Carpentry & Cabin Building in 1876
A Puzzle for a Carpenter—To Build a Log-house without Iron—Split-Shingles—Put on the Roof—Make 
Door and Fireplace—To make a Door, Fireplace, and Chimney— Log Quarters of the Boundary 
Commission—Effects of Cold—A Caution to be remembered—To procure a Light from two pieces of 
Wood—Getting a Light with a Gun—How to carry Lucifers.

Direct a carpenter to build a house; he is only to have as tools an axe, an auger, and a knife; he is not to use a nail,
hinge, screw, or iron of any kind, and yet the door is to open and shut, latch, and accomplish all that an ordinary 
door is expected to do; he is to let in light, and at the same time keep out wet, without the aid of glass; he must roof 
the house, and make a fireplace and chimney entirely with wood, so as not to catch fire or allow the smoke to come
into the room; the only building materials at his disposal are to be trees growing near the site of the intended 
house.

Do you not think he would pronounce it an impossible task? Nevertheless, lumberers, settlers, and practised 
wanderers have to manage it. Like most other things, it is easy of accomplishment when once you know how to go 
to work. I presume the previous directions as to how an axe is to be used have been put into practice. 

First stake out the square or other shape you intend making your house, having previously satisfied yourself that 
the trees round about are suited to your purpose and that a constant supply of water is near by, a precaution the 
ancient Romans never lost sight of. Then calculate, by taking the average circumference of the trees, how many 
you will require to fell so as to make a wall seven feet high when the trunks are laid upon one another.

Ply your axe, chop down the required number of trees, trim them and lop off the tops, leaving the trunks the length 
you want them; the next process is that of rolling these logs to the site of the shanty, which can be accomplished 
easily if a long handspike is employed. This done, lay four of the largest logs into a square, (we will suppose this to 
be the shape of the house), then by using long sticks placed slantwise, as 'skeds' are adjusted to wagons, get four 
other logs upon the foundation logs. It will be necessary, in order to roll up the logs, as the height of the wall 
increases to have them of a less circumference, in order to diminish the weight; this, however, must depend upon 
the number and strength of the builders, or builder, if only one is at work; it is better to cut notches in the lower logs 
for those above them to drop into; it makes the building firm, and leaves less space open betwixt the logs.

Now stand upon the topmost log, and chop out a piece from it 2 ft. 6 in. long, and so on, log after log, until the 
bottom one is reached; this one must be only cut half-through, and the half split out; this done, roll up one more log,
and your doorway is finished; if you did not axe out the entrance at this stage of the building, you could not do it at 
all. In one end of the house chop out another opening precisely in the same way, only three feet wide; this is for the
fireplace. Having got the walls up, the hard and laborious part is over. Roofing is the second stage in the 
proceeding; rafters must be trenailed together and arranged precisely as they are in a stone house, which is to be 
either tiled or slated, but in lieu of tiles or slates shingles are used in wild countries.

Shingles vary in size, but fourteen inches by eight inches will be found to answer well. To make them, a cedar tree 
must be felled and axed into lengths of fourteen inches; to get a shingle eight inches wide the tree ought to 
measure forty-eight inches in circumference. Split your lengths into four pieces of equal size, remove the bark, and 
then, by employing the axe as a wedge and driving it with a log of wood, it becomes an easy job to split off thin 
slabs from the faces of the four pieces of cedar. These slabs are called shingles, and if properly put on form a roof 
quite as secure as if it was made of slates (parenthetically it will be as well to say that shingles are usually split with 
a tool made on purpose, called a 'frau,' which in shape nearly resembles the knife used for cutting hay into bundles;
commercially, and where there is a large demand for shingles, they are made by machinery and sold by the 
thousand). 

