The Bark Canoes and Skin Boats of North America 42

The Bark Canoes and Skin Boats of North America 42

EXTINCT FORMS OF CANOES RECONSTRUCTED FROM OLD MODELS, showing

variations in the bottom frame construction and the effects of hull

form. Dimensions are estimated from the sizes of canoes in the area of

each example.]

 

In some bateau variations of the kayak-form canoe, the longitudinals

were secured by crosspieces, the ends of which were tenoned into the

inside faces of the chine battens. The three inner battens were below

the cross pieces. As a result, their bottoms were slightly below the

bottom of the chine members, so that in this canoe two chine lines show

through the bark cover on each side of the canoe.

 

From tribe to tribe the method of building the kayak-form canoe varied

somewhat, but generally the following procedure was employed. On a

smooth, level piece of ground the form of the canoe was staked out

in the usual manner, using a building frame, with the stakes sloped

outward at the top to match the desired flare of the sides.

 

Stem and stern posts were shaped of cedar by charring and scraping.

The gunwales were made in the same manner and were then lashed at the

desired heights on the stakes. Next, the bark cover was formed, usually

of two or more sheets sewn together. This was placed inside the stakes

and the building frame was forced down on it and weighted with stones.

The ends were then trimmed and the sides were gored, sewn, and trimmed

to fit the gunwales, to which the bark was laced. The stem and the

stern post were then placed and lashed to the gunwales and secured to

the bark by lashing, in some instances through holes in the posts. The

bark at this stage was usually quite dry and stiff and the gunwales

could be freed from the side stakes.

 

The bottom frame, assembled before other construction had started, was

hogged; the middle was placed on a log or block and the ends weighted.

Hot water was often applied to set the bottom frame.

 

Next, the bark cover was thoroughly wetted with boiling water to make

it pliable and elastic. The building frame and stones were now removed,

the bottom frame was substituted, and its ends fastened or engaged

to the heels of the stem and stern posts. The bottom frame was then

forced flat and held there by stones. This stretched the bottom bark

longitudinally, and increased the sheer slightly toward bow and stern.

The hogged bottom frame was known as a "sliding bottom" by some Indians.

 

The transverse frames, or ribs, had been prebent in the usual manner

before assembly began; a few of these were now put in place, the ends

being forced under the gunwales between their outer faces and the bark,

or into a groove on the underside of the gunwale. This stretched the

bark transversely and vertically. Once the bark had been forced into

form by this method, the remaining ribs were added, and these now held

the hogged bottom down so that the weights or stones could be removed.

The canoe was then turned over, the seams gummed, and any tears or

rents repaired.

 

This method of building usually produced a slight hogging in both

bottom and in the sheer amidships, but when the canoe was afloat

and loaded the light, flexible construction caused the hogging to

disappear. The kayak-form canoes of the Dènè tribe appear to be the

most highly developed of all in this type.

 

The decks of many of the kayak-form canoes were made of a triangular

sheet of bark cut with the grain of the bark running athwartships, so

that it could be held in place by the curl of its edges, which clamped

under the outwales, as well as by three lashings. The edges were curled

by passing a glowing brand along them. One lashing was around the

stem-head and two were at the inboard end of the deck, around inwale

and outwale. If the inboard end of the deck was not on a thwart it was

stiffened by a batten lashed on top of the deck athwartship, at the

deck end, to serve as an exterior deck beam and breakwater in one. If

the deck end was on a thwart, a batten might be pegged athwartship on

top of the deck; sometimes this batten was rolled in a sheet of bark

first. Another method was to use a small sheet of bark tightly rolled,

with its free edge tucked under the deck end and secured at the ends

of the roll by the deck-gunwale lashings there. Some canoes had their

decks lashed over battens for a short distance along the gunwales. In

some Mackenzie Basin kayak forms, the end of the deck at the stem-head

was protected by a small paddle-or leaf-shaped piece of bark placed

under the lashing there and shaped to reach a little over onto the stem

piece so as to seal the seam.

 

The fitting of the bark cover of the kayak-form canoes was not the same

in all types. In the Mackenzie canoes the bottom, which might be in

three, four, or five pieces sewn together, was alike on both sides; to

it the side pieces were sewn at, or just above, the chines. The sides

were made up of deep panels, five to nine to a side. There were no

horizontal seams other than the one near the chines.

 

In some Yukon canoes, however, the bottom sheet was often made of three

pieces and covered not only the bottom but also a portion, such as

the after two-thirds, of one side. The forward portion of that side

would then be covered by a single large panel or perhaps two, so that

the horizontal seam on that side would run from the stem aft to the

inboard end of the foredeck and would be just above the chine. On the

opposite side a sheet would cover the bottom there and the bow topside

from the stem aft for a short way. Deep panels would then cover the

rest of that side to the stern, so that the horizontal seam there began

forward at the sheer, some feet abaft the bow, and swept downward in a

gentle curve to near the chine and then ran aft to the stern in a long

sheered line just above the turn of the bilge, rising slightly as it

neared the stern. Hence the foremost of the panels on that side was

nearly triangular and the others were nearly rectangular. Inside, at

the chine, was placed a reinforcing strip of bark wide enough to reach

3 inches beyond both sides of each chine longitudinal and running the

length of the bottom; or if a seam near the chine permitted, the side

and bottom pieces were overlapped. As has been noted, in the Yukon

canoes a reinforcing piece at the outwale was not used, but was in the

Mackenzie canoes; it extended down the side about 3 inches below the

underside of the outwale amidships and ran to the ends of the canoe, or

nearly so, tapering with the outwales to a width of about 1½ inches at

bow and stern. In these canoes much of the lashing at stem and stern

was double-thong; the longitudinal sewing was often over a batten in

the usual spiral stitch, and a simple spiral stitch was also used to

join the panels, although in-and-out stitching might also be seen in

some canoes.

