THE WHITE WORLD 



was exactly the same that would have been caused by 

 the tread of a man. 



After the Indians left me, I took one of my rifles and 

 Zilla, and went down the river prospecting for a place 

 suitable for building a boat. I found a very desirable 

 place on the river bank, at the edge of a large forest, 

 about five miles farther down stream. I could not live 

 so far from my work, so I decided to move my supplies 

 down to this place. I hooked Zilla to the sled, and at the 

 end of three days I had moved everything, set up my 

 tent and put my new camp in order. I had never built 

 a boat, or helped to build one, in my life. I had no lumber 

 with which to make it, and no way of cutting lumber, for 

 I had no one to help me run a saw. I had seen the natives 

 use large skin boats, but I had no skins and nothing large 

 enough could be made from birch bark, even though I 

 could manipulate the bark. Canvas must be the only 

 solution of the problem, and I at once went through my 

 outfit to see what I could find. I discovered two pieces, 

 somewhat worn, that I thought would be large enough if 

 sewed together. 



I decided to make a boat twenty-four feet long, five and 

 one-half feet beam and twenty-one inches deep amidships. 

 I set to work cutting tall, slender young pines, which I 

 hewed and planed and bent to shape, a work that required 

 a good many days and taxed my skill to its greatest effort. 

 After many days of toil, from early morning till late at 

 night, the perspiration often streaming from me as I have 

 seen it do from a man in the harvest field, the frame was 

 made complete, and I was so pleased with it that I photo- 

 graphed it. 



I then went into the woods and found two tall, straight 

 pines — one of them measuring fifty-five and the other fifty- 

 seven inches in circumference. I cut them down and took 

 the bark from each in a single piece to the height of twenty- 

 five feet. I dragged these over and covered the frame of 

 the boat with them completely, leaving the smooth inner 

 bark out. I then stretched the canvas over this perfectly 

 tight and made it fast, after which I went into the woods 

 and gathered a large quantity of spruce gum from the 

 trees. I melted bacon into grease, and, mixing the gum 



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