GANN] MAYA INDIANS OF YUCATAN AND BRITISH HONDURAS 



27 



usually help him, and the residence is ready for occupancy in a few 

 days, as all the materials are growing ready to hand in the neighbor- 

 ing forest, and require only cutting down and assembling. The 

 facility with which their dwellings are constructed, and the difficulty 

 in getting more than one or two crops in succession from each plan- 

 tation, with their primitive agricultural methods, probably account 

 for the frequent changes in site which one notices in Indian villages. 

 As the lands in one neighborhood become impoverished, the popula- 

 tion has a tendency gradually to desert the old village, and start a 

 new one in a more favorable locality. 



The kitchen, which is a replica of the house on a small scale, is 

 usually placed a few yards be- 

 hind it. 



The furniture is of the sim- 

 plest, consisting of a small 

 round cedar table, with a lit- 

 tle bowl-shaped projection 

 which contains a lump of masa 

 when tortillas are being made 

 and chili peppers or salt at 

 meal times. The seats are mere 

 blocks of wood, 3 or 4 inches 

 high (caancJie), with perhaps 

 one or two more pretentious 

 low hollow-backed wooden 

 chairs covered with deer skin 

 or " tiger" skin. A number of 

 calabashes of all shapes and 

 sizes, with a few earthen 

 water jars, iron cooking pots, 

 and plaques for baking tortil- 

 las, are found in all houses. 

 Hammocks (kdan) of cotton or henequen fiber are always conspicu- 

 ous articles of furniture, as they are slung all around the room, 

 making it very difficult to move about in it when they are let 

 down. In many houses contact with the hammocks is not desir- 

 able, as Uce have a habit of leaving the body of the hammock 

 during the day and secreting themselves in the knots between 

 the body and the arms, whence they may transfer themselves to the 

 garments of the unwary. If the hammock is large the father and 

 mother often sleep in one, their heads at opposite ends, while the 

 smaller children, frequently to the number of three or four, occupy 

 another. There can be no such thing as privacy, as the whole family 

 commonly sleep, live, and eat in a single room, which at most is divided 

 into two apartments by a flimsy cotton curtain. A prominent 



Fig. 8.— Domestic altar. 



