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Twenty to thirty feet long, sometimes piled high with vegetables, sometimes with several natives seated Indian file in the bottom, the gunwales a bare two or three inches above the water, they needed nice management, especially in the rapids below Cruces.
And then, as we rested on our paddles and talked, under pretence of getting closer to us they would dash into the water and seizing the gunwales of the canoe laughingly insist upon our coming ashore and entering their cool houses, and indeed it was hard to resist their blandishments. Then, once we were inside, they would tell us that they would not let us go till we had eaten and drunk a little.
And at every pull they push their feet against the gunwales to give more force to the stroke; intoning in every pause a strange refrain of which the soft melancholy calls back to me certain old Spanish Creole melodies heard in West Indian waters: A-ra-ho-no-san-no-sa, Iya-ho-en-ya! Ghi! Ghi!
The baggage was in the boat; the small trunk toward the stern, and bedding rolls arranged toward the bows. Francisco had dumped in a boiled ham and a sack of rice; he took the other supplies from Charley and his father, and stowed them also. A pair of broad-bladed paddles lay along the gunwales, fore and aft. "Go ahead," spoke Maria, stepping back from the canopy.
I crossed the river to Quincy in a small dug-out; but I came back in a large riverboat, down to the gunwales with the results of my thrown feet.
Already it was plain that Heidrek meant fighting, if he could make no gain of these ships elsewise, for we could see that his men had hung the war boards the shields along the gunwales. He would see the same here directly, and make up his mind either to fight or fly. As we armed ourselves, Bertric and I had some thoughts that he might choose the latter.
A rudder being entirely out of place in the kind of navigation found in the canyons, a heavy rowlock was placed at the stern to hold a strong, eighteen-foot steering oar. The boats were entirely decked over on a level with the gunwales, excepting two open spaces left for the rowers.
Hanging along our gunwales inside, were six harpoons, three lances, and a blubber-spade; all keen as razors, and sheathed with leather. Besides these, we had three waifs, a couple of two-gallon water-kegs, several bailers, the boat-hatchet for cutting the whale-line, two auxiliary knives for the like purpose, and several minor articles, also employed in hunting the leviathan.
If we're out of the boat, it will only sink so that the gunwales are level with the water. Isn't that so?" "I believe so," admitted Nancy. "Then out we go," said Jennie, working her way toward the bow. "What you going to do?" "Lighten the boat. You slide out over the stern. We've got to do it, Nance." "I guess that's so," admitted her chum. "Do be careful, Jennie.
The boats, their oars all in, and extra ones secured handily to the gunwales, in case of accident, with a coxswain in each, lay at either of the booms, second cutter on starboard, third on the port side; and the arrangement was that they should both lay upon their oars and await the signal, which was to be the dropping of a handkerchief by the umpire, who was first to see that neither had the advantage.
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