OF NORTH CAROLINA. 289 



prevent any damage by liard gales of wind. They 

 make tlic iire in tlie middle of tlie house, and have 

 a hole at the top of the roof right above the fire, 

 to let out the smoke. These dwellings are as hot 

 as stoves, wdiere the Indians sleep and sweat all 

 night. The floors thereof are never paved nor 

 swept, so that they have always a loose earth on 

 them. They are often troubled wdth a multitude 

 of fleas, especially near the places w^here they dress 

 their deer skins, because that hair harbors them ; 

 yet I never felt any ill, unsavory smell in their cab- 

 ins, whereas, should w^e live in our houses, as they 

 do, we should be poisoned w^ith oar owai nastiness, 

 which confirms these Indians to be, as they really 

 are, some of the sweetest people in the world. 



The bark they make their cabins withal, is gen- 

 erally cypress, or red or white cedar ; and some- 

 times, when they are a great way from any of these 

 woods, they make use of pine bark, v/hich is the 

 worser sort. In building these fabrics, they get 

 very long poles of pine, cedar, hickory, or any 

 other ^vood that w^ill bend ; these are the thickness 

 of the small of a man's leg, at the thickest end, 

 which they generally strip of the bark, and warm 

 them well in the fire, which makes them tough 

 and fit to bend. Afterwards, they stick the thick- 

 est ends of them in the ground, about two yards 

 asunder, in a circular form, the distance they de- 

 sign the cabin to be (which is not always round, 

 but sometimes oval) then they bend the tops and 

 bring them together, and bind their ends with 



.^:-i_»i 



