ompound "bee-hive"
house:--"The greatest height of the living room--in its centre, that
is--was scarcely 6 feet. In no part of the dairy was it possible to
stand erect. The door of communication between the two rooms was so
small that we could get through it only by creeping. The great
thickness of the walls, 6 to 8 feet, gave this door, or passage of
communication, the look of a tunnel, and made the creeping through it
very real. The creeping was only a little less real in getting through
the equally tunnel-like, though somewhat wider and loftier passage,
which led from the open air into the first or dwelling room."[73]

[Footnote 72: _Op. cit._, p. 161.]

[Footnote 73: _The Past in the Present_, p. 60.]

[Illustration: PLATE III.

BEE-HIVE HOUSES, FIDIGIDH IOCHDRACH, UIG, LEWIS, HEBRIDES. Inhabited
1859.]

PLATE III.--_Bee-Hive Houses at Uig, inhabited in 1859._

(From Plate XII. of Vol. III. of _Proceedings of the Society of
Antiquaries of Scotland_, First Series.)

See p. 47, _ante_.

[Illustration: PLATE IV.

BEEHIVE-HOUSES (BOTHAN) MEABHAG, FOREST OF HARRIS.]

PLATE IV.--_Bee-Hive Houses at Meabhag, Forest of Harris._

(From Plate X. of Vol. III. of _Proceedings of the Society of
Antiquaries of Scotland_, First Series.)

At the date of Captain Thomas's visit (1861) a man was still living who
had been born in one or other of these dwellings.

[Illustration: PLATE V.

GROUND PLAN OF RUINED _BOTH_ AT BAILE FHLODAIDH, ON THE NORTH SIDE OF
THE ISLAND OF BENBECULA.

_a_. "scarcely 18 in. wide."]

PLATE V.--_Ground Plan of Bee-Hive House, Island of Benbecula._

(From Plate XXXII. of Vol. VII. of _Proceedings of the Society of
Antiquaries of Scotland_, First Series.)

[Illustration: PLATE VI.

SECTIONAL VIEW AND GROUND PLAN OF MOUND DWELLING, CALLED _BOTH
STACSEAL_, SITUATED MIDWAY BETWEEN STORNOWAY AND CARLOWAY, LEWIS,
HEBRIDES.

"A hole (_e_), called the Farlos, is left in the apex of the roof for
the escape of the smoke, and is closed with a turf or flat stone as
requisite."

_Height of Dome, 7 feet._

_a, b. Doorways._

_c. Fireplace._

_d. Row of stones for seats._

_e. Centre. (Distance from e to end of cells, 7 feet.)_

_f, g, h. Cells or bed-places._

_f is "2 feet wide and 15 inches high at the inner end; is 5 feet long
and 3 feet high at the mouth. The opposite cell (g) is of the same
dimensions. The third cell (h) is 4 feet wide at the mouth, 5 feet long,
decreasin