To shingle a house when you have no nails, begin at the bottom of the rafters, and let half the shingle project over, 
in order to carry the rain-water clear of the wall, exactly in the same way as an ordinary house is tiled. Fasten this 
row by trenailing a light piece of wood at each end, so that it rests firmly on the row of shingles. Following up this 
plan, let row follow row until the ridge of the rafters is attained, finish the opposite side and ends in the same way, 
and your house, if you are anything of a carpenter, has a waterproof roof.

The door can be easily constructed of rough plank, split from off a cedar log in the same manner as the shingles
were, only the log must be as long as the plank you require. These planks are then to be trenailed together by 
means of cross-pieces; one hole must be bored in the half-split lowermost log, and another in the uppermost log, 
for two pegs to work easily in, which pegs are to be fastened to the top and bottom of the door. This plan makes a 
capital substitute for an iron hinge. Any ordinary amount of ingenuity will be equal to designing a latch.

A fireplace I have always found to answer remarkably well is made in this way: Measure about five feet from the logs
forming the end in which you have axed out the place for your fire; cut as many light poles as you think you may 
require, each pole to be considerably taller than the ridge of the house when one end is placed on the line five feet 
from the logs and the other slanted against the log-house. 

Commence by placing one of these poles close to the lower log of the house on one side of the opening. Of course,
the first pole will be vertical, and as the distance from the house increases slant the poles as you place them 
towards the point or angle of the gable. Continue this arrangement along the measured line, and finish at the log on
the opposite side to that at which you commenced. You have now enclosed your fireplace, and by fastening the 
upper ends of the poles first firmly together, and then to the apex of the gable, you will find a capital chimney has
been constructed. About six inches from the bottom of this semicircle of poles, on the inside drive in several pickets,
the height of which, clear of the ground, should be quite four feet. Next wreath in betwixt these uprights a 'wickey' or
basketwork of light twigs and sticks, and it should be woven close and firm. 

This operation completed, you will have to turn mudlark for a short time, and mix well together a good thick muck, 
composed of clay, sand, small shingle, and water. It must be so thick as not to run through the basketwork, and yet 
thin enough to settle and pack well together; next fill in the space between the basketwork and the poles with this 
compo, and work it well down with a, tamping stick, so that no cracks or hollow spaces are left; then let it settle until 
you have completed the other parts of your house, which may be floored with rough plank if you are of a luxurious 
turn, or left only with the bare earth. 

A good trench should be made round the house, if you have the tools to do it with; a small bench will be found 
convenient as a table, and for seats chop logs the length best suited to your taste. When I have no glass I admit 
light by raising one or two shingles in the roof, working them up and down by means of a bit of hide pegged on, like 
the hinge boys usually employ for rabbit hutches. If it rains, all that is needed is to nearly close the shingles; the 
slant is then sufficient to run off the wet. I do not think I need go into any further detail, because there are 
numberless minor matters which can, and indeed must be left to the ingenuity of the wanderer. 

One who has a turn for carpentering will, as a matter of course, construct a better house than another not so gifted.
The work of building completed, light your fire, by first placing two logs at a short distance from each other, and a
third log at the back; build in your wood between them, and light it; as you keep your fire burning day after day, the 
compo gradually drys and hardens, but the wet for some time will keep the basketwork from catching fire; by and 
by, however, it begins to burn, and when consumed leaves you a regular concrete back to your fireplace, which, if 
well made and properly packed, becomes as hard and durable as fire-brick. This kind of fireplace answers 
admirably, and if the poles are properly slanted, and carried sufficiently high above the house, the smoke is carried 
up by a draught that keeps the fire burning briskly, and gets rid of the nuisance wood smoke always causes when it 
escapes into an enclosed space.

I need hardly say, that where tools and proper labour are to be obtained, log houses can be built quite equal to 
those made of stone or bricks, but as these are matters which do not apply directly to the wanderer, it would only 
occupy time unprofitably to give instructions as to the systems of building these more elaborate edifices.

