Chapter V: Introduction (4)

When this is completed, the ends of the thwarts can be lashed, the strand passing through the holes in the shoulders, around the two gunwale members, and through one or two holes in the bark cover. The groupings for the bark cover are spaced so that these lashings do not overlap them, and thus the lashings serve a dual purpose.

Next, the gores are usually sewn and the ends of the side panels closed. To do this, the temporary side battens outside the bark are removed. Since this is a Malecite canoe, the gores are sewn edge-to-edge with an over-and-over stitch, the strand crossing the seam square outside and diagonally inside. When these seams and those remaining in the upper panels are sewn, the rather stiff bark holds the shape formed on the building bed to a remarkable degree.

The canoe can now be raised from the building bed. To set it up at a most convenient working height, the weights are first removed from the gunwales and the remaining stakes are pulled up. The canoe is then lifted from its bed and turned upside down over a couple of logs, or crude horses. Traditionally, logs or sapling were rested across two pairs of boulders or the logs were tied between two pairs of trees at convenient distances apart. More recently, horses, formed by sticking four legs into auger holes drilled in the bottom of a 4-foot length of timber, were used. After the canoe is on its supports the ends are ready to be closed in.

The stem-pieces customarily used by the Malecite builder are formed from two clear white cedar billets a full 36 inches long and in the rough nearly 1½ inches square. The billets are first shaped so that the outboard face of each stem-piece is about ¾ inch wide, making it a truncated triangle in cross-section. Then, along lines parallel to the base of the truncated triangle, it is split into six laminations which are carried to within 6 or 7 inches of the end selected to be the heel of the stem-piece. Just clear of the laminations a notch is cut into the top side of the heel, to hold the headboard, as will be seen. The piece is then treated with boiling water until the laminations are flexible, and the curve of the stem-piece can be formed and either pegged out or tied with cords until it dries in the desired shape. When dry the laminations are tightly wrapped with basswood bark cord, leaving the form of the stem-piece a quarter arc of a circle, with short tangents at each end, as shown in the illustration (p. 35).

FIFTH STAGE OF CANOE CONSTRUCTION: canoe is removed from building bed and set on horse in order to shape ends and complete sewing. Bark cover has dried out in a flat-bottomed and wall-sided form. (_Sketch by Adney._)]

Next, the ends of the outwales are cut to a length determined by the quality of the bark already in place; if the bark in one end is not very good, it may be cut away somewhat and the canoe made shorter by this amount at both ends in finishing. After the ends of the outwales have been cut, both are notched on the inside at the extreme ends to take the head of the stem-piece. The outwales may or may not project ¼ or ½ inch beyond the stem and the stem head may project ½ or 1 inch above the top of the outwales of the canoe; these matters, at the builder's option, decide the length of the notch and the fitting of the stem-pieces.

The stem-piece is now placed between the folded bark end of the canoe with the heel resting for a small distance along its length on the bark bottom; the head must come to the right height above the outwales, as noted. While one worker holds the stem-piece in place, another trims away the excess bark at the end to the profile of the outboard face of the stem-piece. Thus the profile of each end is cut and the rake of the ends is established. The bark is next lashed to the stem-piece. In this canoe it is done with a spiral over-and-over stitch, a batten made of a large split root being placed over the edges of the bark, as the lashing proceeds, to form a stem band. The turns pass alternately from outboard around the inboard face of the stem-piece and through it; the awl inserted in the laminations from one side opens them enough to allow the strand to be forced through. Care is taken to pull up the strand very hard each time. As the outwale is approached, the bark is cut away at the notching in each so that the outwales can be brought snugly against the sides of the stem-piece. Here the strand is brought up one or two times over the outwales, abaft the stem head, before the bitter end is tucked, thus locking the outwales to the stem-piece and the bark. Then a lashing is placed around the outwales just inboard of the stem-piece, passing through a hole in the flap of the end deck-piece of bark and through the side bark. This lashing holds the outboard end of the deck piece flap. At the inboard end of the flap, another lashing is required, but the pinched-in outwales require additional securing outboard of this point; hence a lashing is passed just inboard of the middle of the flap, a little outboard of the ends of the inwales, and about six inches inboard from this lashing another is passed through the side bark and around the gunwale and outwale on each side. These three lashings hold the outwales snug to the ends of the gunwales and against the projecting bark ends in the pinched-in form of projecting outwales.

RIBS BEING DRIED AND SHAPED FOR OJIBWAY CANOE. (_Canadian Geological Survey photo._)]

The heels of the stem-pieces rest on the bottom bark and the sewing is carried down to where the cutting of the profile makes an end to the seam, the solid part of the heels extending about 6 to 8 inches inboard of this. Next, any sewing required on the bottom is done. When the bark cover has been given a final inspection on the outside and all sewing has been completed, the canoe is lifted from its supports, righted, and set on the bed or on a smooth grassy place.

