It is not easy to use them among bushes without frequent overthrows, nor to rise afterwards without help.

Each shoe weighs about two pounds when unclogged with snow.

The northern Indian snowshoes differ a little from those of the southern Indians, having a greater curvature on the outside of each shoe, one advantage of which is that when the foot rises the over-balanced side descends and throws off the snow.

All the superiority of European art has been unable to improve the native contrivance of this useful machine.
Sledges are made of two or three flat boards curving upwards in front and fastened together by transverse pieces of wood above.

They are so thin that, if heavily laden, they bend with the inequalities of the surface over which they pass.