 

In many of the kayak-form canoes two ribs often stood noticeably close

together amidships, and the rest stood parallel to the rake of the end

on their side, respectively, of the middle ribs. However, not all

these canoes had such double ribs; some were framed out in the usual

manner, with the ribs widely spaced and canted toward their respective

ends of the hull, away from the midship of the canoe.

 

[Illustration: Figure 150

 

KAYAK-FORM CANOES OF THE ALASKAN ESKIMOS and Canadian Athabascan

Indians: chine form of Eskimo birch-bark canoe (above) and the

dish-sectioned form of the Canadian Athabascans.]

 

In most of these canoes the paddler sat on a sheet of bark secured on

the bottom; this was held in place by one or two false ribs having

their ends under the inner gunwales and their middle forced down

against the bark on the bottom framework. In place of bark, some Eskimo

builders of the type used thin splints of wood laced together by two or

three lines of double-thong stitching athwartships, which was passed

through two holes in each splint. This might be loose or held in place

by a false frame.

 

The paddle was single-bladed and the same as that used with the second

class of Mackenzie Basin canoe (fig. 151). The blade was parallel-sided

with the point formed in a short straight-sided ~V~-form; The blade

of Yukon paddles was often taper-sided toward the point, which was

a rounded ~V~. Other variations in blade form existed, however, and

the narrow leaf-shaped blade was used in some areas in Alaska. In the

Mackenzie paddles the handle ended in a knob, but in Alaskan versions

it ended in a cross-grip like those of paddles used with some Alaskan

sea kayaks. The Eskimo double-blade paddle was used with the kayak-form

canoe by some paddlers; Hearne mentions its use.

 

Some of the kayak-form canoes were decorated; in Alaska this decoration

often took the form of a line of colored beads sewn along each side

of the afterdeck at the gunwale, or it consisted of a few oval panels

of red, blue, or black paint along the sides or centerline of the

afterdeck. In some Mackenzie kayak forms the decks were painted in

various designs; a rather common one seems to have been two or more

bands of paint around the deck edges, along the gunwales, ending at bow

and stern with a full round sweep. Painted disk designs appeared on

some of the large Algonkin-Ojibway canoes of the second type.

 

A number of kayak forms became extinct before any accurate, detailed

records of their shape and construction had been made; models of some

of these canoes exist but are not to scale and are untrustworthy

as to detail, since they are often simplified. One model of the

extinct British Columbia bateau form, for example, showed but three

longitudinals in the bottom, though the probable size of the canoe

undoubtedly would have required a greater number. On the other hand,

the model may have represented a spruce-bark canoe constructed for

temporary use, in which case a simplified construction might have

been employed. One can only speculate which it was. Models of some

kayak-form Yukon canoes show the decks lashed to the gunwales with

a very coarse spiral stitch not recorded for any of the observed

full-size canoes; thus it may be a model-maker's method of securing

the decking firmly rather than an actual practice used on full-size

canoes.

 

[Illustration: Figure 151

 

KAYAK-FORM CANOE OF BRITISH COLUMBIA and upper Yukon valley. Shows

hogged bottom, usual in the type with a rigid bottom frame, which

becomes straight or cambered when canoe is afloat and manned. Original

in the Museum of the American Indian, New York.]

 

It now remains only to give short descriptions of the various

kayak-form canoes that have been observed.

 

The ends of the Eskimo-built canoes of the lower Yukon had a short

rake, the heel of the end profile breaking out of the bottom line at

a slight angle and sweeping upward and outward in a gentle curve,

often becoming almost straight near the stem head. The bow and stern

were nearly the same height, the bow being a little higher, about half

the midship depth above the sheer amidships. The sheer at each end

was almost dead straight until within a few inches of the end; thence

it swept up sharply with the inner gunwale ends, broadened, resting

on the inboard side of the stem piece. The extreme ends of the inner

gunwales were thus at the extreme stem-head. The stem-pieces were of

plank, the cutwater portion outside the bark cover being sharpened

the full height of the stems. These lower Yukon canoes had three side

battens above the chine piece, but not all ran the full length in one

piece; some were in two, in which case the ends merely ran past one

another for a few rib-spaces and were neither butted nor lapped. The

forward deck extended nearly one-third the canoe's length and had a

batten across the inboard deck-end; the after deck reached to the after

thwart. Adney's model of such a canoe shows the after deck lashed to

the gunwales with spiral turns over a batten along the deck edges and

finished toward the stern with chain stitching, but no such arrangement

was seen in any full-sized canoe.

 

The form of these Eskimo-built canoes was nearly that of a double-ended

flat-bottom skiff; the bottom being flat athwartships and without

rocker fore-and-aft. The sides flared and were nearly straight. The

turn of the bilge was quite sharp, the chine having a very short

radius. In plan, the canoe showed no hollow in the ends, which were

convex both at gunwale and on the bottom frame. In some of the

full-sized canoes inspected there appeared to be a slight hog ranging

from ¼ to ⅜ inch in the bottom, but there was no evidence to suggest

that this was a result of the drying and shrinkage of the canoe

structure with age. Hearne's drawing of a kayak-form canoe shows an

impossible amount of hog in the bottom, and he indicates that some hog

was intentional in building. This would disappear when the canoe was

loaded afloat owing to the light and flexible structure, and it is

evident that the builders usually sought to have the bottom slightly hogged.