Canoe

“ All this can be cured by the sun and the wind and the delicious splash of the river on face and breast and arms. Those are they to whom a canoe is a godsend. They can get more health and strength and memorable joy out of a two-weeks' canoe trip than from a lazy, expensive and sea-sick voyage to Europe, or three months' dawdle at a fashionable watering-place.
Boats are for work; canoes are for pleasure. Boats are artificial; canoes are natural. In a boat you are always an oar's-length and a gunwale's-height away from Nature. ”

“ Inside reigns the calm of untroubled water, whereon a canoe like ours can sail with no more than a couple of inches of free-board.
We flew over the water. And such water! - clear as the clearest spring-water, and crystalline in its clearness, all intershot with a maddening pageant of colours and rainbow ribbons more magnificently gorgeous than any rainbow. ”

“ The canoe being ready, I went up to the top of the portage, and we launched into the river. It was a small fishing canoe about ten feet long, quite new, and light and elegant and buoyant as a bird on the waters. I reclined on a mat at the bottom, Indian fashion (there are no seats in a genuine Indian canoe) ; in a minute we were within the verge of the rapids, and down we went, with a whirl and a splash!—the white surge leaping around me—over me. The Indian with astonishing dexterity kept the head of the canoe to the breakers, and somehow or other we danced through them. ”

“ The canoe-men, standing up, give a loud shout as they discern us, and blow their horns louder than ever. We pull briskly on to gain the right bank, when, looking up stream, we see a sight that sends the blood tingling through every nerve and fibre of the body, arouses not only our most lively interest, but also our most lively apprehensions—a flotilla of gigantic canoes bearing down upon us, which both in size and numbers utterly eclipse anything encountered hitherto! Instead of aiming for the right bank, we form in line, and keep straight down river, the boat taking position behind. ”

“ THE ENTERTAINMENTS OF KAPNIDES. ON quiet days, when no wind blows, my canoe is particularly restful. It has perfect sympathy with the weather. It creeps down slowly to King’s, leans itself against the bank, and thinks. Then, later in the afternoon, it bears the organ humming in the chapel—a faint, sweet sound which produces religious exaltation; and it becomes necessary to wrestle with the canoe, because it desires to fly away and be at rest. It is owing to this rhythmic alternation of laziness and spirituality in the boat that I have given it the name which is blazoned on its bows—Zeitgeist. ”

“ Through the long afternoon and far into the twilight the voyageurs drove the canoe up the swift river, paddling, or poling where the current permitted, often compelled to track the boat from the shore with a long line. ”

“ The assembling canoes flashed out of the dark like fireflies. Not even the spirits that tread the air come and go more magically than the canoe that is wielded by a trained hand. The touch of the skilled paddler becomes but a caress of the water. ”

“ Here the scenery is good, and we spent an active day on the river, [33] sailing in a splendid breeze, landing on islands, scudding about in steamers' waves, and, in fact, enjoying a combination of yacht voyage, pic-nic, and boat race.
This was a fine long day of pleasure, though in one of the sudden squalls my canoe happened to ground on a bank just at the most critical time, and the bamboo mast broke short. The uncouth and ridiculous appearance of a sail falling overboard is like that of an umbrella turned inside out in a gust of wind. ”

“ Now, everybody knows that a canoe is very easily upset: and in a moment, before I knew exactly where I was, I found the canoe floating bottom upward about three yards away from me, and myself standing, safe and dry, in my tutor's punt, beside his pretty blushing daughter. I had felt the canoe turning over as I handed back the pole, and had instinctively jumped into the safer refuge of the punt, which saved me at least the ignominy of appearing before Miss Nora Murray in the ungraceful attitude of clambering back, wet and dripping, into an upset canoe. ”

“ Foam-crested waves have often seemed as though about to overwhelm us, and treacherous gales to swamp us, yet my faithful, well-trained canoe men were always equal to every emergency, and by the accuracy of their judgment, and the quickness of their movements, appeared ever to do exactly the right thing at the right moment. ”

