Indians are known only from a model, as are the 

 spruce-bark hunters' canoes of the Malecite, but the 

 testimony of old St. Francis and Malecite builders 

 support the evidence of the models; therefore it is 

 probable that the use of scarfed gunwales was common 

 in these canoes, and, hence, also in the canoes of the 

 Iroquois, who dwelt nearby. The manner of scarfing 

 is not certain. Probably the butts were snied off so 

 that the lap woukd be flat face, as was usual in the 

 Malecite spruce-bark canoes of this same class. The 

 butts were secured together by lashings — apparently 

 let into shallow grooves around the members. In a 

 very hastily built tanoe the butts might be merely 

 lapped for a short distance, one butt above the other, 

 and lashed; this, of course, would make a jog in the 

 sheer, but do no harm, as the jog would occur in 

 both inwale and outwale, and the bark would lay up 

 between these and be trimmed to suit. 



The thwarts were described in old accounts as 

 very small saplings, or tree branches, with their ends 

 sharply reduced in thickness so that they were thin 

 and pliable enough to be bent around the gunwales 

 and brought inboard under the thwart, as done by 

 some Kutenai in the West (see p. 169). The thwart 

 ends might be lashed or, as in some eastern spruce- 

 bark canoes, brought up through a hole in the thwarts 

 to the top where it could be jammed or lashed. 

 In the Iroquois canoe it seems probable that the 

 thwart ends passed around the main gunwales 

 only and were secured under the thwarts for, as 

 noted, the evidence strongly suggests that the main 

 gunwale members were preassembled, a procedure 

 that requires the thwarts to be in place. In the small 

 hunters' canoes, however, some eastern builders 

 apparently put in a temporary spreader in place of 

 a single thwart until the canoe was completed to the 

 point where the outwales were in place, then the 

 thwarts were added, the ends passing over and 

 around both inwale and outwale and through the 

 bark cover below, to the underside of the thwart. 



One requirement in building these canoes was to 

 crimp the edges of the bark at the gunwales in such 

 manner that the bottom of the canoe would be 

 rockered and at the same time would be moulded 

 athwartships. First steps in the process were to set 

 into the building bed two heavy stakes on each side 

 of the stems, a little inboard of the ends, and to tie 

 the heads of each pair together with a heavy bark 

 cord or a rawhide thong. Then a sling was made, 

 the bight of which went under the bottom of the bark 

 cover near its ends, and the ends of the sling were 



made fast to the heads of the stakes. By taking up 

 on these slings, the ends of the bark cover were 

 sharply lifted and then the folding of the bark along 

 the gunwales could be easily accomplished, as they 

 then formed naturally, without strain. The crimps 

 were commonly located a fourth to a fifth the length 

 of the canoe inboard of the ends, about where the 

 end thwarts would be located. In small hunters' 

 canoes the end thwarts were often replaced by twisted 

 cords across the gunwales, but in the large Iroquois 

 canoes there were probably five or seven or perhaps 

 as many as nine thwarts according to length. 



The ends of the gunwales were simply lashed 

 together with cords or thongs in shallow grooves to 

 prevent slipping. They were raised by a small inside 

 post, its heel placed on the bark near the stem and 

 its head brought under the gunwales, so that it 

 served the purpose of a headboard in sheering the 

 gunwales. 



The procedure in building to this point, then, 

 appeared to follow the general plan used in birch-bark 

 construction. Next, the stakes were redriven in the 

 bed around the gunwale frame, which was weighted 

 on the bark with stones, and the sides of the bark cover 

 were brought upright. Apparently only a few stakes 

 were considered necessary — three or four to a side 

 and two pairs of end stakes to raise the stems. The 

 gunwale frame was then lifted to the required height 

 of side and lashed temporarily to the side stakes, the 

 ends of the bark cover were creased to form bow and 

 stern, and the headboard posts were inserted to support 

 the ends of the inwales and to sheer the canoe. 

 Before this, of course, the ends of the bark cover had 

 been raised by means of the slings to the end stakes. 



The outwales of split saplings were now put into 

 place, with the edges of the bark cover lashed between 

 the flat surfaces of the inwale and outwale, the gun- 

 wales having been assembled with the flat face of the 

 longitudinal members outboard. The lashings were 

 in small groups spaced 5 to 7 inches apart so as not to 

 split the bark, and these not only secured the bark 

 in place but also held the inwales and outwales 

 tightly together, to clamp the edges of the bark cover. 

 At the thwarts, the outwales were notched on their 

 inboard face to allow them to come up against the 

 bark pressed against the face of the inwales (in some 

 eastern canoes the bark cover was notched at the 

 thwart ends to lay up smoothly there, and this may 

 have also been done in the Iroquois canoes). In 

 placing the outwales, the crimps were carefully formed 

 and held by the clamping action of the inwale and 



216 



