| “ | And the forest life is in it, — |
| All its mystery and its magic, | |
| All the tightness of the birch-tree, | |
| All the toughness of the cedar, | |
| All the larch's supple sinews. | |
| And it floated on the river | |
| Like a yellow leaf in autumn, | |
| Like a yellow water-lily.” |
It was desirable that a canoe should be fashioned with as
large strips of bark as possible, to reduce the number of
joints uniting them. These joints were originally sewed
with long fibres from the roots of the spruce-tree. One or
more transverse bars kept the craft in shape. The bow
and stern turned sharply upwards. It was usual to lift the
canoe from the water at night, and as often as was
convenient during stoppages by day, to give it a chance to dry,
as the bark readily absorbs water, increasing its weight.
For two hundred years canoes of great carrying capacity,
for many tons of freight and many paddlers and passengers,
have been in use by the employés of the Hudson Bay
Company, and are known as Canots du Nord. The steerage of
these vessels through the rapids is a critical and exciting
work. The chief responsibility is with the bowsman, really
the captain, who sharply gives his directions by words and
gestures to the paddlers in the middle and the steersman in
the stern. Sometimes in smooth waters, with a moderate
wind, a sail is availed of. The management and navigation,
with a valuable load, require the utmost caution of
all concerned to keep the balance, as the only way to “trim
the ship.”
Where the materials for the birchen fabric — varying as it would in size for one or for fifty human passengers and their goods — were not to be found, nor its less facile substitutes, elm or oak bark, the Indian had an alternative craft. By the help of fire and his stone axe he would bring down a giant tree from the forest, and sever a section of the trunk of desired length,
