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Rh considered universal. Boats were made according to the materials at hand. In regions of large trees the dug-out was preferred, but in the far North, the extreme South and parts of the Amazon country and the lake region of North America, we find frame boats covered with skins or bark. The crudest are the bark boats of the Fuegians; the finest are the birchbark canoes of the Ojibway and the kayaks of the Eskimo. From Central California to Chile we have occasional occurrences of the balsa type, a raft-like structure of reeds.

If we except the Eskimo, row-locks were not used, the method of propulsion for small boats being to paddle first on one side and then on the other. The double paddle is found only among the Eskimo. (Yet it was reported by Frezier in 1717 as being used in the insular region of Chile with a boat combining some of the features of the balsa and the kayak. ) Even the great dug-outs of the North Pacific Coast were propelled by paddles. The use of sails is somewhat in doubt, but it is asserted that the Spaniards found them in Peru with balsas large enough to carry fifty men. Sails are used on the North Pacific Coast, but whether known before the era of Russian trade is not clear. The Eskimo use both the row-lock and sails, but as these occur on the Siberian coast, they are most likely intrusive. From the same source may have come sails on the West coast. Large canoes are mentioned for the West Indies, but no sails are spoken of until later, so that we cannot be sure of their original use there.

The only boat with hull built up of planks was that of the now extinct Santa Barbara of California. Another unique form was the circular tub-like boat with a skin-covered frame, used to ford rivers in the widely separated bison and guanaco areas, and one on the lower Colorado River made of basketry, Spanish name coritas.

The two regions in which an approach was made to a seafaring culture were the North Pacific Coast and the Antilles. The great war dug-outs of the former with their carved prows remind one of old Norse models. The latter region was overrun in succession by two races of canoe men, both apparently war-like, the Arawak and the Carib. Of these only the