The Saint Paul globe., 1904-01-24
Men Known by Their Boats


world, however low in the scale, who do not
/ use boats of some kind. Indeed, the manufac-
ture of something that would float and support
passengers freight seems to have been one OF the
first forms that the of construction took all the
world.
This natural for the first need that men had was
TO find to carry their possessions to any distance
The invention of the wheel that wonderful perfect cir
clar lever did not come until many ages after man had
emerged from semi-anima state. In his early days he
probably did not possess any means OF transport eX
cept that of fiat hurdles, which he had to drag himself,
for primitive had not begun domesticate ami
mails and teach them to do his work for them.
So the offered the striking of trans
port; and primitive had observed how it float
ed heavy logs it only step for him to squat on
Next he learned that he could guide the log with a
branch by polling Then he learned that, in the deep
water where the branch could not reach bottom, he
could push against the water itself and so move his
rude craft.
1t was not long before he learned further that the
wind would blow him, and the next step therefore,
hold something up in the air catch the breeze. First
this thing probably branch full of leaves In the
beginning no doubt he held it up with his hands until
mechanical genius of those dim days discovered
that it could be thrust into crevice in the log.
Soon some other inventive man made the first real
sail by substituting piece of skin for the branch
That about the limit that the art of navigation
reached for long time the science OF setting sails so
that craft can steer into the wind and sail almost
against reached for many agesj and to-
day there tribes that sail only with the wind
They know nothing about lacking or beating.
Students OF ethnology can tell by glance at boat
what kind of race built it. for the boats OF the world
are absolutely typical OF their makers
Thus in the Arctic regions boats made from
framework of warus and whale bones and covered with
the skins of seals This boat is typical of regions with
out trees shrubs
As soon as one gets farther south where there is
any wood at all even though there be very little, the
boats made from It, The framework IS OF willow or
cedar, and though the craft still kncOvered. the
skin is that of trees instead OF beasts.
While the Arctic boat is fine OF its kind, 1t shows
no Improvement through the centuries; but the bark
boats show steady improvement Ill model generation
after generation With wood to work on the boat build
II TT,,+aI S+otaG al0TNpf1
their wonderfully that all the science OF clV1fza
ton has been able produce boat that well
adapted the American wilderness is the bark canoe
OF the Indian Indeed, the great inland boat building
by machinery that not different except in minor
points from the canoe of the old Iroquois.
Farther down south again, in the Woodless country
Of the United States west of the Mississippi and IN the
country in the east where communication by water
not as good as it by land, the early boats
the Missouri a poor crate OF thin stcks covered
with bison hide In the OF the United States, the
boats clumsy things, roughly dug out OF trees and
known "dugouts
On the Pacific Coast the dugout was also used, but
there it shaped into mighty craft the tree beng
beautifully fashioned and the boats being capable OF
making voyages OF hundreds of miles over tire open
ocean.
Through the Caribbean Sea and the Gulf lighter and
less substantial form of dugout used it made up
buoyancy just what was needed on the long slow
rollers of the sub-trOpiCs.
In South America the barbarous Indians hidden away
the prmeval forest did not to the height OF dig
Orinoco Indians go RATS even on mere floats
made of light reeds roughly ashed together
Then the moment goes farther SOUTH to the
vicinity Cape Horn he discovers the skin boat again