miles away was striking. No great advance had been made upon the
homes that the people had occupied in Gaul before their emigration.
In the centre stood Parta's abode, distinguished from the rest only
by its superior size. The walls were of mud and stone, the roof
high, so as to let the water run more easily off the rough thatching.
It contained but one central hall surrounded by half a dozen small
apartments.

The huts of the people consisted but of a single room, with a hole
in the roof by which the smoke of the fire in the centre made its
way out. The doorway was generally closed by a wattle secured by a
bar. When this was closed light only found its way into the room
through the chinks of the wattle and the hole in the roof. In
winter, for extra warmth, a skin was hung before the door. Beyond
piles of hides, which served as seats by day and beds at night,
there was no furniture whatever in the rooms, save a few earthen
cooking pots.

Parta's abode, however, was more sumptuously furnished. Across one
end ran a sort of dais of beaten earth, raised a foot above the
rest of the floor. This was thickly strewn with fresh rushes, and
there was a rough table and benches. The walls of the apartment
were hidden by skins, principally those of wolves.

The fireplace was in the centre of the lower part of the hall, and
arranged on a shelf against the wall were cooking pots of iron and
brass; while on a similar shelf on the wall above the dais were
jugs and drinking vessels of gold. Hams of wild boar and swine hung
from the rafters, where too were suspended wild duck and fish, and
other articles of food. Parta's own apartment led from the back