tiles, coloured red. Many houses in the city had simply a roof-covering
of thatched straw.

The house was but a single story high, but in this respect the king's
palace itself was no better. There were three divisions to the house.
One was for the use of the men, a second for the women of the family,
and a third for the servants. Each division had a suitable number of
rooms for its occupants.

Yung Pak's own sleeping-room was a dainty affair, with its paper walls,
tiger-skin rugs upon the stone floor, and the softest of mats and silk
and wadded cotton coverings for his couch.

This couch, by the way, was another queer affair. It was built of brick!
Beneath it were pipes or flues connected with other pipes which ran
beneath the whole house. Through these flues were forced currents of hot
air from a blaze in a large fireplace at one end of the house. The
chimney was at the other end, and thus a draught of hot air constantly
passed beneath the floors in cold weather. On warm nights Yung Pak would
pile his mats upon the floor and sleep as comfortably as ever you did
on the softest feather bed your grandmother could make.

The windows of Ki Pak's house were not made of glass, but were small
square frames covered with oiled paper. These frames fitted into grooves
so that they could be slid back and forth, and in warm weather the
windows were always left open. The doors were made of wood, though in
many houses paper or plaited bamboo was used.

When Yung Pak ate his meals, he sat upon a rug on the floor with his
father and such male guests as might be in the house. The women never