All seams are now payed with gum on the inside of the bark while this can still be done without interference from the sheathing or those parts of the structure remaining to be installed. The Malecites used only spruce gum tempered with animal fat. The gum, heated until it is sufficiently soft to pour like heavy syrup, is spread with a small wooden paddle or spoon, and is then worked into the seam and smoothed by rubbing with the thumb dipped in water to prevent the gum from sticking and burning. It is first worked into the ends, between the bark and each side of the stem-pieces, particularly near the heel below the waterline. When the crevices are filled, a piece of bark (in later times a piece of cloth was used) wide enough to cover the gum alongside is well smeared with warm gum and pressed down along the inside of the stem-pieces. On each seam, at gores, and on side panels a thin narrow strip of bark is smeared with gum and pressed over the seam after the latter had been well payed. The bark is now carefully scrutinized for small splits, holes, or thin spots since these can be easily patched from the inside at this stage of construction. In fitting bark strips and in gumming, great care is taken to obtain a flat surface; the edges of the strips inside are faired to the inside face of the bark by smearing gum along the edges. The canoe is now ready to be sheathed and ribbed out.

The sheathing for this canoe has been split in advance out of clear white cedar in splints about 5 to 9 feet long, 3 to 4¼ inches wide, and ⅛ inch thick. The butts of each piece have been whittled to a feather edge, the bevel extending back about 2 inches. Also, some pieces of basket ash have been split out of saplings for temporary ribs to hold the sheathing in place.

A total of 50 or more ribs in five lengths, the longest about 5 feet, have been made up from white cedar heartwood and bent to the desired shape.

In deciding the rough lengths of the ribs, the builder can resort to various methods. He can prebend ribs in pairs to a number of arbitrarily chosen shapes: the first set of six pairs to the desired midsection form; a second set of five pairs to the form of the section between the middle and first pair of thwarts; a third, of five pairs, to the section at the first thwarts each way from the middle; a fourth, of four pairs, to the section between the end and the first pair of thwarts each way from the middle; a fifth, of three pairs, to the section at the end thwarts; and a sixth, of two or three pairs, for the section at or near the headboards. This makes from 50 to 52 frames in a canoe measuring 18 or 19 feet overall.

Each frame piece is treated with boiling water and then bent, over the knee or around a tree, to a slightly greater degree than is needed. While thus bent, each pair is wrapped lengthwise over the end with a strip of basswood or cedar bark to hold the ribs in shape. Sometimes a strut is placed under the bark strips to maintain the desired form, or a cross-tie of bark may be employed. The ribs are then allowed to season in this position.

Another method, which will be illustrated later (p. 53), involves placing ribs of green spruce in their approximate position and forcing them against the bark. In this method, a number of long battens are placed over the roughly bent ribs laid loosely inside the bark cover, and are spread by forcing a series of short crosspieces, or stays, between them athwartships. The bark is given a good wetting with boiling water to make it flexible and elastic, so that the pressure applied to the battens by the temporary crosspieces brings the bark to the shape desired for the canoe. The rough lengths of the ribs are determined by use of a measuring stick or by measurements made around the bark with a piece of flexible root or a batten of basket ash. The ribs, in any case, are made somewhat longer than required to allow a final fitting when being placed over the sheathing.

It can be seen that the exact form the canoe takes is largely a matter of judgment and of the flexibility and elasticity of the bark, rather than of precise molding on a predetermined model, or lines.

DETAILS OF RIBS and method of shaping them in pairs in a bark strap or thong so that they take a "set" while drying out.]

In the Malecite canoe the ribs are wide amidships, 3 or 4 inches, and narrow to 2½ or 2 inches toward the ends. The thickness is an even ⅜ inch. Most birch-bark canoes have ribs of even thickness their full length, but in a few the thickness is tapered slightly above the turn of the bilge, usually when the tumble-home is high on the sides and rather great. The width, as previously explained, is usually carried all across the bottom; above the bilges there is a moderate taper.

The sheathing of the canoe is now first to be put in place. In the Malecite canoe the center pieces are the longest; they are tapered each way from their butts, which overlap about 2 inches amidships. The ends are made narrow enough to fit readily into the sharp transverse curve of the bottom and are long enough to pass under the heels of the stem pieces for an inch or two. The pieces of sheathing on each side of the center pieces are fitted in the same manner, and by the time two or three courses are in place they must be held in some manner at the ends. This is accomplished by means of the rough temporary ribs mentioned earlier. The sheathing is laid edge-to-edge, with the butts overlapping, and, if there are not enough long pieces to complete the bottom amidships, three or four lengths, with overlapped butts, will be used. As the sheathing progresses, more temporary ribs will have to be added. At the turn of the bilge, the sheathing will bend transversely as pressure is applied by the temporary ribs; the bark must be again wetted so that the angular bilge can be forced into a roughly rounded form. Particular care is required in finishing the sheathing below the gunwale to be certain that the top strake will be close up against the sewing of the bark at gunwales, but no particular attempt is made to make the edges of the sheathing in the topsides maintain edge-to-edge contact.

