description, calculated, it would seem, rather for a temporary and
occasional than a lasting shelter. Its architecture, compared with that
even of the surrounding log-houses of the country generally, was
excessively rude; its parts were out of all proportion, fitted seemingly
by an eye the most indifferent, and certainly without any, the most
distant regard, to square and compass. It consisted of two stories, the
upper being assigned to the sleeping apartments. Each floor contained
four rooms, accessible all, independently of one another, by entrances
from a great passage, running both above and below, through the centre
of the structure. In addition to the main building, a shed in the rear
of the main work afforded four other apartments, rather more closely
constructed, and in somewhat better finish than the rest of the
structure: these were in the occupation of the family exclusively. The
logs, in this work, were barbarously uneven, and hewn only to a degree
barely sufficient to permit of a tolerable level when placed one upon
the other. Morticed together at the ends, so very loosely had the work
been done, that a timid observer, and one not accustomed to the survey
of such fabrics, might entertain many misgivings of its security during
one of those severe hurricanes which, in some seasons of the year, so
dreadfully desolate the southern and southwestern country. Chimneys of
clay and stone intermixed, of the rudest fashion, projected from the two
ends of the building, threatening, with the toppling aspect which they
wore, the careless wayfarer, and leaving it something more than doubtful
whether the oblique and outward direction which they took, was not the
result of a wise precaution against a degree of contiguity with the
fabric they were meant to warm, which, from the liberal fires of the
pine woods, might have proved unfavorable to the protracted existence of
either.

The interior of the building aptly accorded with its outline. It was