square across the butts to eighteen inches in length. They were dipped in water and laid in courses after the manner of shingles but the butts of the stems are driven forward to a slope which obliterates the shoulder, making the courses invisible. In the better houses this thatching may be plastered with earth mortar or with an earth-lime mortar, which is less liable to wash in heavy rain.
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Fig. 89.—Air-dried earth brick for house building.
The walls of the house we saw building were also sided
with the long, large kaoliang stems. An ordinary frame
with posts and girts about three feet apart had been
erected, on sills and with plates carrying the roof.
Standing vertically against the girts and tied to them,
forming a close layer, were the kaoliang stems. These
were plastered outside and in with a layer of thin earth
mortar. A similar layer of stems, set up on the inside of
the girts and similarly plastered, formed the inner face
of the wall of the house, leaving dead air spaces between
the girts.