The pressure of the temporary ribs, the heads of which are forced under the gunwales, and the elasticity of the bark due to treating it with boiling water are enough to rough-shape the canoe.

Before the permanent ribs are placed the sheer is checked. If it appears to have straightened, the ends of the gunwales are supported by means of short posts placed under them, with the heels standing on the heels of the stem pieces or on the sheathing. Then some stakes, each having a projecting limb or root, are cut and are driven into the ground with the limb hooked over the gunwale to force it down.

After measurements have been made for the first rib with a strand of root or an ash batten, it is now cut to a length slightly more than would permit the rib to be forced upright when in place. The ends of the rib are set in place in the bevel, or notch, on the underside of the gunwales, against the bark cover, and with the bottom part of the rib standing inboard of the head. Then, with one end of a short batten placed against its inboard side, the rib is driven toward the end of the canoe with blows from a club on the head of the batten. If the rib drives too easily it is removed and laid aside; if too hard, it is shortened. It must go home tightly enough to stretch slightly the bark cover by bringing pressure to bear on the whole width of the sheathing. Care is taken, in this operation, to keep moist not only the bark but also the sewing, particularly along the gunwales, so that all possible elasticity is obtained. The ribs are set, one by one, working to within two or three frames of the midship thwart; then the other end of the canoe is begun. The last three or four ribs to be placed are thus amidships. In every rib driven, the tension is great, but no rib is driven so that it stands perpendicular to the base. Those first driven stand with their bottoms nearer the midship thwart than the ends, and this angle, or slant, continues to amidships; the ribs in the other end of the canoe slant in the opposite direction.

It will be evident that skill is required to estimate how much pressure the bark will stand before bursting under the strain of the driven ribs. It is also apparent that the shape of the canoe is controlled by the shaping given the ribs in the prebending, for this fixes the amount of tumble-home and the amount of round, or rounded-~V~, given to the bottom athwartships. No fixed rules appear to exist; the eye and judgment of the builder are his only guides. To show how much strain is placed on the bark, however, it may be noted that inspection of two old canoes showed that the gunwale pegs had been noticeably bent between the inner and outer gunwales.

It appears to have been a rather common practice, after all the ribs had been driven into place, to allow the canoe to stand a few days and then again to set the frames (where unevenness appears in the topsides) with driving batten and maul, the bark cover and the root sewing or lashings having been again thoroughly wetted.

The headboards are now to be made. These are shaped in the form of an elongate-oval from a wide splint of white cedar about 4 inches wide at midlength and ¼ inch thick. The narrow end is first cut off square or nearly so; the bottom end is notched to fit in the notch in the heel of the stem-piece and the top has a small tenon at the centerline that will be fitted into a hole drilled or gouged in the underside of the inner gunwales where they join at the ends. The length of the headboards in the canoe being built is 15¾ inches over all, and when they have been made for each end, they are checked as to width and height to see that they can be fitted. Next, the extreme ends of the canoe between the stem and the headboards are stuffed with dry cedar shavings or dry moss so that the sides stand firm on each side of the bow outboard of the ends of the sheathing, which ends rather unevenly, just outboard of where the headboards will stand. This completed, the headboards are forced into position by first stepping the heel notch in the stem-piece notch and then bending the board by placing one hand against its middle and pulling the top toward the worker. This shortens the height of the board enough so the tenon projecting on its head can be sprung into the small hole under the inner gunwales, where it becomes rigidly fixed. Its sprung shape pushes up the gunwales and makes the side bark of the ends very taut and smooth, while supporting the gunwale ends.

Two thin strips about 19 feet long are next split out of white cedar to form the gunwale caps; these are ¼ to ⅜ inch thick, and taper each way from about 2 inches wide in the middle to 1 inch wide at the ends. These are laid along the top of the inner gunwales and fastened down with pegs placed clear of the gunwale lashings. The ends of the strips are usually secured by two or three small lashings; the caps thus formed often stop short of the ends of the inner gunwale members. If the caps are carried right out to the stems, as was the practice of some Malecite builders, the lashings of the outwale are not turned in until after the caps are in place, in which case the bark deck pieces, or flaps, are put in just before the final lashing is made.

SIXTH STAGE OF CANOE CONSTRUCTION: canoe has been righted and placed on a grassy or sandy spot. In this stage splints for sheathing (upper left) are fixed in place and held by temporary ribs (lower right) under the gunwales. The bark cover has been completely sewn and the shape of the canoe is set by the temporary ribs. (_Sketch by Adney._)]

Next, the canoe is turned upside-down and all seams are gummed smoothly on the outside. The ends, from the beginning of the seam to above the waterline, may be heavily gummed and then covered with a narrow strip of thin bark, heavily enough smeared with gum to cause it to adhere over the seam. In more recent times a piece of gummed cloth was used here. Above this protective strip, the end seams are filled with gum so that the outside can be smoothed off flush on the face of the cutwater between the stitches. All seams in the side and bottom are gummed smooth and any holes or patches remaining to be gummed are taken care of in this final inspection.

