The farmer and mechanic. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 18??-19??, 1909-08-10
SOME HUMAN %HABITATIONS
BY COLLIER COBB

ers' Assembly, at Merehead City. for
a number of years. 1t is not dis
tinctly hemisDherical. but is round at
the bottom. with vertical walls. and
it's ROOF is rather ccnical than henlis-
pherical. 1t is twelve feet in lame
ter and six feet in height It has a
door large enough to crawl through
and a fireplace in the center, the
smoke escaping by a hole IN the apex
of the roof. The rushes have been
SO thoroughly soaked in salt water
as to be practically fire-proof.
Another case in point: A number of
years ago I was wrecked on the
Florida coast, and came upon a little
key which had upon it one of these
primitive habitationS of palmetto
thatch. I lost my camrea in the
wreck and consequently could not
photograph it: but my kind host as
sured me. that there were many such
hid away in the thickets of the main
land and upon the keys around
Biscayne Bay, and that. SO far as he
knew, they were found all along the
keys and. the shoreline as far as Key
| West. Yet letters to several OBJ
servant gentlemen, thoroughly &C
quainted with the coast, failed to get
for me any information Or photo
graphs of such lodges. all of them
assuring me that no such exist on
the Florida coast. Yet another trial
has brought me the desired photo
graph, the promise of several more,
and the assurance that | may obtain
still more. as the land south Of
homesteaders.
was unknown except along the North
Carolina coast, has largely disappear
ed with the disappearance OF the
great forests along The Banks" as
these sand-reefs are called. One Of
the earliest. and the first to disap-
pear was that at the Kill Devil Hills,
which was used by the early settlers
of the Albemarle district as a watch
tower when on the lookout for New
England ships that brought Medford
rum to the CarOllnaS in for
corn. Another was at Mays Head,
where the rude Wrecker Of colonial
days found it to his advantage to keep
informed as to the movements of
these New England ships on their
way to the West Indies for molasses
and more rum. No old inhabitant of
Hatteras has any recollection, or even
tradition, Of such a lookout there;
but Blackbeard's piratical crew main
tanned a tree-tOp lodge in the great
oaks near Teach's Hole, on the south
west end of Ocracoke Island. These
all disappeared long before the days
of our Oldest inhabitant.
Southwark from Ocracoke Inlet,
such lookouts, as they were mere
called, have been known during the
past half-century on Portsmouth
Island, on Core Bank, near Cape Look
out, and nea the western extremity
Of Bogue Banks, where they were
maintained from early colonial days
down to the disappearance of the for
ests, ~from forty to fifty years ago. I
we'll recall a rush-built lodge on
Rno1,n Ranks itS hooru noc,1napt told
me, that it had replaced a tall tree
top lookout Of considerable dimen-
sions.
While the great tree-top habita-
tons nave practically disappeared
from the tai trees there. lookouts of
less significance may still be seen
where the tall pines come down to
the waters edge along the western
border of Currituck Sound, and I re-
call one such as Kitty Hawk. Within
five years I have also seen them on
Jews Quarter Island, Bell Island,
Church's Island, Colleton Island, and
at several points IN the Currituck
marshes.
Straw-thatched lodges are also
frequently built along this same west
ern border, when trees do not afford
the necessary height. They are no
longer used by pirates and wreckers
watching for their prey, nor by
whalemen seeking big game in the
Sea. The laws permit hunting in the
sound on only four days in h week,
and these lesser tree dwellings are
occupied by old hutners on Wednes-
days. and Saturdays. for here they
may watch the passage of wild fowl.
1t is in this region, too, that the
hunter who expects to be away from
home for a few nights only makes
his nest of ruShes under a bush and
possibly throws around himself an
additional bush or two. or. perhaps,
a New leaves from the fan palmetto,
SO abundant on Colleton Island. If
he expects to spend some time in
the neighborhood, he makes a low
rude frame Of bushes. covering it
with brush or with palmetto leaves,