Through this curious scene I was strolling a few days since with my wife, and I observed the Indian women gathering around her, anxious to shake hands with her, and shew her their children, of which she took especial notice; and they literally filled her hands and her arms, with muk-kuks of maple sugar which they manufacture, and had brought in, in great quantities for sale.
After the business and amusements of this great Treaty between the Chippeways and Sioux were all over, the Chippeways struck their tents by taking them down and rolling up their bark coverings, which, with their bark canoes seen in the picture, turned up amongst their wigwams, were carried to the water’s edge; and all things being packed in, men, women, dogs, and all, were swiftly propelled by paddles to the Fall of St. Anthony, where we had repaired to witness their mode of passing the cataract, by “making (as it is called) the portage,” which we found to be a very curious scene; and was done by running all their canoes into an eddy below the Fall, and as near as they could get by paddling; when all were landed, and every thing taken out of the canoes ([plate 239]), and with them carried by the women, around the Fall, and half a mile or so above, where the canoes were put into the water again; and goods and chattels being loaded in, and all hands seated, the paddles were again put to work, and the light and bounding crafts upon their voyage.
The bark canoe of the Chippeways is, perhaps, the most beautiful and light model of all the water crafts that ever were invented. They are generally made complete with the rind of one birch tree, and so ingeniously shaped and sewed together, with roots of the tamarack, which they call wat-tap, that they are water-tight, and ride upon the water, as light as a cork. They gracefully lean and dodge about, under the skilful balance of an Indian, or the ugliest squaw; but like everything wild, are timid and treacherous under the guidance of white man; and, if he be not an experienced equilibrist, he is sure to get two or three times soused, in his first endeavours at familiar acquaintance with them. In [plate 240], letter a, the reader will see two specimens of these canoes correctly drawn; where he can contrast them and their shapes, with the log canoe, letter b, (or “dug out,” as it is often called in the Western regions) of the Sioux, and many other tribes; which is dug out of a solid log, with great labour, by these ignorant people, who have but few tools to work with.
In the same plate, letter c, I have also introduced the skin canoes of the Mandans, (of the Upper Missouri, of whom I have spoken in Volume I), which are made almost round like a tub, by straining a buffalo’s skin over a frame of wicker work, made of willow or other boughs. The woman in paddling these awkward tubs, stands in the bow, and makes the stroke with the paddle, by reaching it forward in the water and drawing it to her, by which means she pulls the canoe along with some considerable speed. These very curious and rudely constructed canoes, are made in the form of the Welsh coracle; and, if I mistake not, propelled in the same manner, which is a very curious circumstance; inasmuch as they are found in the heart of the great wilderness of America, when all the other surrounding tribes construct their canoes in decidedly different forms, and of different materials.
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