squares, rising from the surface, white and glistening in the moonlight,
were village roofs covered with snow. Surely, these other squares lying
flat upon the surface were town lots, and the broader ones stretches of
field and meadow, where grain would ripen in summer and flowers bloom.
And the spots of open water, made black by the whiteness about them,
were fishing-ponds where one might lazily dip his line and dream.

But as he shook himself back into reality, a startling question had come
to him. His lips put it in words.

"How are we going to tell that schooner when we see it?" he barked
through the Major's telephone. "Won't she be buried in snow?"

"Probably will," admitted the Major, "but there's sure to be a native
village near by, and though their houses are built of snow, they always
have a litter of black things about--sleds, hunting implements, skins,
and the like. We can't miss it."

"Natives. M-m-m," Bruce mumbled. "Nagyuktogmiut, or something like that.
Hope the white man happens to be about when we land. I've read
Stefansson's account of them. They treated him all right, but when old
Thunderbird, his own self, brings them some white men, they may not be so
glad to see them, and those chaps have copper-pointed spears and arrows,
not to speak of rifles."

"The Indians didn't bother us," phoned back the Major.

"That's right. Well, I hope this is our lucky day." Bruce again gave his
whole attention to driving. Then, as they made out in the distance some
high elevations, that might be land or might be clouds, he dropped to a