If the canoe is to be decorated (not many types were) the outside of the bark is moistened and the rough, reddish winter bark, or inner rind, is scraped away, leaving only enough to form the desired decorations. When paints of various colors could be obtained, these were also employed, but the use of the inner rind was apparently the older and more common method of decorating.

The paddles are made from splints of spruce or maple, ash, white cedar, or larch. Two forms of blade were used by the Malecite. The older form is long and narrow, with the blade wide near the top and the taper straight along each edge to a narrow, rounded point. Above the greatest width, the blade tapers almost straight along the edge, coming into an oval handle very quickly. At the head, the handle is widened and it ends squared off, but the taper toward the handle is straight, not flared as in modern canoe paddles; there is no swelling. Paddles of a shape similar to this, some without a wide handle, were used by other eastern Indians. The more recent form of Malecite paddle has a long leaf-shaped, or beaver-tail, blade, much like that of the modern canoe paddle, except that it ends in a dull point; the handle is as in the old form but the head is swelled to form the upper grip. The face of the blade, in both old and new form, has a noticeable ridge down the centerline.

GENERAL DETAILS OF BIRCH-BARK CANOE CONSTRUCTION, in a drawing by Adney. (From _Harper's Young People_, supplement, July 29, 1890.)]

The eastern style of construction described here produced what might be called a wide-bottom canoe with some tumble-home above the turn of the bilge, but a different method of construction was used to produce canoes having a narrow bottom and flaring sides. These canoes were not set up on the building bed, in the first steps of shaping the hull, with the gunwale frame on the cover bark. Instead, a special building frame, mentioned earlier, was used. Each tribe using the building frame had its own style, but the variations were confined to minor matters or to proportion of width to length.

In general, the building frame is made of two squared battens, about 1¼ inch square for an 18-foot canoe. These, sometimes tapered slightly toward each end, are fitted with crosspieces with halved notches in each end to fit over the top of the battens. There may be as many as nine or as few as three of these crosspieces, with seven apparently a common number. Where ends of the long battens join they are beveled slightly on the inside face and notches are cut on the outside face to take the end lashings. Each crosspiece end is lashed around the long battens, a hole being made in each end of the crosspiece for this purpose. The lashings, commonly bark or rawhide thongs, are all temporary, as the building frame has to be dismantled to remove it from the canoe. Sometimes holes are drilled in the ends of the crosspieces, or in the long battens, and in them are stepped the posts used to fix the sheer of the gunwales.

The methods of construction, using the building frame, varied somewhat among the tribes. Since the gunwale was both longer and wider across than the building frame, the posts for sheering were set with outboard flare. However, some builders made the gunwales hogged by staking them out when green, and then set them above the building frame with vertical posts. These gunwales would not be fitted with thwarts nor would the thwart tenons always be cut at this stage. The bark was lashed to the gunwales while they were in the hogged position with the ends secured; the gunwales were then spread by inserting spreaders, or stays, between them, after which the thwarts were fitted. This method required knowledge of just how much hog should be given to the gunwales, and it must be stated that not all builders guessed right enough to produce a good-looking sheer. Judging the hogging required in the gunwales was complicated by the fact that most of these canoes had laminated ends in the gunwales at bow and stern, and a quick upturn there as well. This method of construction persisted, however, because the straight sides made easy the sewing of gores and side panels. In some Alaskan birch-bark canoes the building frame was, in fact, part of the hull structure and remained in the canoe. In these, the building frame was hogged and then flattened by the ribs in construction so as to smooth the bottom bark by placing it under tension. In some canoes the posts for sheering the canoe rested under the thwarts rather than under the gunwales. In most canoes the building frame was taken apart and removed from the canoe when the gunwale structure was complete and in place, sheered.

Where large sheets of bark were available, the setting up with the building frame or gunwale was made easier than where the bark had to be pieced out for both length and width. If large pieces of bark could be obtained there was little or no sewing on the bottom; only the gores or laps, and the panels, in the side required attention after the bark had been lashed to the gunwales. In such instances, the set-up did not require perpendicular sides, as the sides could be completed after the canoe was removed from the building bed and the building frame had been removed from the hull. There were many minor variations in the set-up and in the sequence of the sewing. In view of the slight opportunities that now exist for examining the old building methods and construction sequences, it is impossible to be certain that the one used by a tribe in recent times was that employed in prehistoric times by their ancestors.

