34 ALL AFLOAT 



Before starting, every broken seam and 

 hole must be gummed over. Water is poured 

 into the canoe and every point of exit marked 

 for gumming. Loading must be done with 

 unusual care, as the slightest crankness of 

 such frail craft in such wild waters is likely 

 to prove fatal. Crews always were their own 

 stevedores, and it was a poor crew that 

 could not load to perfection in a short five 

 minutes, once the cargo had been settled. 

 The actual paddling is not difficult to learn, 

 that is, the paddling required from an ordinary 

 member of the crew. But the man in the bow 

 and, still more, the man in the stern need the 

 highest kind of skilful daring to take them 

 safely through. Paddling by oneself also re- 

 quires a special touch, only to be learnt by 

 long practice. Even in dead water it takes 

 some time before a novice can send the canoe 

 straight ahead when paddling on one side only. 

 As the paddle goes aft the bow naturally tends 

 to turn towards the other side. The trick of 

 it consists in counteracting this tendency by a 

 twist of the blade which brings the inner edge 

 round, aftwise beside the canoe, till the blade 

 becomes a rectifying rudder as well as a 

 thrusting propeller at the end of every stroke. 

 When a fall or impassable rapid is reached, 