“ As I once before mentioned to you, these creatures eject a fluid which blisters the skin most painfully; so instead of carrying them in a basket, it is customary for the fisher to have a miniature canoe which he can drag over the reef by means of a rope, or float on the calm lagoon, should he have occasion to dive; into this canoe he throws all treasure-trove, and when it is full, empties it into one of the larger boats. Noonday is the most favourable hour for the diver, as the sun's vertical rays then most clearly illumine the submarine depths where he seeks his game. ”

“ A canoe is usually sighted long before it turns into the entrance to the lagoon, and then the members of the failu stand or squat on the stone platform at the seaward end of the house and quietly watch the slow approach of their daring comrades. When they are within a half a mile or so of the shore where the water is shoal and thickly sown with many protruding treacherous boulders,—the remains of ancient fish-weirs,—the mast with its sail of matting is unstepped and stowed ”

“ Sometimes a young man wades after a canoe and joins some fair friends, sitting in front of them, as etiquette demands. The fresh breeze catches [90] the sails, and the ten or fifteen canoes glide swiftly across the bright water, the spread sails looking like great red butterflies. The spray splashes from the bows, one woman steers, and the others bale out the water with cocoa-nuts,—a labour worthy of the Danaides; sometimes the outrigger lifts up and the canoe threatens to capsize, but, quick as thought, the women lean on the poles joining outrigger and canoe, and the accident is averted. ”

“ In an instant, if you hesitate, the boat is on a bank; and it is remarkable how speedily the exercise of this resolution becomes experienced into habit, but of course only after some severe lessons.
It is exciting to direct a camel over the sandy desert when you have lost your fellow-travellers, and to guide a horse in trackless wilds alone; but the pleasure of paddling a canoe down a rapid, high-banked, and unknown river, is far more than these. ”

“ There is something inspiring about the profundity of transparency in these lakes, where they are 15 feet deep their bottoms are no more obscured than in an ordinary eastern brook at 6 inches. On looking down into the far-below world, one gets the sensation of flight as one skims overhead in the swift canoe. ”

“ When all was in readiness I lighted my pipe, seated myself on the bottom of my canoe, leaned back against one of the bords or cross bars; then David, sitting upon the V formed by the sides of the canoe at the stern, with paddle in hand, sent the birch bark flying up our river. Like most Canadian trout streams it consists of a series of still, deep pools, and swift, rocky rapids, alternating. Often the rapids have a fall of one foot in ten, and are from one to five, and sometimes ten or more rods in length. It is marvellous how these canoeists will force a loaded canoe up them. ”

“ Cedar canoes, after being subjected to such use for some time, generally become leaky; so, to avoid this disaster, the canoeist, when threatened with wet weather, is forced to the disagreeable task of troubling some private householder for a shelter, or run the risk of injuring his boat by packing himself away in its narrow, coffin-like quarters and dreaming that he is a sardine, while his restless weight is every moment straining his delicate canoe, and visions of future leaks arise to disturb his tranquillity.
The one great advantage possessed by a canoe is its lightness. ”

“ In this were placed a live pig, a dog, and a cock, also some bread-fruit, cocoa-nuts, and a bowl of poi. The canoe was much ornamented, and rigged with mast, and sail of kapa. With much shouting it was launched, and pushed by bold swimmers through the roaring surf into the open sea, where they left it and returned to shore. The canoe drifted slowly out of the bay, but struck on the northern headland, where it was in danger of being dashed to pieces on the rocks, when a native ran round the harbour and once more shoved off the frail bark, which sailed out to sea with its living freight. ”

“ The ‘shout’ was a sort of flat-bottomed canoe, sometimes covered fore and aft with canvas painted grey in which one man lay with his hands over the sides so that by using short paddles he could approach the ducks unseen. ”

