58 NATURAL HISTORY OF HAWAII. 



hand, the houses of the better class, notably the chiefs and the nobility, were 

 much superior. Being well built and neatly kept, they were not so devoid of 

 simple comfort as their absolute lack of architectural beauty might suggest. 



While their houses varied much in size and shape they were uniformly 

 dark and poorly ventilated, being invariably without windows or doors, save 

 the small hole left, usually on one side, through which the occupant might pass 

 in and out in a crouching posture. 



Complete Domestic Establishment. 



As with the various occupations that had to do with the gathering of their 

 food and the making of their raiment, so the building of the house which 

 sheltered them was attended by many important religious observances, the omis- 

 sion of any of which might result in the most serious consequences. Every 

 stage, from the gathering of the timbers and grass in the mountains, to the last 

 act of trimming the grass from over and around the door before it was ready 

 for final occupancy, furnished an occasion for the intervention of the priests 

 and the imposition of special tabus that must be satisfied before the house 

 could be used as a dwelling. 



As has been suggested elsewhere, a complete domestic establishment was made 

 up of several conveniently grouped single-room houses that were given over to 

 special purposes. The well-to-do Hawaiian boasted of at least six such single- 

 room houses. The house for the family idols and the men's eating house were 

 both always tabu to women. The women's eating house, a common sleeping 

 house, a house for the beating of the tapa, and lastly, a separate house for the 

 use of the women during various tabu periods made up the group. Occa- 

 sionally the better houses were on a raised stone foundation, and a fence made 

 about the group to separate them from their neighbors and to mark the limits of 

 the sphere of domestic influence. To the foregoing might be added a house 

 for canoes, a storehouse, and others for special purposes as might be required. 



Building of a House. 



The building of a grass house of the better type was an important task and 

 one that called for much skill and experience. The timbers of which it was con- 

 structed were selected with great care, different woods being preferably used for 

 certain purposes. When trimmed of the outer bark, notched and fashioned into 

 shape by crude stone tools they were placed into the positions which they were 

 intended to occupy in the framework of the structure and then firmly bound 

 together with braided ropes of ukiuki grass. 



The corner posts were first to be put in place, each being securely set in the 

 ground. The side posts were next planted in line and the plate pole lashed 

 to the top. The tall poles at the end of the house w^ere next put up and the 

 ridge pole put into place. The rafters were then added and the upper ridge 

 pole lashed firmly above the main ridge pole. Small straight poles were finally 

 lashed horizontally, a few inches apart, on the outside of the completed frame- 



