Canoes of Admiralty Isles

Labillardière makes the following remarks on canoes of the Admiralty Isles, near New Guinea, as seen by him in 1792:—

"Their canoes are formed of the excavated trunk of a tree, with boards fitted to its sides. Their length is thirty-two feet, and their page 369extreme breadth not more than twenty-six inches. Their sides are supported internally by cross-boards, which form so many divisions, in the bottom of which are the paddlers, towards the two extremities of the canoe. Those canoes are furnished with an outrigger, about thirteen feet in length, which projects laterally, and nearly at the same distance. On the opposite side is a counter-outrigger, which does not take the water, and which is eight feet in length. It serves as a place upon which to lay the sail; the commander sometimes sits upon it, but his station is commonly on an elevated platform of the same extent as the outrigger.

"The sail is a mat, in the form of a regular square, thirteen feet in the side. Two opposite sides of it are fastened to poles of the same length, which serve for yards. When the sail is set, one of its diagonals is always vertical, and its upper angle is elevated three feet above the top of the mast, which is about twenty feet in height. The wind acts strongly upon so lofty a sail, and gives to those canoes an impulse which makes them plough the water with astonishing rapidity. When this swift motion is not required, they only hoist about five feet of one side of their sail in a horizontal position, while the rest of it lies on the canoe. But in this way they can only sail right before the wind.

"Their paddles are very broad, and are furnished with a handle six feet and a half in length. They use them as our sailors do their oars; for they act like levers, whose point of support is on one side of the canoe. The steersman is stationed in the stern, and directs the canoe with his paddle."

Here again is the balance platform opposite the outrigger, but the triangular sail is replaced by a square one. The mode of using the paddles is by no means clearly put.

Of some of these canoes accompanying the vessel this writer says: "We admired the celerity with which the flotilla clave the waters. Although we had a very fresh breeze, and a great deal of sail set, those little vessels sailed a great deal faster than our ships."

The canoes of the Hermit Isles, west of the Admiralty Group, were found to be similar to those above described, but not such good sailers. They had two sails, the after one much smaller than the forward one; they were both rectangular, the length being almost double the breadth.