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St. Francis Canoe of About 1910, with narrow, rockered bottom, a model 

 popular with guides and sportsmen for forest travel. 



used to form it. He could not verify this, however, 

 as the area was covered by the frames and sheathing. 



The sheathing was in short lengths with rounded 

 ends which overlapped, and it was laid irregularly in 

 the "thrown in" style found in many western birch- 

 bark canoes. The ribs were commonly about 2 inches 

 wide and nearly % inch thick, the width tapering 

 to roughly 1 % inches under the gunwales. The ends 

 of the ribs were then sharply reduced in width to a 

 chisel point about 1 inch wide; the sides of the sharply 

 reduced taper being beveled, as well as the end. A 

 1 5-foot canoe usually had 46 to 50 ribs. 



The thwarts, unlike those of the Micmac and some 

 Malecite canoes, in which the thwarts were unequally 

 spaced, were equally spaced according to a builder's 

 formula. The ends of the thwarts, or crossbars, were 

 tenoned into the main gunwales and lashed in place 

 through the three lashing holes in the ends of each 

 thwart, except the end ones, which usually had but 

 two. In some small canoes, however, two lashing 

 holes were placed in all thwart ends. The design of 



the St. Francis thwart was as a rule very plain, 

 gradually increasing in width from the center out- 

 wards to the tenon at the gunwale in plan and 

 decreasing in thickness in elevation in the same 

 direction. The ends of the main gunwales were of 

 the half-arrowhead form, and were covered with a 

 bark wulegessis, but the flaps below the outwales were 

 sometimes cut off, or they might be formed in some 

 graceful outline. 



The bark cover was sometimes in one piece; when 

 it was pieced out for width, the harness-stitch was 

 used. In most canoes, the bark along the gunwale 

 was doubled by adding a long narrow strip, often 

 left hanging free below the gunwales and stopping 

 just short of the wulegessis, which it resembled. It 

 was sometimes decorated. A few St. Francis canoes 

 with nailed gunwales omitted this doubling piece. 

 When used, the doubling piece, as well as the end 

 cover, were folded down on top of the gunwale before 

 being sewn into place. The decoration of the St. 

 Francis canoes seems to have been scant and wholly 



90 