Instead of a laminated stem-piece, a large root whittled to the desired cross section was sometimes used by builders among the Malecites and other eastern tribes. This was bent into the ends while green and to it was lashed the bark, so that the stem dried in place to the desired profile curve. No inner stem-piece was used by the Micmacs, who formed the end structure by placing a split-root batten on each outside face of the bark and passing the lashing around both. When a plank-on-edge was used to form the stem-piece, as mentioned earlier, no headboard was required, as the gunwales ends could be brought to the plank structure. In canoes having the complicated stem structure seen in the large fur-trade canoes and some others, the headboard became an integral part of the stem structure, rather than an independent unit, and was placed in the canoe during building with the stem-pieces.

There was much variation in the form of gunwale structure employed in bark canoes. A strip of bark was added all along the outwale by some tribes, so that between the gunwale members and for a short distance below the sewing the bark was doubled; the bottom of this strip was, in fact, a flap not secured and thus was much like the flaps at the ends of the Malecite canoe, but without covering the top of the main gunwales. The outwale and inwale cross sections of some canoes were almost round. The use of a single gunwale member is commonly followed by continuous lashing of the bark along it. On some northwestern canoes having continuous lashing, the ends of the ribs were made in sharp points that could penetrate between the turns of root sewing, under the gunwales. The ends of the ribs in some of these were secured more firmly by tying them to long battens placed between the ribs and the bark cover just below the gunwales. The northwestern canoes built in this manner had double gunwales, an outwale and an inwale, but no bevel or notch for the rib heads. The ends of the gunwales, inner and outer, were secured in many ways. Some, instead of being pegged and lashed, were simply tied together; others were fastened by a rather elaborate lashing through the bark and around the gunwales. Caps were sometimes allowed to overlap at the ends and were pinned together with pegs or lashed. In some canoes the outwales were lashed, rather than pegged, to the inwales, and for this and for the caps rawhide appears to have once been widely used. In some canoes the head of the stem-piece was bent inboard sharply and lashed to the ends of the inwales or outwales. In many canoes the gunwales, instead of stopping short of the stem-piece, ran to it and were lashed there.

GUNWALE CONSTRUCTION and thwart or crossbar fastenings, as shown in a sketch by Adney. (From _Harper's Young People_, supplement, July 29, 1890.)]

At the start of ribbing out a canoe, the first two or three ribs might not be put at each end until after the headboards had been fitted, and sometimes a rib was placed on each side of the middle thwart, apparently to hold securely the sheathing butted amidships while the ribbing progressed toward them from the ends. When a canoe was short and rather wide, the ribs usually were bent by placing them inside the faired bark cover before the sheathing was installed, there to dry and set or to season, depending on whether they were steamed or green. Prebending the ribs, as described in the building of a Malecite canoe, worked well only when the canoe was long, narrow, and sharp. The spacing of the ribs was done by eye, not by precise measurement, and was never exactly the same over the length of the canoe. Ribs near the ends were usually spaced at greater intervals than those in the middle third of the length.

The extension of the bark beyond the ends of the inner gunwale in an eastern canoe was often about one foot on each end, but this distance was actually determined by the length of the bark available and by the usual reluctance of the builder to add a panel at the end.

For the height of the end posts, in sheering the gunwales, a common Malecite measurement was the length of the forearm from knuckles of clenched fist to back of elbow. These posts were often left in place until the stems were fitted.

The use of a building frame is known to have been common in areas where, normally, the gunwale frame would be employed in the initial steps in building. In a few instances this occurred when a builder had a number of canoes of the same size to construct. It seems probable that the use of the building frame spread into Eastern areas comparatively recently as a result of the influence of the fur-trade canoes on construction methods. The employment of the plank building bed in the East is known to have occurred among individual canoe builders late in the nineteenth century as a result of this influence.

The use of nails and tacks instead of pegs and root lashing or sewing in bark canoe construction became quite widespread early in the nineteenth century; it is to be seen in many old canoes preserved in museums. The bark in these is often secured to the gunwales with carpet or flat-headed tacks, and both the outwale and the cap are nailed to the inner gunwales with cut or wire nails. Various combinations of lashings and nailing can be seen in these canoes, although such combinations are sometimes the result of comparatively recent repairs or restorations rather than evidence of the original construction. No date can be placed on the introduction of nails into Indian canoe building, although it may be said that nailing was used in many eastern areas before 1850.

Among the many published descriptions of the method of building bark canoes the earliest give very incomplete information on the building sequence and usually contain obvious errors as to proportions and materials. (An example is that of Nicolas Denys, who, sometime between 1632 and 1650, saw bark canoes being built in what is now New Brunswick and Cape Breton.) The best descriptions are relatively recent and, as a result, may describe methods of construction that are not aboriginal.

The description given here is based upon notes made by Adney in 1889-90 and upon inspection of old canoes from the various tribal areas. It was noted that, although among canoes of the same approximate length there was some variation in dimensions and some variety in end form, the construction appeared to vary remarkably little, and it is apparent that the Malecites held very closely to a fixed sequence in the building process. There was, however, great variation in detail. The number of gore slashes in canoes 18 to 19 feet long varied from 10 to 23 on a side. The number was not always the same on both sides of a canoe nor were the gores always opposite one another. Canoes with long, sharp ends often had a large number of closely spaced gores in the middle third of the length, with widely spaced gores toward the ends. Full-ended canoes, on the other hand, had rather equally spaced gores their full length. The amount and form of rocker was also a factor in spacing the gores, and when the rocker was confined to short distances close to the ends there would naturally be rather closely spaced gores in these portions of the sides.

