Hawaiian Doors. 



99 



within the house, not an unsightly finish if the thatch is well laid ; but it must be 

 remembered that there was not enough light by day from the very small door, to show 

 the finish, and by night the feeble light of kukui candles, or even of several oil lamps 

 gave to the aho nothing more than the appearance of dark horizontal lines on a lighter 

 ground. No wonder then that the interior finish was not an object of great solicitude. 



The Hawaiians had a thatching needle (often a rude substitute was vised), but 

 seldom used it except on the raised edgings where it was not always easy to pass the 

 stiff cord through the thick mass of grass or fern leaves. 



When the thatching was complete, it was customary to put heavy nets over the 

 whole building to compel the grass to dry evenly, and not curl up. This is seen in 

 the picture of the Museum house (Fig. 85). Two or three days of dry weather suiiBce 

 to fix the grass in an orderly wa3^ 



The door was a matter of more carpentry than the rest of the house, and its 

 constru(5lion was not easy where there were no sawmills to furnish boards. These must 

 be hewn from logs, generally split logs of no great size, and fitted to two thicker pieces 

 of wood the length of the door width, which were rabbeted to receive the boards. To 

 these transverse pieces the boards were fastened hy pegs of wood inserted in holes 

 bored, according to Malo, by drills made of human bone. To give additional strength 

 a larger hole was drilled in the middle of the transverse pieces through which a cord 

 was passed to bind them together. 



As to the hanging of the door in olden times there are two opinions : Dr. Emer- 

 son, in his translation of Malo, says the}' were arranged to slide, while as I translate 

 the passage they were swung between two uprights. I have seen in a very old and 

 poor house the remains of a grooved threshold and a broken bar above which might 

 have supported a sliding door, but I have never seen any in use, nor can I find any 

 kamaaina who have. Certainly a sliding door would be convenient in a house like 

 that of the Hawaiians, but a hinge of coconut cord was simpler, and hence more likely 

 to have first suggested itself to the primitive builders. I have also seen a pintle 

 hinge iised. We have seen that the Maori houses were provided with neat sliding 

 doors, generally decorated with carving, but we cannot consider these primitive houses. 

 The doors of matting — perhaps we should more properly call them curtains or screens 

 — in Samoa were suspended so as to slide with some small latitude, but generally our 

 information about such details as door hanging is pitifully scant. 



The Hawaiians had a bar to fasten the door from within, which would indicate 

 a swinging door, but they also had a contrivance to deter uninvited persons from enter- 

 ing at night, consisting of a heavy stone" suspended over the door by a rope which 



^* A figure of one of these door stones is given in my account of Hawaiian Stone Implements, Memoirs, I, p. 351 



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