The Commission were all wintered (for two winters) in log-houses built on the banks of the Upper Columbia River. In 
the construction of these log-houses we employed sun-dried bricks for making the fireplaces and chimneys, which 
answered perfectly, and we burnt lime to make mortar for building and for filling in the spaces between the logs of 
the houses. Of course we had glass and nails, and tools of all kinds, besides having men who were regular 
carpenters. We had also blacksmiths and workers in every description of handicraft. Hence we were enabled to 
build very complete houses, for stores, dwelling places, and large rooms for mapping. The cost of this log-camp 
was very heavy, because labour was dear, and rations most costly, in consequence of the distance provisions had 
to be brought by pack animals, from the nearest water communication.

The men and officers enjoyed admirable health during the winters, although the temperature was often down to 32 
deg. below zero; the ink froze so quickly in the pens that writing was next to an impossibility, and I have frequently 
seen the contents of a pail which was filled with water and placed close to the fire in my shanty become solid ice in 
a few hours; yet as long as the air was calm and no wind blew it did not appear to the senses unusually cold. I may 
mention one little matter as a caution to be remembered in very cold weather — never put an iron bit into a horse's 
mouth without previously warming it; very cold iron or steel acts much in the same way on animal tissues as it would
do if at a white heat; the bit takes the skin off the tongue of the horse in an instant.

I told the wanderer just now to light his fire when he had built it. This is not at all times quite so easy a job as it 
appears to be to us, who have lucifer matches and a box. The savage has no steel or iron to strike sparks from by 
using a flint; still he manages to light a fire with the same material he burns. I had again and again read about the 
savage procuring a light by rubbing two sticks together, but for the life of me I could not tell how it was possible until 
I saw it done.

You might continue to rub two pieces of dry wood one against the other, without kindling them, until your hair turned
grey, or you froze to death. It is not in this way the Indian manages; he takes a round piece of wood and a flat 
piece; the former he tapers to a conical shaped point, in the latter he scoops out a hollow place a trifle larger than 
the cone; laying the flat piece on the ground, and, placing his feet firmly upon it, with his hand he rapidly rotates the
end of the stick in the hollow place, by rubbing it between his palms, and at the same time pressing it firmly down. 
Very soon the dust thus rubbed off begins to smoulder, and at last ignites. This burning dust is next placed in dry
bark or moss, and carefully blown by the breath into a flame. 

Cedar wood is best, but it must be very dry, sound, and free from knots. Any one can thus procure a light, if wood is
to be obtained fitted for the purpose, but you will find it takes some practice to give the stick a rapid rotation, and to 
make at the same time a due amount of pressure. 

It is at all times easy to obtain a light, if you have a gun, gunpowder, and caps, or a flint lock does as well. The best 
plan of proceeding is to tear up a small quantity of the inner bark of a fir or cedar tree into fine threads, place a 
small quantity of gunpowder in the palm of the hand, slightly damp the bark, or whatever the material may be you 
are going to employ and then rub it well in the powder. Ram this very lightly into the gun, build a little heap of the 
driest material you can find (dry material for kindling can be generally procured from the under sides of fallen trees,
if it is rainy weather, or take the inside bark). Then if the weather is wet, cover your heap with a slab of bark.

Now stand a few yards off, and fire your gun into the heap; you will in all likelihood find the bark-wad smouldering; 
blow it carefully into a flame, and then the rest is easy. Flint and steel are very good in their way, but the grand 
difficulty is to keep your tinder dry.

If I can possibly procure lucifer matches I invariably use them in preference to anything else, and by exercising a 
little care and strict economy it is wonderful how long you can make a large metal box full of matches last. The best 
plan of carrying them is in a tin, or metal box of any kind; this box should be always rolled up in a long strip of 
dressed hide and tied firmly; packed in this way you could not make the matches wet, even by soaking the package 
in a river. As a rule, I am not favourably disposed towards any of the machines — and their name is legion — for 
procuring instantaneous light; they are pretty sure to get broken, or escaping that contingency, the material 
composing them soon wears out, and of course cannot be replaced; my advice is, have nothing to do with such 
useless toys.
        
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