was to spend its existence. It had been loaded the evening before
at our door, half a mile from the river, with potatoes and melons
from a patch which we had cultivated, and a few utensils, and was
provided with wheels in order to be rolled around falls, as well
as with two sets of oars, and several slender poles for shoving
in shallow places, and also two masts, one of which served for a
tent-pole at night; for a buffalo-skin was to be our bed, and a
tent of cotton cloth our roof. It was strongly built, but heavy,
and hardly of better model than usual. If rightly made, a boat
would be a sort of amphibious animal, a creature of two elements,
related by one half its structure to some swift and shapely fish,
and by the other to some strong-winged and graceful bird. The
fish shows where there should be the greatest breadth of beam and
depth in the hold; its fins direct where to set the oars, and the
tail gives some hint for the form and position of the rudder. The
bird shows how to rig and trim the sails, and what form to give
to the prow that it may balance the boat, and divide the air and
water best. These hints we had but partially obeyed. But the
eyes, though they are no sailors, will never be satisfied with
any model, however fashionable, which does not answer all the
requisitions of art. However, as art is all of a ship but the
wood, and yet the wood alone will rudely serve the purpose of a
ship, so our boat, being of wood, gladly availed itself of the
old law that the heavier shall float the lighter, and though a
dull water-fowl, proved a sufficient buoy for our purpose.

"Were it the will of Heaven, an osier bough
Were vessel safe enough the seas to plough."

Some village friends stood upon a promontory lower down the