“Immediately after our arrival at Clowey, the Indians began to build their bark canoes, and embraced every convenient opportunity for that purpose; but as warm and dry weather only is fit for this business, which was by no means the case at present, it was the 18th of May before the canoes belonging to my party could be completed. On the nineteenth we agreed to proceed on our journey; but Matonabbee’s canoe meeting with some damage, which took near a whole day to repair, we were detained till the twentieth. Those vessels, though made of the same materials with the canoes of the Southern Indians, differ from them both in shape and construction; they are also much smaller and lighter, and though very slight and simple in their construction, are nevertheless the best that could possibly be contrived for the use of those poor people, who are frequently obliged to carry them a hundred, and sometimes a hundred and fifty miles at a time, without having occasion to put them into the water. Indeed, the chief use of these canoes is to ferry over un-fordable rivers, though sometimes, and in a few places, it must be acknowledged that they are of great service in killing deer, as they enable the Indians to cross rivers and the narrow parts of lakes; they are also useful in killing swans, geese, ducks, &c., in the moulting season. All the tools used by an Indian in building his canoe, as well as in making his snow shoes, and every other kind of wood-work, consist of a hatchet, a knife, a file, and an awl, in the use of which they are so dexterous that everything they make is executed with a neatness not to be excelled by the most expert mechanic, assisted with every tool he could wish.” (Note 2)
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The lightest and most easily-made boats in Guiana are “woodskins,” made of the bark of the locust (Hymenoea courbaril), or the purple heart (Copiafera pubiflora). A strip of bark of sufficient length is first carefully taken from a tree and cut to an oblong shape, the natural curve being accurately preserved. About two or three feet from each end a wedge-shaped piece, or gore, is cut from either side of the bark, the ends bent up until the edges of the gores meet, when they are sewed together with “bush rope.” This process raises the bow and stern at an angle, while the body of the craft floats parallel to the water-line. Sticks of strong wood are sometimes fastened around the gunwale. Pieces of squared bark are laid on the floor to serve as seats for passengers or rests for goods, and the craft is ready. These canoes are so light as to be portable around falls or obstructions to navigat ion. When not in use they are sunk in the water to prevent splitting or warping under the action of the sun. Paddles are hewn out of solid block or out of the board, like natural buttresses of the paddle tree (Aspidospermum excelsum). These paddles differ in form from tribe to tribe. (Note 3). On the Columbia river the Callispels, and on the Amoor the Giliaks, cut the gore so as to make the canoe bow and stern pointed under water.
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To make a bark canoe the Dyak goes to the nearest stringy bark tree, chops a circle round it at its base, and another circle seven or eight feet from the ground; he then makes a longitudinal cut on each side and strips off as much bark as is required. The ends are sewed up carefully and daubed up with clay, the sides being kept in position by cross pieces. The steering is performed by two greatly developed fixed paddles. (Note 4).
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The natives of Gippsland, Australia, make a boat of a single sheet of the Eucalyptus sirberiana, the ends being tied up. The interior people use for the same purpose the bark from the convex side of a crooked tree, and stop the ends with balls of mud. They are propelled by poles and by means of a circular piece of bark, six inches in diameter, which is used as well to bail out the canoe. Two men with six hundred pounds of flour will cross a lake in one of these frail craft. (Note 5).
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