George Wharton James

TERRACED HOUSES OF THE HOPIS, ALLOWING SLEEPING OUT OF DOORS.

As I have already intimated, the Indian is practically an out-of-door sleeper. I say “practically,” for there are exceptions to the general rule. The Hopis of northern Arizona have houses. In the cold winter months they sleep indoors whenever they can. The Navahos, Apaches, Havasupais, and other tribes have their “hogans” and “hawas” in which they sleep in the very cold weather. But in the summer the invariable rule is for all to sleep out of doors. And even in the winter, if duty calls them away from home and they have to camp out, they sleep in the cold, on the snow, in the rain, as unconcerned for their health as if they were well protected indoors. It is this latter feature that so much commends itself to me. It is just as natural to them to have to sleep out of doors as it is to sleep indoors. They think no more of it, do not regard it as an unusual and dangerous experience, or one to be dreaded. They accept it without a murmur or complaint, and without fear. This is an attitude of mind that I would the white race would learn from the Indian. I once had a friend, a city-bred man, born and brought up in New York, sent west to me by his physician because he had had two or three hemorrhages, whom I took out into Arizona. The first night we had to sleep out was very cold, for it was early in the year, and at that high altitude the thermometer sank very rapidly after the sun went down. Yet I deliberately called camp by the side of a great snowbank. The fearful invalid wanted to know what I was stopping there for. I told him it was to afford him a good sleeping place on the snow. He expressed his dread, and assured me that such an experience would kill him at once. I told him that if it did I would see that he was decently buried, but that did not seem to dissipate his fears. After a good camp-fire was built, and he had had a warm and comforting supper, and his blankets were stretched out on the snow, and he was undressed and well wrapped up, with a hot rock at his feet and the cheery blaze lighting up the scene, he felt less alarmed. I talked him to sleep, and when he awoke in the morning it was to confess that his throat and lungs felt more comfortable than they had done for many long months. A month of this open-air sleeping gave him new ideas on the subject, and sent him back east to fit up a camp in the Adirondacks, where he could get a great deal of outdoor life, and sleeping with doors and windows wide open.

The outdoor treatment for tuberculosis is now almost universal. Here is what one eminent authority says on the subject:

“Tuberculosis is a direct result of over-work, either mental or physical, and rest is largely its cure. This life in the open air is best carried out in a sitting or semi-reclining posture. Every hour of the day in all seasons of the year and in all kinds of weather should thus be spent, together with sleeping in a tent, protected veranda, or in a house with windows wide open. It will be found that the colder the weather, the more marked and permanent the results. One does not need to be uncomfortable; one can be well wrapped with heavy blankets. It is the inhalation of cold air that is so effectual in stimulating appetite, as a general tonic and fever reducer. A consumptive should have for his motto: ‘Every hour in the closed house is an hour lost.’ There is no excuse for losing time.”

But it is not for those who are in ill health alone that I would commend out-of-door sleeping. Those who are healthy need to be kept in health, and there is a vim, a vigor, a physical joy, comes from this habit that I would that every child, young man and woman, and adult in the land might enjoy. Here is what one intelligent writer, Mary Heath, has recently said upon this subject, and her words I most heartily indorse:

“The success of any scheme for human betterment, morally, mentally, or physically, depends upon securing human co-operation by convincing the intellect of the truth or falsity of any widespread belief. The almost universal notion that night air is dangerous has predisposed, more than any other one cause, to the shutting of every door and window at sunset to keep out malaria. Notwithstanding the fact that all air analyses show that outdoor night air is much purer than day air, the old fear of night air still remains, and is responsible for much infection from foul air, because outdoor and indoor workers in summer and winter—all alike—spend their sleeping hours in ill-ventilated bedrooms. After false ideas about the harmfulness of fresh air are eradicated, plans should be devised and utilized for arranging outdoor sleeping apartments; plans should also be devised for keeping the body warm in cold weather without an over-amount of bedclothing; and for the health and convenience of the millions of middle class and more or less humble domestic home workers, provisions should be made for doing the housework as much as possible out of doors, away from the kitchen heat and odors of cooking food. Out-of-door recreation for the family should also be provided for. Could all sedentary workers spend the seven to nine hours of sleep in a clean, outdoor atmosphere, many of the evil effects of indoor sedentary work would be neutralized. The shop, office, or factory employe, after sleeping in the pure night air, would awake invigorated for the day’s demands and duties. Beginning the day aright, with a keen normal appetite for healthful food, he would be able to utilize his working energies without either structural damage to the tissues, or intellectual or moral degradation.”

Elbert Hubbard, of Roycroft fame, has converted all the sleeping-rooms of his phalanstery into outdoor rooms, where fresh, pure air is breathed. Dr. Kellogg, editor of Good Health, sleeps out of doors all the time, and all his large family of adopted children have rooms which practically contain no doors or windows, so that they sleep as near the open air as civilization will allow.

For years, as far as was possible, I have slept out of doors. When at home my bed is on an open porch, my face turned to the stars, the waving of plum, peach, and fig trees making music while I sleep, the beautiful lights of earliest dawn cheering my eyes before I arise, and the twittering and singing of the birds putting melodies into my soul as I dress. When I am in the wilds exploring, I sleep out of doors always, when and where I can. Those who have read my various books know of my experiences of sleeping in storms, during heavy rains, without bedding in rocky washes, in leaky boats and the rain pouring upon us, in the heat of the desert, and the cold of the snowy plateaus of Arizona. Yet I do not remember that I ever once “took cold,” though I have been wet through many a night. On the other hand, I never visit civilization, especially the proud, haughty, conceited civilization of the East, where houses are steam-heated, and street and railway cars are superheated, without taking severe colds and suffering much misery.

Those who have heard Nansen and Peary and other arctic explorers will remember that they had the same experience. Is it not apparent, therefore, that the outdoor life is the normal, the healthful, the rational, the natural life, while that of the steam-heated house is abnormal, unhealthful, irrational, and unnatural?

People often say: But I see that my house is well ventilated, and therefore the air is as pure and good as it is out of doors. In reply, permit me to say that no house can ever be well ventilated. Air to be pure and wholesome must be alive. It can only live when free and uncontained, and in contact with the direct rays of the sun during the day. Every thoughtful person has noticed the great difference there is between outdoor air and indoor air, on stepping from outside inside, even through all the doors and windows of the room were wide open. There is a vast difference between indoor and outdoor air, even under the best of conditions; so get into the open all you can, day or night, winter or summer, wet or dry.

One of the finest and strongest poems in the language is the following, by Richard Burton:

GOD’S GIFT, THE AIR

Many white people go out tenting in the summer and think they are sleeping out of doors. What a foolish error. Here is what a scientific authority says upon the subject:

“Are you tenting? If so, you should know:

“That a well-closed tent is nearly air-tight, and consequently,—

“That in an ordinary-sized tent, one occupant will so pollute the air as to render it unfit to breathe in less than twenty minutes; two occupants, in less than ten minutes.

“That if you are tenting for your health, an opening at each end of the tent must be provided for ventilation at night. The openings should be at least a foot square for each occupant.

“Breathing impure air lowers the vitality, and consequently renders one susceptible to colds and other diseased conditions.”