The canoe itself is merely a large shallow box, made of rough planks, with sloping prow and stern, more like a bread-tray in shape than anything else I can think of.
There is no attempt at making the bows taper, and indeed the Indians stoutly resist this or any other innovation.

In the fore part of the canoe there is already a heap of other passengers, lying like bait in a box, and when we arrive the voyage begins.
The crew are ten in number; the captain, eight men, and an old woman in charge of the tortillas and the pulque-jar.

All these are brown people; in fact, the navigation of the lakes is entirely in the hands of the Indians, and "reasonable people" have nothing to do with it.

Reasonable people--"gente de razon"-- being, as I have said before, those who have any white blood in them; and republican institutions have not in the least effaced the distinction.
So it comes to pass that the canoe-traffic is carried on in much the same way as it was in Montezuma's time.

There is one curious difference, however.