6o 



Tlie Ancient Hawaiian House. 



lages, was about 150 feet long, very high, with carved posts, and iu front overhead a beautifully 

 decorated shade, with long pendants of different kinds of leaves. [P. 135.] 



The centre post in every house is sacred to Kaevakuku, and her portion of food in every feast 

 is first offered there. The first fruits belong to her. [P. 152.] 



Their dwellings, as everywhere else in New Guinea, are built on piles about eight or ten feet 

 above the ground. They are substantially built, but singularly arched. The house of each chief is 

 furnished with a platform, about two feet from the ground, covered with a handsome cupola, but 

 open at the sides, and floored with split bamboo. 

 Here the men meet to discuss their tribal affairs. 

 Between the liou.ses are small enclosures of j-oung 

 areca palms, betel-pepper plants, variegated cro- 

 tons, red cordylines and other shrubs. [P. 273.] 

 The thatch used for the roof and sides of their 

 houses is the leaf of the sago palm, which is not 

 (as in Polynesia) sewn on to the small rafters, but 

 pressed down firmly by long poles secured to the 

 framework of the house. [P. 274.] 



From the dead piles to the living tree 

 seems not a long step, and we find all along 

 the New Guinea coast illustrations of this 

 habitation. The one represented in Fig. 

 51 is not one of the highest, but shows the 

 general construdlion better than any view 

 that I have in my collection, and marks the 

 transition from pile to tree. In this case the 

 tree or trees, no longer living, serve merely 

 to raise the house above the position of con- 

 venient attack ; the house is well built and 

 skilfully balanced on its supports, while 

 the lower platform serves for a cooking 

 place or a general rendezvous. The frame of a similar struAure intended for a Dubu 

 or club house for young men is shown in Fig. 53. In this case the elevated position 

 of the building seems not so much for protedlion as for privacy. 



I have referred to the communal house, common enough in this region, and a pidlure 

 is given in Fig. 50. It is a long, barn-like strudlure, imposing by its size rather than bj^ 

 any grace of architedlure. Perhaps the more common mode of entrance is at the ends, 

 where the doors at either end are connedled b}' a long passage from which the many 

 apartments open on both sides. A family occupies one or more rooms, and the privac}' is 

 reasonably observed: each has its own hearth and provides its own food. I have not seen 

 any statement as to the course pursued in building or keeping in repair this large habita- 

 tion. Communal houses are common in the East Indies. See also, for the entrance, Plates 

 XXIV and XXV. [244] 



FIG. 53. CLUB HOUSE FOR YOUNG MEN. 



