18 inches, or so, in diameter, the bark is
apt to break when flattened out. When stripped for huts, it is laid on
the ground for some days to dry, being flattened out on its face, and a
few stones or logs put on it. the ordinary bark of gum-trees is about
half an inch to three-eighths thick, so that a large sheet is very heavy.
Most exploring expeditions are accompanied by a black, whose dexterity in
stripping bark for a wet night is invaluable, as if the bark will "come
off" well, he can procure enough of it in an hour's time to make a
shelter for a large party.

Mats can be woven with ease when there is abundance of string, or some
equivalent for it (see "String"), in the following manner:--

[Sketch of loom].

A, B, are two pegs driven into the ground and standing about a foot out
of it. A stake, A B, is lashed across them; a row of pegs, E, are driven
into the ground, parallel to A, B, and about 6 inches apart. Two sets of
strings are then tied to A B; one set are fastened by their loose ends
into clefts, in the pegs E, and the other set are fastened to the stick,
C D. If there be ten strings in all, then 1, 3, 5, 7, 9, are tied to C D,
and 2, 4, 6, 8, 10, to A B. By alternately raising and depressing C D,
and by pushing in a handful of rushes between the two sets of strings
after each of its movements, and, finally, by patting them home with a
flat stick, this rough sort of weaving is carried on very successfully.
Mats are also plaited in breadths, and the breadths are stitched
together, side by side. Or a thicker kind of mat may be made by taking a
wisp of straw and working it in the same way in which straw beehives are
constructed. Straw is worked more easily after being damped and beaten
with a mallet.

Malay hitch.--I know no better name for the wonderfully simple way (shown
in the figure) of attaching together wisps of straw, rods, laths, reeds,
planks, poles, or anything of the kind, into a secure and flexible mat;
the sails used in the far East are made in this way, and the moveable
decks of vessels are made of bamboos, joined together with a similar but
rather more complicated stitch.

[Sketch of fastening].

I may remark that soldiers might be trained to a great deal of hutting
practice in a very inexpensive way, if they were drilled at putting
together huts, whose roofs and walls were made of planks lashed together
by this simple hitch, and whose supports were short scaffolding poles
planted in dee