote N126: In some of the older houses, the ruins of which are still to be seen at the southwest end of the village of Utkiavwĭñ, whales’ bones were used for timbers. Compare Lyon Journal, p. 171, where the winter huts at Iglulik are described as “entirely constructed of the bones of whales, unicorns, walruses, and smaller animals,” with the interstices filled with earth and moss.] [Illustration: FIG. 9.--Plans of Eskimo-winter house.] The passage is entered at the farther end by a vertical shaft about 6 feet deep in the center of a steep mound of earth. Round the mouth is a square frame or combing of wood, and blocks of wood are placed in the shaft to serve as steps. One or two houses in Utkiavwĭñ had ship’s companion ladders in the shaft. This entrance can be closed with a piece of walrus hide or a wooden cover in severe weather or when the family is away. The passage is about 4 feet wide and the sides and roof are supported by timbers of whalebone. On the right hand near the inner end is a good-sized room opening from the passage, which has a wooden roof covered with earth, forming a second small mound close to the house, with a smoke hole in the middle, and serves as a kitchen, while various dark and irregular recesses on the other side serve as storerooms. The passage is always icy and dark. [Illustration: FIG. 10.--Interior of iglu, looking toward door.] At the inner end of the passage a circular trapdoor in the floor opens into the main room of the house, close to the wall at the middle of one end. The floor is at such a height from the bottom of the tunnel that a man standing erect in the tunnel has his head and shoulders in the room. These rooms vary somewhat in dimensions, but are generally about 12 or 14 feet long and 8 or 10 feet wide. The floor, walls, and roof are made of thick planks of driftwood, dressed smooth and neatly fitted together, edge to edge. The ridgepole runs across the house and the roof slopes toward each end. The two slopes are unequal, the front, or that towards the entrance, being considerably the longer. The walls are vertical, those at the ends being between 3 and 4 feet high, while the sides run up to 6 or 7 feet at the ridgepole. The wall planks run up and down, and those of the roof from the ridge to the ends of the house, where there is a stout horizontal timber. In some houses the walls are made of paneled bulkheads from some wrecked whaler. [Illustration: FIG. 11.--Interior of iglu, looking toward bench.]