[A Woman’s Journey Round the World by Ida Pfeiffer]@TWC D-Link book
A Woman’s Journey Round the World

CHAPTER VII
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Besides these, a number of small wooden houses were in the course of erection, the want of them being greatly felt; at the time of my visit even officers of high rank were obliged to be contented with the most wretched huts.
I went from hut to hut in the hopes of being able to obtain some small room or other; but in vain, all were already occupied.

I was at last obliged to be satisfied with a small piece of ground, which I found at a carpenter's, whose room was already inhabited by four different individuals.

I was shown a place behind the door, exactly six feet long and four broad.

There was no flooring but the earth itself; the walls were composed of wicker work; a bed was quite out of the question, and yet for this accommodation I was obliged to pay one florin and thirty kreutzers a-week (about 7s.) The residence or hut of an Indian consists simply of a roof of palm- trees, supported on a number of poles, with sometimes the addition of walls formed of wicker-work.

Each hut contains only one room, from twenty to fifty feet long, and from ten to thirty feet broad, and is frequently occupied by several families at the same time.
The furniture is composed of finely woven straw mats, a few coverlids, and two or three wooden chests and stools; the last, however, are reckoned articles of luxury.


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