Page:The sexual life of savages in north-western Melanesia.djvu/60

Rh streets deserted, dim lights flickering through small interstices in the hut walls, and voices sounding from within in animated conversation. Inside, in a small space heavy with dense smoke and human exhalation, the people sit on the floor round the fire or recline on bedsteads covered with mats.

The houses are built directly on the ground and their floors are of beaten earth. On the adjoining diagrammatic plan (fig. ii) we see the main items of their very simple furniture: the fireplace, which is simply a ring of small stones with three large ones to support a pot; wooden sleeping bunks, placed one over another against the back and side walls opposite the fireplace (cf. pl. 8) and one or two shelves for nets, cooking pots, women's grass petticoats, and other household objects. The chief's personal dwelling is built like an ordinary house, but is larger. The yam houses are of somewhat different and more complicated construction, and are slightly raised above the ground.

A normal day in a typical household forces the family to live in close intimacy — they sleep in the same hut, they eat in common and spend the best part both of their working and of their leisure hours together.

Members of the household are also bound together by community of economic interest. On this point, Rh