SOD-HOUSES or THE PLAINS. 385 



tradition gives no account. By these and other re- 

 mains which the gnawing tooth of Time has still 

 spared to us, the people of those days tell us that 

 they were full of commercial energy ; and who knows 

 but they may have been as determined as our nation 

 has ever been, to push trade across from ocean to 

 ocean? It is highly probable also that the Indians of 

 the interior were then far superior to the present 

 tribes, as seems very fairly determined by many of 

 the traditions and customs which obtain among the 

 latter. 



In view of the foregoing considerations, it is not 

 remarkable that the beads, denoting, as they did, a 

 place and manner of burial unlike that of the sav- 

 ages of the plains, interested us so much. It was 

 a leaf, we could not but think, from the lost history 

 of the mound-builders. 



A noticeable feature of life on the plains is the 

 sod-house, there called an adobe, from some re- 

 semblance to the Mexican structures of sun-dried 

 brick. The walls of these primitive habitations are 

 composed of squares of buffalo-grass sod, laid tier upon 

 tier, roots uppermost. A few poles give support for 

 a roof, and on these some hay or small brush is laid. 

 Then comes a foot of earth, and the covering is com- 

 plete. When well-constructed, these houses are 

 water-proof, very warm in winter, and cool in sum- 

 mer ; but when the eaves have been made too short 

 to protect the walls, the latter are liable to dissolve 

 under a heavy shower. Durin": a sudden rain at 

 Sheridan, being obliged to turn out early one morn- 

 ing to protect some goods, we discovered that the 



