There was much variation in the form of gunwale structure employed in bark canoes. A strip of bark was added all along the outwale by some tribes, so that between the gunwale members and for a short distance below the sewing the bark was doubled; the bottom of this strip was, in fact, a flap not secured and thus was much like the flaps at the ends of the Malecite canoe, but without covering the top of the main gunwales. The outwale and inwale cross sections of some canoes were almost round. The use of a single gunwale member is commonly followed by continuous lashing of the bark along it. On some northwestern canoes having continuous lashing, the ends of the ribs were made in sharp points that could penetrate between the turns of root sewing, under the gunwales. The ends of the ribs in some of these were secured more firmly by tying them to long battens placed between the ribs and the bark cover just below the gunwales. The northwestern canoes built in this manner had double gunwales, an outwale and an inwale, but no bevel or notch for the rib heads. The ends of the gunwales, inner and outer, were secured in many ways. Some, instead of being pegged and lashed, were simply tied together; others were fastened by a rather elaborate lashing through the bark and around the gunwales. Caps were sometimes allowed to overlap at the ends and were pinned together with pegs or lashed. In some canoes the outwales were lashed, rather than pegged, to the inwales, and for this and for the caps rawhide appears to have once been widely used. In some canoes the head of the stem-piece was bent inboard sharply and lashed to the ends of the inwales or outwales. In many canoes the gunwales, instead of stopping short of the stem-piece, ran to it and were lashed there. [Illustration: Figure 47 GUNWALE CONSTRUCTION and thwart or crossbar fastenings, as shown in a sketch by Adney. (From _Harper's Young People_, supplement, July 29, 1890.)] At the start of ribbing out a canoe, the first two or three ribs might not be put at each end until after the headboards had been fitted, and sometimes a rib was placed on each side of the middle thwart, apparently to hold securely the sheathing butted amidships while the ribbing progressed toward them from the ends. When a canoe was short and rather wide, the ribs usually were bent by placing them inside the faired bark cover before the sheathing was installed, there to dry and set or to season, depending on whether they were steamed or green. Prebending the ribs, as described in the building of a Malecite canoe, worked well only when the canoe was long, narrow, and sharp. The spacing of the ribs was done by eye, not by precise measurement, and was never exactly the same over the length of the canoe. Ribs near the ends were usually spaced at greater intervals than those in the middle third of the length.