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 longitudi- 

 nally, 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 grove 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 Dene 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 Mackensie 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 Macken- 

 zie 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 out- 

 wale 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 1^ inches at bow and 

 stern. In these canoes :nuch 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. 



162 



