Page:Houses and House-Life of the American Aborigines.djvu/285

 and the gateway in front. Such at least is the object which the presence of the mound in each case suggests.

In the engraving, Fig. 48, there is a ground plan of a section of one of the long-houses resting upon the restored embankment. It shows eight apartments upon opposite sides of the central passage, each nine feet wide by six feet deep, and surrounded by raised bunks used both for seats and beds. The passage is eight feet wide and runs through the house from end to end, with fire-pits in the center for each four apartments. In interior plan it is an exact transcript of the long-house of the Iroquois, and therefore adapted to the joint habitation of a large number of related families, and to the practice of communism.

Another section shows the embankment below the line A-B, which, as stated, is ten feet high upon a base thirty-seven feet wide, and with a summit platform twenty-two feet wide, which forms the floor of the house. Above this is a cross-section of the structure Round posts six inches in diameter are set in the ground upon the lines of the central passage, defining also the several stalls. These posts, which rise eight feet above the level of the floor and are forked at the top, support string-pieces which run the length of the house. Against these, planks of split timber are placed so as to form a sloping external wall, and these are covered with clay and gravel a foot or more thick. A simpler method would be the use of poles set close together and sunk in the ground, afterwards coated in the same manner. Cross-pieces of round timber rest upon the stringers over each pair of posts. The roof over the central passage is formed independently of poles bracing against each other at the center from opposite sides. This is also covered with concrete or mud mortar. Openings through the roof are left over the fire-pits for the exit of the smoke. The principle of construction adopted is that employed in the dirt lodges of the Minnitarees and Mandans of the Upper Missouri. As thus restored, this pueblo of the Mound-Builders is not superior in the mechanism of the houses to those of the tribes named.

An elevation of a portion of one of the houses, on the court side, is also furnished, showing the embankment with a ladder resting upon it used