ON the next day, Gaithel took Tig and showed him the village; and Tig saw what he had taken to be an island was really a large and solid platform made of tree-trunks laid close together. There was a paling of stakes at the edge of the platform next the water, all round; and within the paling were the huts, built close together side by side in rows with narrow alleys in between, and sheds for the cattle, built of poles and wattled and daubed with clay like the huts. Besides their cattle the Lake People had some sheep, which they prized greatly on account of the wool, from which the women span yarn for weaving into cloth. At the place where the gangway joined the platform there was a gate of bars in the paling, and also a rough stairway going down to the canoes that were drawn up alongside. In an open place in the middle of the village was a fire burning on a large open hearthstone; and Gaithel said that nowhere else on the island was anyone allowed to have a fire, for fear of burning down the huts. In another place was a shoot for rubbish, to which the people had to bring their household refuse and tip it into the lake. Then Gaithel took Tig down to the landing stage, and showed him the canoes that were moored there; “I know someone who would like to see these canoes of yours,” said Tig. “He is a man in our village, called Crubach. He is lame. He makes troughs in the same way as you make canoes, by burning out a tree trunk, only of course they are much smaller; my mother has one to dip hides in when she is curing them.” [Illustration: Making a Canoe] “My uncle is making a canoe in the wood now,” said Gaithel. “He has been at work on it for weeks and weeks. Shall we go and see him at it?” So they went together into the wood where Gaithel’s uncle was at work. He had felled a stout oak tree and had got a portion of the trunk cut off. This was to be his canoe, and he had already begun to shape it fore and aft and to hollow it out. He had a little fire of dry chips and sticks burning in one place on the top of the log; and in another place, where he had had the fire burning the day before, he was hacking away at the charred wood with his stone axe. There was another man at work with him, and this man was hacking at the bows of the canoe; but his axe would not make a deep cut in the hard oak wood, and he was getting on very slowly. Gaithel’s uncle left off work to speak to Tig. He stood up and wiped his face which was all hot and grimy. “My boat will be a beauty when she is finished;” he said, “a rare one! Have you any like her in your village?” “We haven’t any boats in our village,” said Tig. “What--no boats? How do you do to get on the water then?” “We haven’t any water,” said Tig, “at least not a lake--only a pond.”