In summer the means of travel, before the horse came with the European, were, on land, nothing more than a good pair of legs, but, on the water, it was different. There, many of the Amerinds were at home, for they had some of the most admirable small boats ever devised. Chief of these, for lightness and grace, is the birchbark canoe,[249] though the Eskimo kayak is not far behind it. The birchbark canoe is made in various sizes and in different tribes has variations, but the type is the same everywhere. There is a slender, well-made frame of wood, consisting of ribs, gunwales, and stiffening strips, over which the bark, which has previously been sewed together, is stretched. The bow is a trifle broader across the beam than the stern, but both are pointed. The bark covering is rendered water-tight, where there are holes or seams, with pine gum. The paddle is similar to the paddle in use everywhere by the Amerinds, having a sort of T-shaped top to the handle, and being about five feet long and four to six inches wide. This kind of canoe was made wherever there was birchbark and water to float it. Another form of boat which was universal was the dugout canoe. This varied in size and shape according to locality, and was always hollowed out of a single tree, by fire and by gouging. When completed it was spread open wider, so that one of these boats has the appearance of being from a larger tree than is the case. The finest dugout canoes are those of the North-west coast, where they are constructed from cedar trees of huge proportions. One of these canoes, made by the Haidas, now in the American Museum in New York, is almost a ship and could be navigated in stormy waters. The Haida canoes are often elaborately carved. Farther up the coast the Tlinkits are experts likewise in canoe building and in the management of them. Their canoes are also hollowed from single logs. Many of them are small, being barely large enough for two persons. Some have a peculiar projection, a point sticking out from the lower part in line with the place where the keel would be if they had one, and also another at the top, rather square; that is, the wedge-like end is hollowed out in the middle. Either end is sent forward, but the prong end usually first. It seemed as if this projection might be intended to ward off ice, for it is in the regions of Yakutat and Glacier bays that it is the dominant type; and there ice is always floating from the glaciers. At Prince William Sound the _baidarka_,[250] or kayak, comes into use. This is certainly the perfection of a canoe. The frame is admirably made, being tied together and covered with walrus hide, or sealskin, and the boat rests on the sea seeming scarcely to sink into it. The umiak is the boat for travelling and general transportation. In it the whole family, or even two or three families, with all their trappings, journey about—dogs, children, packages, and adults all combined. In the sunlight its rich,