CHAPTER XIII.

Kansas Interiors.-The Log-hut.-Discomforts.-Wind and Mud. Strange Medley.-Various Modes of Construction.Different Stages of Log-hut building.-The Wooden House and Shanty. How it is built.-Tent-life.-Interior Economy. -"Temperance House."-The Company.—Occupations.— Unreasonable Demands for Accommodation.-Alligators turned out. Travel teaches Contentment.-Disallowed at Night, but enforced by Day.-Conveniences of the Toilet.Meals.-Pride of the Host.--Rapid Eating.-Population of Leavenworth.-Commerce of the Plains.--Value of Stock. Caravan Trains.

A DESCRIPTION of the home-life of Kansas must commence with the log-hut as the most elementary form of dwelling.

The external form of the log-hut is probably familiar to most readers. But it would be difficult to convey to those accustomed to the homes of England an idea of the dirt, discomfort, and misery which often reign within. In justice I must add that I have seen remarkable exceptions to this-especially in the backwoods of Canada and of the North Western States of

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the Union. The Western border-man, however, loves his rude cabin with all its apparent discomforts. The wind which enters in gusts through the broad gaping chinks betwixt log and log is to him an agreeable ventilation; wanting this, the place would feel close and remind him of the pitiable habitations of "cityraised Down-Easters." The filth upon the floor, the smoke which fills the air, the blending of diverse odours arising from the cooking of hog-flesh over the fire and the presence of the living hog-flesh in the room, the intermingling of pig and poultry, parent and child, within the same few yards square, the strange decking of sides and roof with household stores and buffalo-skins, rifles, hatchets and powder-horns, all these things seem to be elements of charmed life to the true-born Western man.

There are stages of progress, too, in log-hut building. The most elementary is that in which the logs are piled one above another in a single square, notched and saddled so as to fit into one another angularly at about a foot short of the extremity of each log, and thus to form a stout framework, sawn through at the place where

the door is intended, and the whole capped by a roofing of timber covered with broad flat pieces of wood, called "shakes." If the settler desires to have his cabin plastered, he uses mud. Within, for furniture, he contents himself with a few tree-stumps, nicely trimmed, for seats, and a shelf or two, to do service in place of bedsteads. In dry weather the cooking is most conveniently managed outside the dwelling. This is the first stage of log-hut building. The second is marked by the introduction of the chimney. This is commonly built outside the house, as an adjunct; or rather, one might say, the house seems to be built against the chimney, so speedily has that which is but a novel invention come to be regarded, if one may judge from its size and prominence, as the most important feature. The third stage-if one may pass over the introduction of a second floor, reached by a rough ladder of home manufacture-is that in which further accommodation is sought laterally. This is accomplished by building a second square hut at, probably, twelve feet distance from the first and carrying the roof across the intervening space, so that a single house is

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formed, consisting of rooms right and left, and an open reception-room in the centre, where meals can be taken if desired, free to the air at its two sides, but shielded above by the roof covering. This is the highest style of log-house, and one much in favour in some parts of the Far West.

For the city life of Leavenworth, however, the log-hut is naturally discarded for the more polished shanty, or the yet larger wooden house. Sawn timber costs less in many parts of Kansas than the rough log, the groves and forests being far from plentiful, even in the east of the territory. A frame is run up and the planks nailed together, much as in any other place, understanding always that the rough settler is not particular about the right relation of the door to the doorway, or the nice fitting together of the plank sides, or the general finish and architectural correctness of either exterior or interior. That, when built, it is next furnished can scarcely be said of one of these Western houses. The settler commonly arrives at the place of his choice, strikes his tent, deposits his household furnishings and implements of husbandry

and war, and it then remains to build his house around his furniture rather than to introduce his furniture into his house. I have seen many instances in which a family has been living half within and half without their house, their domestic arrangements being in a state of incompleteness. On the very outskirts, too, of Leavenworth, I have remarked families living, Indian-like, beneath a rude covering of branches and mud, or under a simple awning stretched across a pole, amid the thick brushwood which skirts the steep banks of the Missouri. In the city itself, however, there are many houses of two stories, and comparative comfort, such as would be called in the vernacular of the West "mighty fine," "elegant," "right smart," "all-fired grand and Down-East like."

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As an illustration of the interior economy of one of these better houses, I will attempt a brief sketch of that which was my own home while in Leavenworth City. Temperance House" was a newly erected, low-roofed, wooden building, with two rooms in front, and others at the rear. The name was an