CANOES 25 



waterproof, and then stretched as tightly as 

 a drumhead all over the frame, except for the 

 little ' well ' where the Eskimo sits with his 

 double-bladed paddle. As he tucks himself 

 in so closely that water cannot enter he does 

 not fear to be capsized, for he can right himself 

 with a sweep of his paddle. Kayaks are very 

 light and handy, as the frame is made either 

 of whalebone or spruce. The oomiak is the 

 Eskimo's family boat and cargo carrier, flat- 

 bottomed, not decked in, and sometimes big 

 enough for twenty people with their gear. It 

 is made of much the same materials. 



The white man's canoes, so well known — 

 outside of Canada — as ' Canadian canoes,' are 

 partly true canoes and partly a cross between 

 canoes and boats. The fact that the skin 

 is not made of bark or hide, but of canvas, 

 wood, or metal, and the further innovation 

 that machinery is freely used, make no essential 

 difference, provided always that there is no 

 semblance of a keel. But once the keel is 

 introduced the whole constructional idea is 

 changed and the ways of savages are left 

 behind. A first-rate keeled canoe, built of 

 white cedar, brass shod and copper fastened, 

 fitted with air tanks and life-line, a lateen sail 

 and portage handles, is the very perfection 



