Probably man did not live long on the earth without discovering the convenience which there
is in a house, the domestic comforts, which phrase may have originally signified the
satisfaction of the use more than of the family; though these must be extremely partial and
occasional in those climates where the house is associated in our thoughts with winter or the
rainy season chiefly, and two thirds of the year, except for a parasol, is unnecessary. In our
climate, in summer, it was formerly almost solely a covering at night. In the Indian gazettes
a wigwam was the symbol of a day's march, and a row of them cut or painted on the bark of a
tree signified that so many times they had camped. Man was not made so large limbed and robust
but that he must seek to narrow his world, and wall in a space such as fitted him. He was at
first bare and out of doors; but though this was pleasant enough in serene and warm weather,
by daylight, the rainy season and the winter, to say nothing of the torrid sun, would perhaps
have nipped his race in the bud if he had not made haste to clothe himself with the shelter
of a house.
We may imagine a time when, in the infancy of the human race, some enterprising mortal crept
into a hollow in a rock for shelter... From the cave, we have advanced to roofs of palm leaves,
of barks and boughs, of linen woven and stretched,of grass and straw, of boards and shingles,
of stones and tiles.