House and Garden 
pile-dwelling, constructed on piles in lakes 
or rivers, in order to secure the inhabitants 
from the sudden attack of their enemies or 
the ravages of beasts of prey. Switzerland 
is famous for its lake dwellings, and the 
settlements at Morges, on the Lake of 
Geneva ; at Sutz, on the Lake of Bienne, 
and at Marin and Auvernier, on the Lake 
of Neuchatel, reveal extraordinary evidences 
of early pre¬ 
historic civili¬ 
zation. Eng- 
land, too, has 
its lake dwell¬ 
ings, the most 
complete ex¬ 
amples hav¬ 
ing been re¬ 
cently discov¬ 
ered at Glas¬ 
tonbury. A 
platform was 
found con¬ 
structed of 
timber and 
brushwood, 
supported by 
rows of small 
piles. The 
wal Is were 
built of upright posts, the crevices be¬ 
ing filled with wattle and daub ; and the 
houses were usually circular in shape, though 
some were rectangular. The floor was made 
of clay. Communication with the land was 
effected bv means of a canoe, cut out of the 
stem of an oak, with a pointed prow, which 
had a hole through which doubtless a rope 
was passed in order to fasten it to the little 
harbor of the lake village. The life of the 
village extended from about 300 B. C. to 
the advent of the Romans. 
When the Celtic folk abandoned their pit- 
dwellings they still retained the circular form 
in the construction of their abodes. At 
the time of the Roman invasion, Caesar tells 
us that their houses resembled those in Gaul. 
Diodorus Siculus calls them wretched cot¬ 
tages, constructed of wood and covered with 
straw ; and Strabo describes those of Gaul as 
being constructed of poles and wattled work, 
in the form of a circle, with lofty, tapering or 
pointed roofs. The Antonine Column gives 
representations of the Gaulish houses which 
accord with the description of Strabo, except 
that the roofs are domed, and some ol the 
houses are oblong; but the want of skill in 
the sculptor has made them appear more 
like large tin canisters than human habi¬ 
tations. The early races in Britain knew 
how to build with stone, and evidences of 
their work can be seen in Cornwall and in 
the remote 
Caithness. At 
Chun Castle 
there are walls 
built of rough 
masses of 
granite, five or 
six feet long, 
fitted together 
and piled up 
without ce¬ 
ment, but pre¬ 
senting a tol¬ 
erably smooth 
surface, and 
my friend Sir 
Francis d ress 
Barry has 
been excava- 
t i n g some 
brocks on the 
northern shore ol Scotland, constructed of 
uncemented stone. These brocks, buried 
homes ol a forgotten race, are very singu¬ 
lar and curious buildings. There is a 
circular tower composed of a dry-built 
wall, fifteen feet thick, enclosing a court 
twenty feet in diameter. The wall rises to a 
height of forty-five feet, and has no opening 
to the outside except the doorway, which 
gives access to the court. Opening from the 
court are a series of chambers on the ground 
floor, constructed in the thickness of the wall 
and rudely vaulted with overlapping masonry. 
Above these are successive ranges of level 
galleries, also in the thickness of the wall, 
each going around the tower, and placed so 
that the roof of the one below always forms 
the floor of the one above. These galleries 
are crossed successively by a stair, from which 
access to them is obtained by facing around 
in the ascent and stepping across the vacant 
space forming the well of the stair. The 
lower three galleries only are lighted, and 
WAVLAND smith’s CAVE 
2 5 
