The homes of the Eskimo along the Arctic coast of North America present an aspect which differs, in several respects, from those of the Siberian coast. The American polar rivers are less numerous and of far less volume than those of Siberia, and for the _tundras_ of Siberia are substituted the “_barren lands_” of North America, which are essentially different. The first consists of frozen earth and ice for an immense depth, the second of low granite and gneiss hills with rounded summits separated by narrow valleys. Except for limited deposits of imperfect peat-earth in the valleys, the surface of the “barren lands” consists of a dry coarse quartzose sand scattered over with granite boulders. The American Arctic coast is faced by islands, with narrow straits intervening, except for 800 miles to Bering Strait where it faces the heavy ice of the Polar Ocean. This American coast produces edible berries and roots, and on the land are musk oxen, reindeer, wolverines, wolves, foxes, martens, hares, and marmots. Salmon, with other fish, frequent the rivers, and many wading birds, besides ptarmigan and willow grouse, ducks, geese, and guillemots, come to breed. It is a Sub-arctic, not an Arctic region. The whole coast, for 1700 miles, affords the means of subsistence. Here the hardy little Eskimo race has dwelt for long ages, from the Aleutian peninsula to Hudson’s Bay and Labrador. Their original position is supposed to have been the coast near Bering Strait, from Kotzebue Sound to the Colville river. They have preserved themselves, for generations, by their great faculty of obtaining subsistence by the most ingenious contrivances, and through hereditary skill and perseverance. Their tales and traditions go back for untold years, and with them have been transmitted those methods of hunting and fishing which long practice, through many generations, has perfected. Living mainly on seals, their southern neighbours, the Algonquin Indians, gave these coast people the name of _Askikamo_ or seal-eaters, whence our word Eskimo, but they call themselves Innuit.