(boiling tar and seashore sand) was spread on the ground where they were
destined to lie. Having adjusted each in its due position, I adzed the
upper faces and cut a series of mortices for the studs, which were
obtained in the bush--mere thin, straight, dry trees which had succumbed
to bush fires. Each was roughly squared with the adze and planed and
tenoned.

Good fortune presented, greatly to the easement of labour, two splendid
pieces of driftwood for posts for one of the doors. To the sea also I was
indebted for long pieces to serve as wall plates, one being the jibboom
of what must have been a sturdily-built boat, while the broken mast of a
cutter fitted in splendidly as a ridge-pole. For the walls I visited an
old bean-tree log in the jungle, cut off blocks in suitable lengths, and
split them with maul and wedges into rough slabs, roughly adzed away
superfluous thickness, and carried them one by one to the brink of the
canyon, down which I cast them. Then each had to be carried up the steep
side and on to the site, the distance from the log in the jungle being
about three hundred yards.

Within the skeleton of the building I improvised a rough bench, upon
which the slabs were dressed with the plane and the edges bevelled so
that each would fit on the other to the exclusion of the rain. Upon the
uprights I nailed inch slats perpendicularly, against which the slabs
were placed, each being held in place temporarily until the panel was
complete, when other slats retained them. The rafters were manipulated of
odd sorts of timber and the roof of second-used corrugated iron, the
previous nail holes being stopped with solder. A roomy recess with a
beaten clay floor was provided for the cooking stove. Each of the two
doors was made in horizontal halves, with a hinged fanlight over the
lintel, and the window spaces filled with wooden shutters, hinged from