BUILDING OUR HOUSE. 77 



soon supplied by the ingenious La Eonde, in a much 

 simpler fashion than we had suspected. A doorway 

 and window was hewn through the solid walls ; a door 

 constructed of boards from the carts ; whilst a piece of 

 parchment supplied the place of window-glass. The 

 roof was covered in by straight poles of young, dry 

 pines, and over this was a thatch of marsh grass, 

 weighted down by loose earth thrown over. The low- 

 ness of the building, externally, was remedied inside 

 by digging out the ground two feet, rendering the 

 building very much warmer. The interstices between 

 the logs were filled up with mud, mixed with chopped 

 ^rass, to give it tenacity. But we had still the most 

 important and difficult work of all — to build the 

 chimne}^ For a long time we were unable to discover 

 any clay wherewith to cement the boulders of which a 

 chimney is constructed in backwood fashion, and 

 began to be seriously afraid that the strong frost would 

 commence before our fire-place was ready. This would, 

 of course, have been exceedingly awkward, for it was 

 difficult enough to work with untempered mortar, and 

 if it were frozen, building would obviously be out of 

 the question. 



At last, after digging through several feet of rich 

 loam, we discovered some clayey soil, with which we 

 made shift, and the fire-place rose rapidly. As it 

 approached completion, a fire was lighted, and we were 

 congratulating ourselves upon complete success — when, 

 crash ! and down it tumbled. Great was our con- 

 sternation, and for some time we were completely 

 nonplused. An animated discussion took place as to 