A number of the building practices remain to be described, but these will be best understood when the individual tribal canoe forms are examined. No written description of building canoes can be understood without reference to drawings, and to promote this understanding construction details have been shown on many of those of individual canoes of each tribal type.

"PETER JOE AT WORK." Drawing by Adney for his article "How an Indian Birch-Bark Canoe is Made" (_Harper's Young People_, supplement, July 29, 1890).]

_Chapter Four_

EASTERN MARITIME REGION

Study of the tribal forms of bark canoes might well be started with the canoes of the eastern coastal Indians, whose craft were the first seen by white men. These were the canoes of the Indians inhabiting what are now the Maritime Provinces and part of Quebec, on the shores of the St. Lawrence River and in Newfoundland, in Canada, and of the Indians of Maine and New Hampshire, in New England. Within this area were the Micmac, the Malecite, and the mixture of tribal groups known as the Abnaki in modern times, as well as the Beothuk of Newfoundland. All these groups were expert canoe builders and it was their work that first impressed the white men with the virtues of the birch-bark canoe in forest travel.

_Micmac_

The Micmac Indians appear to have occupied the Gaspé Peninsula, most of the north shore of New Brunswick and nearly all the shores of the Bay of Fundy as well as all of Nova Scotia, Prince Edward Island, and Cape Breton. They may have also occupied much of southern and central New Brunswick as well, but if so they had been driven from these sections by the Malecites before the white men came. The Micmacs were known to the early French invaders under a variety of names; "Gaspesians," "Canadiens," "Sourikois," or "Souriquois," while the English colonists of New England called them merely "Eastern Indians." The name Micmac is said to mean "allies" and not known, but this name was in use early in the 18th century, if not before 1700.

The Micmac were a hunting people with warlike characteristics; they aided the Malecite and other New England Indians in warfare against the early New England colonists and in later times aided the French against the English in Nova Scotia and New Brunswick. These Indians lived in an area where water transport represented the easiest method of travel and so they became expert builders and users of birch-bark canoes, which they employed in hunting, fishing, general travel, and warfare.

The area in which they lived produced fine birch bark and suitable wood for the framework. Through experience, they had become able to design canoes for specific purposes and had produced a variety of models and sizes. The hunting canoe was the smallest, being usually somewhere between 9 and 14 feet long, with an occasional canoe as long as 15 feet. This light craft, known as a "woods canoe" and sometimes as a "portage canoe," was intended for navigating very small streams and for portaging. Another model, the "big-river canoe," somewhat longer than the woods canoe, was usually between 15 and 20 feet long. A third model, the "open water canoe," was for hunting seal and porpoise in salt water and ranged from about 18 feet to a little over 24 feet in length. The fourth model, the "war canoe," about which little is known, appears to have been built in either the "big-river" or "open-water" form, and to the same length, but sharper and with less beam so as to be faster.

The tribal characteristics of the Micmac birch-bark canoes were to be seen in the form of the midsection, in certain structural details, and in their generally sharp, torpedo-shaped lines. The construction was very light and marked by good workmanship. The distinctive profiles of bow and stern, which do not appear in the canoes of other tribes in so radical a form, were almost circular, fairing from the bottom around into the sheer in a series of curves. The break in the profile of the ends at the sheer, a break that marks in more or less degree, the end profile of other tribal forms, never occurs in the Micmac canoe. At most, a slight break in the "streamlined" curve might occur at the point where the profile was started in the bottom, at which point there might be a short, hard curve.

MICMAC 2-FATHOM PACK, OR WOODS, CANOE for woods travel with light loads, used by the Nova Scotia Micmacs.]

The form of the sheer line of the Micmac canoes apparently varied with the model: the woods canoe had the usual curved sheer with the point of lowest freeboard about amidships, the big river canoe had either a nearly straight sheer or one very slightly hogged, while the open-water canoe had a strongly hogged sheer in which the midship portion was often as much as 3 or 4 inches above that just inboard of the ends. However, there is a possibility that, at one time, the sheer of all Micmac canoes was more or less hogged. The little that is known of the war canoes of colonial times indicate that they had the strongly hogged sheer that now marks the open-water model, through it is also known that some of these were really of the big-river model, which in later times had usually no more than a vestige of the hogged sheer.

