138 YURTS AND GAMMES. 



of the same sort. Over this framing is laid a covering of 

 strong coarse grass, and that, again, is covered with earth ; 

 so that, on the outside, the house looks like a little hillock 

 supported by a wall of stone three or four feet high, which 

 is built round the two sides and one end." 



" The Aleutian Islanders," says Mr. Dall, " especially in 

 their winter villages, were used to construct large, half under- 

 ground habitations, often of extraordinary size. These were 

 so arranged by internal partitions as to afford shelter to even 

 as many as one hundred families. No fires were built in the 

 central undivided portion, which was entered through a hole 

 in the roof, provided with a notched log by way of ladder. In 

 the small compartments each family had its own oil lamp, 

 which, with the closely fitting door of skins, and the heat of 

 numerous bodies in a very small space, sufficed to keep them 

 warm. We learn that the bodies, while being prepared for 

 encasement, as above described, were sometimes kept in the 

 compartment which they had occupied during life until ready 

 for deposition elsewhere. We also know from early accounts, 

 proved true by our own excavations, that the bodies of the 

 dead, in the compressed position before mentioned, were some- 

 times placed in the compartment, laid on their sides, and 

 covered with earth, with which the whole compartment was 

 filled and then walled up. It is stated that others in the 

 same yourt continued to occupy their several compartments 

 after this as usual, a proceeding very different from that of the 

 majority of the Innuit, who usually abandon at once a house 

 in which a death has occurred."* 



Fig. 141* represents the plan of a Laplander's gamme, or 

 hut, at Komagfiord, as given by Mr. Brooke.-f- It was built 

 of sods, supported by a rude framework, and the interstices 



* Dall. The Aleutian Islands. t Brooke's Travels in Lapland, 

 Smithonian Contributions. 1878. p. 318. 



