The ribs, like the rest of the structure, were very light, usually ¼ to ⅜ inch thick and from about 1¼ to 1¾ inches wide, depending upon the size of the canoe. A few examples had ribs 2 inches wide, and still fewer had ribs up to 2½ inches wide. The spacing was usually close, somewhat more than an inch edge to edge amidships and a little more between the end thwarts and the headboards. The spacing amidships would average perhaps 3¼ inches, center to center. The ends of the ribs, in the last 2 or 3 inches, were reduced in width very sharply in a hollow, curved taper to ½ to ¾ inch wide, and were usually beveled on the inside edge. The thickness was also reduced by a cut on the inside, so that the ends were chisel-pointed with a short bevel on the inboard side. The rib ends were forced between the main gunwales and the bark cover, coming home in the bevel of the lower outboard edge of the main gunwales between the group lashings of the bark cover as in the Malecite canoes. The ribs were not prebent but were placed in the canoe when green, treated with hot water, and then allowed to dry into place. In preparing the rib, it was first bent over the knee. It was the custom of some builders to place under the building frame the ribs that were to go near the ends of the canoe, and to mark the point where they would be bent. Sometimes the endmost ribs that were to be "broken" at the centerline to form the ~V~-section were split edgewise. A piece of the inner lamina was then cut out to one side of the center so that the inner laminae would lie flat against each other, and to prevent the inner half from buckling the rib was wrapped with a thong to one side of the "break." [Illustration: Figure 104 TÊTES DE BOULE HUNTING CANOE, 2-FATHOM, with wide bottom, showing structural details.] It does not appear to have been the common practice of the Têtes de Boule to decorate their small canoes, though when building for white men they would decorate if the buyer requested it. The paddles used by the Têtes de Boule were somewhat like those of the eastern Cree but the blade was slightly wider near the tip than near the handle. The top grip was formed wide and thin, the taper from the lower grip to the upper one often being very long. The paddles were usually of white birch, but maple was used in a few of the examples examined. The gunwales, outwales, and caps of the Têtes de Boule canoes were usually of spruce; the ribs and stem pieces, white cedar; the thwarts, white birch; the headboards, white cedar in all but one of the canoes inspected (in this, birch had been used). Jack pine was used also for thwarts, and cedar was sometimes used for the gunwale members; as would be expected, the builders used the materials that were at hand near the building sites.