The hull-forms of the Micmac canoes were marked in the topsides by a strong tumble-home, carried the full length of the hull, that gave these canoes more beam below than at the gunwale. The form of the midsection varied with the model; the woods canoe usually had a rather flat bottom athwartships, the big river canoe a slightly rounded bottom, and the open water canoe either a well-rounded bottom or one in the form of a slightly rounded ~V~. The fore-and-aft rocker in the bottom was always moderate, usually occurring in the last few feet near the ends; however, many of the canoes were straight along the bottom. This condition will be again referred to in discussing the building beds used in this type. The ends were usually fine-lined; in plan view the gunwales came into the ends in straight or slightly hollow lines. The level lines below the gunwales might also be straight as they came into the ends, but were commonly somewhat hollow; a few examples show marked hollowness there. Predominantly, the Micmac canoes were very sharp in the ends and paddled swiftly. Early Micmac canoes seem to have been narrower than more recent examples, which are usually rather broad as compared to the types used by some other tribes.

Structurally, the Micmac canoes were distinguished by the construction of the ends and by their light build throughout. The canoes had no inner framework to shape the ends; stiffness there was obtained by placing battens outside the bark, one on each side of the hull, that ran from the bottom of the cut in the bark required to shape the ends to somewhat inboard of the ends of the gunwales at the sheer. These two battens, as well as a split-root stem-band covering the raw ends of the cut bark, were held in place by passing a spiral over-and-over lashing around all three. Sometimes thicker battens reaching from the high point of the ends inboard to the end thwarts were added, in which case the side battens were stopped at the high point of the ends and there faired into the thick battens.

MICMAC 2-FATHOM PACK, OR WOODS, CANOE with Northern Lights decoration on bow, and seven thwarts.]

The gunwale structure was rather light, the maximum cross section of the main gunwale in large canoes being rarely in excess of 1¼ inches square. These members usually tapered slightly toward the ends of the canoe and had a half-arrowhead form where they were joined. Old canoes had no guard or outwale, but some more recent Micmac canoes have had a short guard along the middle third of the length. Often there was no bevel to take the rib ends on the lower outboard corner of the main gunwales, and the gunwales were not fitted so that their outboard faces stood vertically. Instead, the tenons in the gunwales were cut to slant upward from the inside, so that installation of the thwarts would cause the outboard face to flare outward at the top. Between this face and the inside of the bark cover were forced the beveled ends of the ribs, which were cut chisel-shape. However, some builders beveled or rounded the lower outboard corner of the main gunwale, as described under Malecite canoe building (p. 38). The bark cover in the Micmac canoe was always brought up over the gunwales, gored to prevent unevenness, and folded down on top of them before being lashed. The gunwale lashing was a continuous one in which the turns practically touched one another outboard, though they were sometimes separated under the gunwale to clear the ribs, which widened near their ends, so the intervals between them were very small.

The other member of the gunwale structure was the cap; its thickness was usually ¼ to ⅜ inch, reduced slightly toward the ends. Its inboard face and the bottom were flat, but the top was somewhat rounded, with the thickness reduced toward the outboard edge. The cap was fastened to the main gunwales with pegs and with short lashing groups near the ends, but in late examples nails were used. The ends of the caps were bevelled off on the inboard side, so that they came together in pointed form. The cap usually ended near the end of the gunwale but in some canoes, particularly those that were nail-fastened, the cap was let into the gunwale (see p. 50) so that the top was flush with end of the gunwale.

MICMAC 2-FATHOM PACK, OR WOODS, CANOE with normal sheer and flat bottom.]

The ends of the gunwales were supported by headboards that were bellied outboard to bring tension vertically on the bark cover. The heel of the board stood on a short frog, laid on the bottom with the inboard end touching or slightly lapping over the endmost rib. The frog supported the heels of the headboard and also the forefoot of the stem-piece, which otherwise would have but partial support from the sewing battens outside the ends at these points. The headboard was rather oval-shaped and the top was notched on each side to fit under the gunwale; the narrow central tenon stood slightly above the top of the main gunwales when the headboard was sprung into place and was held in position by a lashing across the gunwales inboard of the top of the headboard. The heel was held by the notch in the frog. Cedar shavings were stuffed into the ends of the canoe between the stem-piece and the headboard to mold the ends properly, as no ribs could be inserted there. All woodwork in these canoes was white cedar, except the headboards and thwarts, which were maple, and the stem battens, which were usually basket ash but sometimes were split spruce roots.

The more recent Micmac canoes usually had no more than five thwarts; this number was found even on small woods canoes. However, old records indicate that canoes 20 to 28 feet long on the gunwales were once built with seven thwarts. The shape of the thwarts varied, apparently in accordance with the builder's fancy. The most common form was nearly rectangular in cross-section; in elevation, it was thick at the hull centerline and tapered smoothly to the outboard ends; and in plan it was narrowest at the hull centerline and increased in width toward the ends, the increase being rather sharp at the shoulders of the tenon. In some, the tenon went through the main gunwales and touched the inside of the bark cover; in others the ends of the thwarts were pointed in elevation, square in plan, and were inserted in shallow, blind tenons on the inboard side of the main gunwales. A single 3-turn lashing through a hole in the shoulder and around the main gunwale was used in every case.

