CANOES OF THE NORTH PACIFIC COAST INDIANS 243 
brush. The substance adheres to the fibres of the cloth, becomes tough 
and quite hard, suitable to take a coat of varnish and the color, and is 
remarkably well fitted for the work as it can be kept in plastic condition 
for three or four days. As to the color work on both garments and figures, 
it has proved better to put on a priming color in a higher key than nature 
after which a thin wash of shellac over the thoroughly dried color forms a 
backing for a stippling of transparent colors to accentuate the desired effect, 
eliminating opaque colors in this finishing work. Finally the oily finish 
of the new paint may be removed and a lifelike texture given to the surface 
by rubbing over lightly with pumice stone and turpentine. 
Results essential to the representation of life as well as the work of 
suiting the subject, pose and dress to artistic uses must always remain to 
the skill of the artist working. The method is valuable in museum work 
and presents a possibility for a new level of accomplishment. 
CANOES OF THE NORTH PACIFIC COAST INDIANS 
By Harlan I. Smith 
Photographs by the Author 
LONG the Pacific Coast from Puget Sound in Washington past 
British Columbia to Mt. McKinley in Alaska live seven great 
groups of sea-faring Indians and canoes make one of their most 
valuable possessions. Their canoes for use on the ocean differ from those 
for river navigation and those of the south differ from those of the north. 
Certain tribes have a characteristic type, but the Indians travel great 
distances and have traded their canoes from tribe to tribe, so that a 
given type may be used throughout the entire region. 
The Haida of the islands of northern British Columbia and southern 
Alaska make an ocean-going canoe with a breakwater at the prow and both 
ends curving upward. Canoes of this type are sometimes only large enough 
for two or three people, while others, especially those formerly made for 
warfare, will hold as many as forty. In 1909 two of these canoes more than 
sixty feet long and with prows and sterns extending higher than a tall 
man’s head were seen on the beach of the Kwakiutl village at Alert Bay. 
This Haida type is one of the most important and seaworthy of all canoes 
of the coast. The Tlingit Indians, who oceupy the coast of Alaska from the 
Haida country to that of the Eskimo, own many Haida canoes although 
they make several kinds of their own. 
