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get that frame-house, we are going to have it just as near to the landing-place as we can possibly stick it. You may bet your pile on that! Of course, in building the shanty, we employed the usual fashion prevalent in the colony. Because, when we set to work we said we were going to build a proper frame-house, _not_ a shanty. That is a name for our habitation, which has since grown up into usage. We were none of us practised carpenters; but what did that matter? We knew how to use our hands; and had so often seen houses built that we knew precisely how to do it. First of all, then, are the piles. These are of puriri wood, tough, heavy, and durable. They are rough-split sections of the great logs, some two feet thick, with squarely-sawn ends. They are fixed in the ground two or three feet apart, so as to bring their flat-sawn tops upon a uniform level. The irregularities of the ground are thus provided against, while a suitable foundation is laid. The next process is to build a scaffolding, or skeleton frame, of scantling and quartering. When that has been done, the floor is planked over, the sides weather-boarded, doors, windows, and partitions being put in according to the design of the architect. Lastly, the roof is shingled, that is, covered with what our chum, O'Gaygun, calls "wooden slates." Our shanty is thirty feet long by ten in width. The sides are seven feet high, and the ridge-pole is double that height from the floor. There are a door and two windows, the latter having been bought at the township. There is a partition across the shanty, two rooms having originally been intended; but as this partition has a doorway without a door, and is only the height of the sides, being open above, the original intention in raising it has been lost, and it now merely serves for a convenient rack. There is no verandah on the outside of the shanty, for we regarded that as a waste of material and labour. The fireplace is an important part of the shanty. Ten feet of the side opposite the door was left open, not boarded up. Outside of this a sort of supplementary chamber, ten feet square, was boarded up from the ground. The roof of this little outroom slopes away _from_ that of the rest of the shanty, and at its highest point a long narrow slit is left open for a chimney. There is no flooring to this chamber, the ground being covered with stones well pounded down. Its level is necessarily sunk a little below that o
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