It is curious that in countries like England and Prance, where from the climatic conditions skating must be a very occasional amusement, there is a special word for the pastime, and that in Germany and Russia, where every winter brings its skating as a matter of course, there should be no word for it.  “Skate” in English, and patiner in French, mean propelling oneself on iron runners over ice, and nothing else; whereas in German there is only the clumsy compound-word Schlittschuh-laufen, which means “to run on sledge shoes,” and in Russian it is called in equally roundabout fashion Katatsa-na-konkach, or literally “to roll on little horses,” hardly a felicitous expression.  As a rule people have no word for expressing a thing which does not come within their own range of experience; for instance, no one would expect that Arabs, or Somalis, or the inhabitants of the Sahara would have any equivalent for either skating or tobogganing, nor do I imagine that the Eskimo have any expression for “sunstroke” or “heat-apoplexy,” but one would have thought that Russians and Germans might have evolved a word for skating.

Apropos of Eskimo, I once heard a missionary describe the extraordinary difficulty he had found in translating the Bible into Eskimo.  It was useless to talk of corn or wine to a people who did not know even what they meant, so he had to use equivalents within their powers of comprehension.  Thus in the Eskimo version of the Scriptures the miracle of Cana of Galilee is described as turning the water into blubber; the 8th verse of the 5th chapter of the First Epistle of St. Peter ran:  “Your adversary the devil, as a roaring Polar bear walketh about, seeking whom he may devour.”  In the same way “A land flowing with milk and honey” became “A land flowing with whale’s blubber,” and throughout the New Testament the words “Lamb of God” had to be translated “little Seal of God,” as the nearest possible equivalent.  The missionary added that his converts had the lowest opinion of Jonah for not having utilised his exceptional opportunities by killing and eating the whale.

Fired by the example of the builders of the ice-palace on the rink at Rideau Hall, I offered to build for the Lansdowne children an ice-hut for their very own, a chilly domicile which they had ardently longed for.  As it is my solitary achievement as an architect, I must dwell rather lovingly on the building of this hut.  The professional ice-cutters were bringing up daily a large supply of great gleaming transparent blocks from the river, both for the building of the band-house and for the summer supply of Rideau Hall, so there was no lack of material.  On the American continent one is being told so constantly that this-and-that “will cut no ice,” that it is satisfactory to be able to report that those French-Canadians cut ice in the most efficient fashion.  My sole building implement was a kettle of boiling water.  I placed ice-blocks in a circle, pouring boiling water between