To roof-in one of these log huts with the shingles we have before described, the builder must proceed in a different manner; rows of rafters must be pinned on to catch the shingles. The first row, or that at the wall plate, should project some inches beyond it; on the heels of these a long flat lath or batten of wood is secured by wood pegs driven in here and there, this nips the row of shingles and keeps them in place. The second row is laid over and beyond the batten and so on, much as slates or tiles are laid for the roof of an English house.
Doors and shutters for log houses are usually made of boards obtained from split logs pinned together with cross-bars, and are generally called dowel hinged; an auger hole is bored a few inches into both frame and door, a hard wood peg placed half-way into each hole gives perfect freedom of motion, and will last as long as the house. A flooring is very easily made by splitting a large log into rough boards, and much increases the comfort of the establishment. The above illustration represents a rough temporary wigwam, which may be easily made as follows: Select either a large fallen log or high bank for a back; drive two stout forked pieces sufficiently far from the back and far apart to give space for the interior; lay another pole across the crutches for a front wall plate, and two side poles from the back, long enough to rest on and be secured to this.
Thatch with hemlock or balsam fir branches, arranging them layer upon layer, butt end upwards. The gable ends can be closed with either branches or grass-covered hurdles or frames. Another kind is made by placing all the posts double, and then dropping the planks down between them, so that they are nipped by the uprights, as shown in the accompanying sketch.
The huts of savages.
As an almost invariable rule, the huts built by savage nations are round, or approximate more or less to the circular form. But sometimes they are shapeless things, like the rude “gunyah” of the Australian, which consists merely of a sheet of bark of the tea-tree (one of the Eucalypti) broken across the middle and set up in a triangular form to shelter “the body” from the inclemency of the weather; while small fires are lighted all around for warmth and defence against the mosquitoes, or a dry log, 6ft. or 8ft. long, is laid on either side, and set on fire in several places. Equally simple is the hut of the desert bushman. A few sticks are set up against each other, so as to form an irregular cone, with one side left open to admit “the body” of the sleeper, as shown in the illustration on [p. 279]. In almost all tribes the commencement is made in the same manner. A circle is traced or imagined on the ground, and the women, squatting down, with sharp pointed sticks work holes a foot or more apart all round it; long flexible wands are inserted, and their tops bent over and lashed together, and if the hut be large, one or more poles are placed inside the circle as supports. In Kafirland the fire-place is simply a flat hearth, occupying the centre, so that the poles, when there are any, are arranged round it. Smaller rods are wattled all round, or bound tightly to the ribs with strips of the inner bark of the mimosa, or other tree, and the hut is thatched with reeds, grass, or whatever may be the favourite or most convenient material of the country.
In Kafirland the huts are hemispherical, like beehives, or rather like inverted bowls, slightly flattened on the top. The thatching is very neatly and compactly done, and generally small ropes of grass are carried many times round and round outside the hut, and laced with smaller strips through the thatching to the inner frame. The floor is nicely clayed with a compost of “kraal mist” or cattle dung, and the fine clay of ant-hills broken up and well mixed. Sometimes the inner wall for 2ft. or 3ft. high is plastered with the same, and pumpkin seeds stuck into it in fanciful patterns, and picked off again, when the clay is dry, leaving a glazed film sparkling in the hollow.