pairs
formed both wall posts and rafters.

[Illustration: Fig. 307.--Ground plan of Osage lodge.]

Generally there was one fireplace and one smokehole in such a lodge; but
when I visited the Osage in 1883, I entered a low lodge with two
fireplaces, each equidistant from its end of the lodge and the entrance,
each fireplace having its smokehole.

Skin Lodges or Tents.

The tent was used when the people were migrating, and also when they
were traveling in search of the buffalo. It was also the favorite abode
of a household during the winter season, as the earth lodge was
generally erected in an exposed situation, selected on account of
comfort in the summer. The tent could be pitched in the timber or brush,
or down in wooded ravines, where the cold winds never had full sweep.
Hence, many Indians abandoned their houses in winter and went into their
tents, even when they were of canvas.

[Illustration: Fig. 308.--Omaha tent (from a photograph by
W. H. Jackson).]

The tent was commonly made of ten or a dozen dressed or tanned buffalo
skins. It was in the shape of a sugar loaf, and was from 10 to 12 feet
high, 10 or 15 feet in diameter at the bottom, and about a foot and a
half in diameter at the top, which served as a smokehole
([t]ihu[k]a^{n}). Besides the interior tent poles ([t]ici--3,
figure 309) and the tent skin ([t]iha--1), the tent had the
[t]i[|c]uma^{n}ha^{n}, or the place where the skins were fastened
together above the entrance (4). The [t]i[|c]uma^{n}ha^{n} was fastened
with the [t]ihu[|c]ubaxa^{n}(5), which consisted of sticks or pieces of
hide thrust crosswise through the holes in the tent skins. The bottom of
the tent was secured to the ground by pins ([t]ihu[|c]ugada^{n}--6)
driven through holes ([t]ihugaq[|c]uge) in the bottom of the skins, made
when the latter were tanned and before they had become hard. The
entrance ([t]ijebe) was generally opposite the quarter from which the
wind was blowing. A door flap ([t]ijebeg[|c]a^{n}--7) hung over the
entrance; it was made of skin with the hair outside, so as to turn
water, and was held taut by a stick fastened to it transversely. The
bottom of the door flap was loose, but the top was fastened to the tent.

[Illustration: Fig. 309--Exterior parts of an Omaha tent.]

The smokehole was formed by the two [t]ihugab[|c]i^{n}[|c]a(9), or
triangular ends of tent skins, immediately above the entrance and
[t]icuma^{n}ha^{n}. When there was no wind both of the