Page:Houses and House-Life of the American Aborigines.djvu/142

 sides are now made, with a range of white boards, sunk a small distance into the ground, with upper ends projecting above the poles at the eaves. * * * The gable end and partitions are formed in the same way. * * * The roof is then covered with a double range of thin boards, except an aperture of two or three feet in the center, for the smoke to pass through. The entrance is by a small hole, cut out of the boards, and just large enough to admit the body. The very largest houses only are divided by partitions, for though three or four families reside in the same room, there is quite space enough for all of them. In the center of each room is a space six or eight feet square, sunk to the depth of twelve inches below the rest of the floor, and inclosed by four pieces of square timber. Here they make the fire, for which purpose pine bark is generally preferred. Around the fireplace mats are placed, and serve as seats during the day, and very frequently as beds at night. There is, however, a more permanent bed made by fixing, in two or sometimes three sides of the room, posts reaching from the roof to the ground, and at the distance of four feet from the wall. From these posts to the wall itself, one or two ranges of boards are placed so as to form shelves, in which they either sleep or there stow away their various articles of merchandise."

These explorers found the houses of the Indian tribes throughout the Columbia Valley occupied by several families, the smallest of them containing from twenty to forty persons, and the largest fire hundred. The presence of large households is fully shown as the rule in their house-life. The practice of communism by the household, as stated by these authors, has already (supra, p. 71) been presented. This tendency to aggregation in groups, for subsistence and for mutual protection, reveals the weakness of the single family in the presence of the hardships of life. Communism in living was very plainly a necessity of their condition.

In a recent description (1869) of the modern houses of the Makah Indians of Cape Flattery, Washington Territory, by Mr. James G. Swan, the old usage which led to joint-tenement houses still asserts itself. Speaking of the manner of building these houses in detail, he remarks that "they are designed to accommodate several families, and are of various