Page:Siam and Laos, as seen by our American missionaries (1884).pdf/506

 them. Bamboo poles are laid across these sills about a foot apart and tied with ratan. Over these is spread the bamboo flooring. This is made from the trunk of a large-sized bamboo. It is cut into the proper lengths, and these are gashed lengthwise all over their surface by repeated strokes of the knife or axe. By this process the sticks become quite pliable. They are then slit open by passing the knife through one side of them from end to end. The broken and jagged edges of the inner side of the joints are smoothed off, and we have bamboo boards a foot or more wide. This flooring bends under the pressure of the feet, and when dry makes a creaking noise, which is not very pleasant. When riddled by a small black beetle that burrows in its fibres, it becomes unsafe to tread upon, and sometimes one breaks through it. But by putting it, when green, into water, and keeping it submerged until it passes through the process of fermentation, it is, in a great measure, free from the ravages of this beetle. The many chinks in this bamboo floor offer convenient passage for the streams of red saliva that flow from the mouths of its betel-chewing inmates.

The walls and roofs of these huts are supported by posts set in the ground some two feet of their length and reaching to the plates. The ridge of the roof also rests upon posts of the