enient, but well contrived to defend them from
all injuries of cold and heat. They have a kind of tree, which at forty
years old loosens in the root, and falls with the first storm: it grows
very straight, and being pointed like stakes with a sharp stone (for the
_Houyhnhnms_ know not the use of iron), they stick them erect in the
ground, about ten inches asunder, and then weave in oat straw, or
sometimes wattles, between them. The roof is made after the same manner,
and so are the doors.

The _Houyhnhnms_ use the hollow part, between the pastern and the hoof of
their fore-foot, as we do our hands, and this with greater dexterity than
I could at first imagine. I have seen a white mare of our family thread
a needle (which I lent her on purpose) with that joint. They milk their
cows, reap their oats, and do all the work which requires hands, in the
same manner. They have a kind of hard flints, which, by grinding against
other stones, they form into instruments, that serve instead of wedges,
axes, and hammers. With tools made of these flints, they likewise cut
their hay, and reap their oats, which there grow naturally in several
fields; the _Yahoos_ draw home the sheaves in carriages, and the servants
tread them in certain covered huts to get out the grain, which is kept in
stores. They make a rude kind of earthen and wooden vessels, and bake
the former in the sun.

If they can avoid casualties, they die only of old age, and are buried in
the obscurest places that can be found, their friends and relations
expressing neither joy nor grief at their departure; nor does the dying
person discover the least regret that he is leaving the world, any more
than if he were upon returning home from a visit to one of his
neighbours. I remember my master having once made an appointment with a
friend and his family to come to his house, upon some affair of
importance: on the day fixed, the mistress and her two children came very
late; she made two excuses, first for her husband, who, as she said,
happened that very morning to _shnuwnh_. The word is strongly expressive
in their language, but not easily rendered into English; it signifies,
"to retire to his first mother." Her excuse for not coming sooner, was,
that her husband dying late in the morning, she was a good while
consulting her servants about a convenient place where his body should be
laid; and I observed, she behaved herself at our house as cheerfully as
the rest.