“ Nay, more than this, the covered canoe is far stronger than an open boat, and may be fearlessly dropped headforemost into a deep pool, a lock, or a millrace, and yet, when the breakers are high, in the open sea or in fresh water rapids, they can only wash over the covered deck, while it is always dry within.
Again, the canoe is safer than a rowing-boat, because you sit so low in it, and never require to shift your place or lose hold of the paddle ”

“ In the bow of each canoe a man wields a stone, several pounds in weight, which is attached to a short rope. He merely smites the water with the stone, pulls up the stone, and smites again. He goes on smiting. In the stern of each canoe another man paddles, driving the canoe ahead and at the same time keeping it in the formation. The line of canoes advances to meet a second line a mile or two away, the ends of the lines hurrying together to form a circle, the far edge of which is the shore. ”

“ Nor have I any observations to make as to sailing among rocks in a current. The canoe must be directed solely by the paddle in a long rapid, and in the other places the course to be steered by a boat sailing is the same as if it were being merely paddled, though the action of the wind has to be carefully taken into consideration.
In all these things boldness and skill come only after lessons of experience, and the canoist will find himself ready and able, at the end of his voyage, to sail down a rapid which he would have approached timidly, even with the paddle, at the beginning. ”

“ They will load a canoe within an inch and a half of the water’s edge, and paddle it for a whole day, without dreaming of danger. And an accomplished canoe man will take a fish spear in his hand, place a foot on each gunwale of the boat, and, propelled by a friend in the stern of the boat, dart down rapids, spearing fish as he shoots along, hauling the struggling fish out of the water, and shaking them into the boat behind him. ”

“ In managing their canoes they kneel two and two along the bottom, sitting on their heels, and wielding paddles from four to five feet long, while one sits on the stern and steers with a paddle of the same kind. The women are equally expert with the men in managing the canoe, and generally take the helm.
It is surprising to see with what fearless unconcern these savages venture in their light barks upon the roughest and most tempestuous seas. They seem to ride upon the waves like sea-fowl. ”

“ If you take to the cut-offs, you may get into passages that will lead you off into the swamps and into interior bayous, from which you will never emerge. Men have starved to death in such places."
So I followed the winding stream, which turned back upon itself, running north and south, and east and west, as if trying to box the compass by following the sun in its revolution. After paddling down one bend, I could toss a stick through the trees into the stream where the canoe had cleaved its waters a quarter of a mile behind me. ”

“ Having navigated more than eight thousand miles in sail-boats, row-boats, and canoes, upon the fresh and salt watercourses of the North American continent (usually without a companion) , a hard-earned experience has taught me that while the light, frail canoe is indispensable for exploring shallow streams, for shooting rapids, and for making long portages from one watercourse to another, the deeper and more continuous water- ways may be more comfortably traversed in a stronger and heavier boat, which offers many of the advantages of a portable home. ”

“ I say "one-man canoe," for their canoes are made to carry from one to a dozen men, and they are not safe with a single man more than they are built to carry. We got safely across the reef, when a wave broke over the boat, and we sank—and it was up to me to swim ashore while a hundred natives, standing on the beach, cheered ”

“ On starting again we pass alongside another bluff, backed by small well-wooded hills, an extension of the aforesaid east horn of the Moon, and cross a little bay, when the lazy crew, tired by two hours' work, bear in with the land, and disembark, as they say, to make some ropes, or find some creepers long and strong enough for mooring this mighty canoe. ”

“ About an eighth of a mile from the water, rising out of the salt grass and reeds, was a little mound, covered by trees and bushes, into which I conveyed my [102] cargo by the back-load, and then easily drew the light canoe over the level marsh to the camp. A bed of reeds was soon cut, into which the canoe was settled to prevent her from being strained by the occupant at night, for I was determined to test the strength of the boat as sleeping-quarters. Canoes built for one person are generally too light for such occupancy when out of water. ”