MICMAC 2-FATHOM PACK, OR WOODS, CANOE with normal sheer and flat bottom.]

Sometimes the thwarts just described were straight (in plan view) on the side toward the middle of the canoe, and only the middle thwart was alike on both sides. In others the straight side of the end thwart and of that next inboard were toward the bow and stern of the canoe. In still others, the middle thwart had a rounded barb form in plan, with the barb located within 6 or 7 inches of the shoulder and pointed toward the tenon; the next thwarts out on each side of the middle thwart were shaped like a cupid's bow but slightly angular and aimed toward the ends of the canoe, and the end thwarts were of similar plan. In one known example having such thwarts, there were two very short thwarts at the ends of the canoe, of the usual plain form described earlier, each a few inches inboard of the headboard. Thus this canoe had seven thwarts in the old fashion.

The ribs, or frames, were thin, about ¼ or ⁵⁄₁₆ inch thick, and across the bottom of the canoe they were often 3 inches wide. In the topsides the ribs were tapered to about 2 inches in width; when the bottom and outboard corner of the main gunwales were not beveled, the rib ends were cut square across on the wide face and chisel-shaped. When the gunwale corner was beveled, the ribs were formed with a sharply tapered dull point at the ends. From the middle of the canoe to the first thwarts each way from the middle, the ribs were spaced 1 inch edge-to-edge. From the first thwarts to the ends, the spacing was about 1½ inches. Most builders made the ribs narrower toward the ends; if those in the middle of the canoe were 3 inches wide, those near the ends might be 2½. They were shaped and placed as described for the Malecite canoe in Chapter 3.

In the construction of a Micmac canoe, the gunwales were first formed, assembled, and used as a building frame. If the sheer was to be hogged, this was done by treating the main gunwales with boiling water before assembly and then staking them out to dry in the required sheer curves. The building bed was well crowned, usually 2 to 2½ inches because of the very wide bottom and the tumble-home of these canoes. Most Micmac canoes appear to have had only slight fore-and-aft rocker in the bottom; the bottoms of the seagoing type were often quite straight, and the other two types had a slight rocker of perhaps 1½ inches, most of it near the ends. When the sheer was hogged, the amount of hog was probably close to the amount of crown in the building bed. The ends of the gunwales, when laid on the bed, were blocked up to about the desired amount of rocker to be given the bottom.

MICMAC 3-FATHOM OCEAN CANOE FITTED FOR SAILING. Short outwales or battens project gunwales to strengthen the ends of the canoe. Some specimens of this type of canoe had almost no rocker in the bottom.]

The bark cover was selected with great care from the fine stand of paper birch available to the Micmac. Except in emergencies, only winter bark was used. The cover was gored six to eight times on each side, and most of these cuts were grouped amidships, owing to the sharpness of the ends. The gores were trimmed edge-to-edge, without overlap, as the Micmac preferred a smooth surfaced canoe, and the sewing was the common spiral, over and over. The width of the bark cover was usually pieced out amidships on each side (at least in existing models) by the addition of narrow panels. These may not have been necessary in the very old canoes, which appear to have been much narrower than more recent examples. The horizontal seams of the panels were straight, or nearly so, and did not follow the sheer. The closely spaced spiral over-and-over stitch was sewn over a batten, the lap being toward the gunwale. As has been said, a continuous over-and-over gunwale lashing was used. The thwart lashings were through single holes in the thwart shoulders, three turns being usual, and two turns around the gunwale on each side were added, all passing through the bark cover, of course. The sewing was neat and the stitches were even.

The wood lining, or sheathing, of the Micmac canoe was like that described for the Malecite canoe in the last chapter. The sheathing was a full ⅛ to about ³⁄₁₆ inch thick. The strakes were laid edge-to-edge longitudinally, with slightly overlapping butts amidships, and were tapered toward the ends of the canoe. The maximum width of any strake at the butts was about 4 inches.

MICMAC ROUGH-WATER CANOE, Bathurst, N.B. (_Canadian Geological Survey photo._)]

In some of the rough-water canoes fitted to sail, a guard strip running the full length of the canoe and located some 6 or 7 inches below the gunwale was placed along both sides to protect the strongly tumble-home sides from abrasion from the paddles, particularly when the craft was steered under sail. These strips, about ⁵⁄₁₆ inch thick and ¾ inch wide, were butted on each side, a little abaft amidships, and were held together by a single stitch. The guards were secured in place by rather widely spaced stitches around them that passed through the bark cover and ceiling, between the ribs in the topsides. At bow and stern, the ends of the guards butted against the battens outside the bark at the end profiles and were secured there by a through-all lashing.

MICMAC WOODS CANOE, built by Malecite Jim Paul at St. Mary's Reserve in 1911, under the direction of Joe Pictou, old canoe builder of Bear River, N.S. Modern nailed type. (_Canadian Geological Survey photo._)]