[THE HOUSE]
Man has always been a builder. Like squirrels and beavers and birds he provides himself a home as by instinct. The kind of house erected by a people in the beginning depended upon the surroundings, upon the enemies that prowled about, upon the climate, upon the building materials close at hand. In a hilly, rocky region primitive folk built one kind of house, in a forest they built another kind, in a low marshy district they built still another kind. In all cases they took the materials that were the easiest to get and erected the kind of dwelling place that would afford the greatest safety and comfort.
If one could have traveled over the earth during the first days of man's history one would doubtless have found that dwellings were made of wood, for in those days the greater part of the earth was covered with forests. To build a home in the forest was the simplest of tasks. All that was necessary was to fasten together the tops of several saplings, interlace the saplings with boughs (Fig. 1) and cover the frame with skins of animals or thatch it with leaves and grass. A cone-shaped structure of this pattern, a tent, or hut, or wigwam, was the first house of all primitive people who lived where there was plenty of wood.
In many regions, especially in parts of northwestern Europe, the wigwam or hut was not always the most suitable dwelling place for early man. In hilly and mountainous districts and along streams where shores were overhung by rocks or pierced by caverns the first inhabitants found that a hollow in the earth was the best kind of house. Sometimes the house of the cave-dwellers was made by Nature (Fig. 2); sometimes it was an artificial living-place dug in the side of a hill or mountain. The cave was truly a rude and gloomy home, yet there was a time when large numbers of the human race lived in caves. The Zuni Indians of Arizona in seeking a refuge from their enemies built their homes far up in steep cliffs where it was almost impossible for a stranger to go.
FIG. 3.—LAKE-DWELLINGS, RESTORED.
(From Troyon.)