POINTS OF INTEREST IN THE VARIOUS TYPES
A.—The “War Canoe” (αο´τος)
The Songish about Victoria, B. C., have this model, which they call a´tqEs.[11] Its most characteristic features, both there and here, are a prominent and lofty bow and stern. These consist, on Puget sound, of separate sections hewn out of cedar and fitted carefully into their places on the hull. They are fastened there by pegs of cedar (st’Δ´stΔd, the word now applied to nails) and lashings of twisted cedar withes (sti´dΔgwΔt), and the joint is watertight without being “pitched” (see Swan, 1868, for the method of fitting). Artistically, the shape of the prow strongly suggests an anima1’s head, and gives the canoe (which is exquisite in design) an air of alertness, as though it were moving of its
WATERMAN—CANOES PL. III
own accord. From the practical standpoint these elevated additions to the hull are designed to throw aside the seas. The naked hull without these bow and stern pieces would soon fill in rough water. The pieces seem so slender and inadequate that an observer would doubt their effectiveness for such a practical end. The answer is that in the course of generations they have been reduced to the most slender proportions which will give the necessary protection, and they are wonderfully effective in aiding the actual navigation of the canoe. Many Indians and whites who have followed the sea tell us that this type of canoe ships less water in a storm than any craft in the world. If we are looking for a catchword, we may call this the “ocean-going canoe.”
A number of other terms have been applied to this class of vessel. A popular term in the Northwest is the word “Chinook.” We find, for example, the “Chinook” wind, the “Chinook” jargon, and “Chinook” salmon. “Chinook” is also applied by Indians and whites to the type of hull just described, and appears in that sense in the works of Swan and Boas. The term, bearing in mind, of course, that it is used in a general sense and is not necessarily to be associated with the Chinook tribe proper, living at the mouth of the Columbia, is distinctive, and has the advantage of usage behind it. Locally, on Puget sound, the model goes commonly by this name. This same type of hull is found in use by all the tribes from Columbia river northward to the Quatsino, living at the northern end of Vancouver island.[12] North of this area, among the Kwakuitl and Tsimshian, Haida and Tlingit, the sea-going canoe is different, and is of the type illustrated in fig. 1. Niblack[13] and Boas[14] have noted the distinction between the sea-going canoes of the south and those of the north, and Niblack illustrates it with a somewhat misleading figure. Niblack calls this northern model the “north coast type,” while Boas styles it the “Tsimshian” model. The terms “Tsimshian” and “Chinook” might well be used as catchwords to mark the distinction between the two varieties: one found along the coast of Alaska and British Columbia, the other