70 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [BULL, 69 
split sapplings, and daub them all over about six or seven inches thick 
with tough clay, well mixt with withered grass: when this cement 
is half dried, they thatch the house with the longest sort of dry grass 
that their land produces. They first lay on one round tier, placing a 
split sappling a-top, well tied to different parts of the under pieces 
of timber, about fifteen inches below the eave: and, in this manner, 
they proceed circularly to the very spire, where commonly a pole is 
fixed, that displays on the top the figure of a large carved eagle. At 
a small distance below which, four heavy logs are strongly tied together 
across, in a quadrangular form, in order to secure the roof . . . The 
door of this winter palace, is commonly about four feet high, and so 
narrow as not to admit two to enter it abreast, with a winding passage 
for the space of six or seven feet, to secure themselves both from the 
power of the bleak winds, and of an invading enemy. As they usually 
build on rising ground, the floor is often a yard lower than the earth, 
which serves them as a breast work against an enemy: and a small 
peeping window is level with the surface of the outside ground . . . 
in the fall of the year, as soon as the sun begins to lose his bree 
power, some of the women make a large fire [within the house] . 
When the fire is a little more than half burned down, they cover % 
over with ashes.” . 
During the night the occupants of the beds or couches would reach 
with long canes and ‘‘strike off some of the top embers,”’ thus keeping 
a glowing surface exposed. The fire would usually die out about 
the break of day. The same author (p. 421) refers to the council 
house, one in every town, ‘‘the only difference between it, and the 
winter house or stove, is in its dimensions, and application. It is 
usually built on the top of a hill; and, in that separate and imperial 
state house, the old beloved men and head warriors meet on material 
business, or to divert themselves, and feast and Games with the rest 
of the mangle’ 
It is remarkable how similar is Catlin’s description of the earth- 
covered structures of the Mandan, as seen by him during the early 
part of the last century, and the preceding account by Adair of the 
appearance and construction of the winter house of the Chickasaw. 
It is difficult to believe they did not have a common origin, and al- 
though the Mandan were then living far beyond the limits of the 
region treated in the present paper, nevertheless Catlin’s description 
should be quoted as it will tend to make more clear the origin of cer- 
tain sites to be mentioned on another page. 
The great village of the Mandan stood on a high point on the west 
bank of the Missouri. The point was at a bend of the river which 
thus protected it on three sides, and Catlin wrote: 
“They have therefore but one side to protect, which is effectually 
done by a strong piquet, and a ditch inside of it, of three or four feet 
