The real Indian wigwams are decorated with all sorts of emblems, for even the uncivilized red men had their crests and totems, and the boys who make these tepees can easily invent some mark which will distinguish their tent abode from all others. The ornamentation should be done with paint and should be carried out before the canvas covering is stretched over the poles.
A square tepee, as shown in the illustration Fig. 5, is another form of rear-yard tent that is easily made. Twelve poles are selected and four of them are lashed fast and spread apart on a square of six feet. Two poles are added to each side and all are lashed together at the head. Four pieces of canvas or heavy unbleached muslin are cut and made on the plan as shown in Fig. 6, the strips being cut from goods a yard wide. These pieces are six feet long, one foot wide at the head, and six feet at the foot. The seam through the middle of one piece is left open for three feet to form the doorway flaps, then the four sides are securely sewed together with waxed white string. This cover is slipped about the pole frame, tied at the front, and held down by means of short ropes that are lashed fast to the foot of each pole. The cover is decorated with paint to give it the Indian appearance, and when the flaps are tied back it is easy to go into and come out of the tepee.
A ridge-pole tepee is shown in Fig. 7, and is a very easy and simple one to make, for it is of one piece of canvas with two flaps sewed at each side to form the ends.
One ridge and two upright poles make the framework, and they are held in place by the canvas, which is drawn and lashed fast to stakes driven in the ground, as may be seen in the drawing. The ridge-pole is eight feet long, one and a half inches thick, and four inches wide. Two inches from either end a half-inch hole is bored to receive the iron pins that are driven in the ends of the uprights as shown at Fig. 8 A and B. The upright poles are eight feet long, and when set one foot of the lower end should be embedded in the ground. The sides are in one piece of muslin made by sewing widths of it together. The sheet measures seventeen feet long and eight feet wide; and when stretched over the ridge-pole and fastened down at both sides an inverted shape will be the result. It is ten feet across at the bottom, seven feet high, and eight feet long at each side. For the back it will be necessary to make a triangular piece of canvas the right size to fit the opening, or two flaps may be cut, divided at the middle, and tied back, or laced, to close the tent. The apron or part enclosure at the front is formed from pieces of canvas two feet wide sewed along the edges and caught together at the middle over the opening.