The Snow Baby: A true story with true picturesPeary, Josephine Diebitsch
General
The Snow Baby: A true story with true pictures
Peary, Josephine Diebitsch
Arctic regions -- Juvenile literature; Eskimos -- Juvenile literature; Peary, Marie Ahnighito, 1893-1978
These great pieces of iron were so wonderful that AH-NI-GHI´-TO’S father
thought he would like to take them back to America, where every one
might see them; so when the ship came back after him the brown woman and
her dog were hauled over the rocks and snow and ice to the ship, and
hoisted on board. When AH-NI-GHI´-TO’S father had brought home the two
heaven-born stones, the woman and the dog, he told several scientific
gentlemen in New York that there still remained in the Snowland another
and much larger stone which had fallen from the sky together with the
woman and her dog. This the natives call the woman’s tupic, or tent.
These gentlemen called the stones meteorites, and were very anxious to
have the largest one also.
So in 1897 AH-NI-GHI´-TO, with her father and mother and her good
colored nurse Laura, boarded the ship and sailed for the Snowland to
bring home the last of the stones.
AH-NI-GHI´-TO was now nearly four years old, and looked forward with
pleasure to seeing the Snowland and all the queer little brown people
again.
On the way north AH-NI-GHI´-TO, who was not seasick, enjoyed the brisk
cool wind, and never tired of the beautiful icebergs which floated past.
A stop was made at Godhavn in South Greenland to get a supply of
drinking water. Here the natives are almost like white people. They have
been living with the Danish families who occupy this part of Greenland
for such a long time that they have become quite civilized both in looks
and manners.
[Illustration: _Marie_]
The Danes compel them to go to school and also to church; in this way
they are growing more knowing every day.
They had seen AH-NI-GHI´-TO when she and her mother came from the
Snowland three years ago and AH-NI-GHI´-TO was only one year old; now
they were anxious to see her again, and crowded to the ship, bringing
her all sorts of presents and receiving others in return.
[Illustration: “_On the Way North_”]
The nurse Laura was the first colored woman these natives had ever seen,
and they thought her a great curiosity. She was invited everywhere with
AH-NI-GHI´-TO, but Laura was afraid to accept anything from these
queer-looking people until AH-NI-GHI´-TO and her mother went with her
and she found how kind every one was and anxious to please her.
[Illustration]
It happened that there were no Danish children in this place, but many
little Eskimos, all eager to see AH-NI-GHI´-TO’S doll and to play with
her. Only a few hours were spent here, and then AH-NI-GHI´-TO and Laura
were brought to the vessel in a little boat and the great ship pushed
toward the north again.
[Illustration: _Harpoons and Lances_]
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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