The Micmac canoes were decorated by scraping away part of the inner rind of the birch bark, leaving portions of it in a formal design. It seems very probable that the Micmac seldom used this form of decoration in early times, but later they used it a great deal in their rough-water canoes, perhaps as a result of contact with the Malecite. The formal designs used as decoration by the Micmac did not have any particular significance as a totem or religious symbol; they were used purely as decoration or to identify the owner. Such forms as the half-moon, a star in various shapes, or some other figure might be used by the builder, but these were apparently only his canoe mark, not a family insignia or his usual signature, and could be altered at will. The usual method of decoration was to place the canoe mark on both sides of the canoe at the ends and to have along the gunwales amidships a long narrow panel of decoration, usually of some simple form. The panel decorations are said by Micmacs to have been selected by the builder merely as pleasing designs. One design used was much like the fleur-de-lis, another was a series of triangles supposed to represent camps, still another was the northern lights design, a series of closely spaced, sloping, parallel lines (or very narrow panels) that seem to represent a design much used in the quill decoration for which the Micmac were noted. Canoes are recorded as having stylized representations of a salmon, a moose, a cross, or a very simple star form; these may have been canoe marks or may once have been a tribal mark in a certain locality. A series of half-circles were sometimes used in the gunwale panels, which were rarely alike on both sides of the canoe, and it is probable that use was made of other forms that have not been recorded. Colored quills in northern lights pattern were used in some model or toy canoes but not in any surviving example of a full-size canoe. It is quite possible, however, that such quill-work was once used in Micmac canoe decoration. Painting of the bark cover for decorative purposes in Micmac canoes has not been recorded. [Illustration: Figure 60 MICMAC CANOE, BATHURST, N.B. (_Canadian Geological Survey photo._)]