164 CARRYING POWERS OF BARK CANOES. 



no doubt that the birch bark canoe is, after their gun 

 and blanket, by far the most valuable article among 

 the forest Indians' effects ; and Captain Levinge assures 

 us that the growth of every canoe birch sapling of any 

 promise is jealously watched over by them, as trees 

 sufficiently clean and free from knots to make canoes 

 are scarce and difficult to find. The bark which forms 

 the outer shell of the canoe having been got into shape, 

 the gunwales and thwarts are formed of strips of ash 

 or other hard wood, and the delicately formed ribs and 

 flooring are made of white cedar or pine, while the 

 whole is sewed together with fibrous roots carefully 

 prepared for the purpose, and the seams are coated, 

 so as to be perfectly watertight, with the gum of 

 the spruce or balsam firs, which is plentifully found 

 throughout the great pine forests. * 



These beautiful boats are far from being as frail as 

 they look, and Captain Campbell Hardie says that a 

 canoe scarcely exceeding 60 Ibs. weight, will carry four 

 persons and a proportionate quantity of luggage, f 

 While Captain Levinge considers that the average 

 weight of the larger canoes from sixteen to twenty-one 

 feet in length, is about 120 Ibs., and in such a one he 

 assures us, he has often see an Indian family, fifteen or 

 sixteen in number, stowed away, with all their goods 

 and chattels; and, "loaded in this way, to the very 

 water's edge," he says, " they will fearlessly hoist an 

 old blanket by way of a lug sail, and carry on when 

 a tremendous sea is running." In crossing some of 



* See Echoes from the Backwoods, by Captain R. G. A Levinge, 

 1849, Vol i., pp. 117, 118; and Captain Campbell Hardie's Forest 

 Life in Arcadia, 1869, pp. 2956. 



j Forest Life in Arcadia, by Captain Campbell Hardie, 1869^.295. 



Echoes from the Backwoods, by Captain R. G. A. Levinge, 1849, 

 Vol. i., p. 1 1 8. 



