Keeping yourself hydraded at rendezvous is important. Finding something to carry your drinking water in that looks peroid correct can be a challenge. None of the canteens I have seen are correct for the Mountain Man peroid, neither are the glass bottles or stoneware jugs. Tin cups are correct but difficult to carry without spilling the contents.
I solved the problem by making a water bottle from a gourd. I have used this one for the past three years and it is still holding up and keeping my water cool. I have since found a cork to fit and it seals better than the gourd neck I originally used.
First, choose a bottle gourd with a shape you like.
Cut your opening. I used a fine tooth saw to cut the neck at its widest point.
Dump out the seeds and dried pulp.
Put a couple of hands full of clean gravel into the gourd and shake it good to loosen the remaining dried pulp. Dump out the gravel and powdery stuff then rinse it with clean water and let it dry.
Your gourd is now ready to store dry stuff but if you want to drink from it you might want to seal it with wax (unless you like the taste of gourd water.) I used bees wax because I like the scent of honey. You can use canning paraffin.
The first coating of wax on the inside of the gourd is the most important one. You get one chance to get it right.
Place the gourd in the oven and heat it to 170 degrees. Melt 3 or 4 ounces of bees wax in a double boiler. I used a clean bean can in a pot of boiling water. Be careful here because hot wax is very flammable.
When your wax is melted and the gourd is warmed up to 170 (about ten minutes in the oven should do it) remove the gourd from the oven (use oven mitts) and pour all the melted wax into the gourd. The gourd will be hot enough to keep the wax from setting up too quickly. Swirl, whirl, twist, rotate, and twirl your gourd to coat all the inside surface with wax. Then pour all the wax back into the can. You will feel a difference in the way the wax moves inside the gourd when it starts to cool. That is when it should be poured out.
Set the gourd aside and let it cool to room temperature. You can add additional coatings of wax, just do not heat the gourd again after the first coat. I added two more coatings of wax to the inside and one coat to the outside of my gourd. It is now leak proof and my drinking water will not taste or smell like swamp water.
To attach a carry strap, I used rawhide. One large rawhide dog chew bone soaked in a bucket of water was plenty to cut the strips from.
For a stopper, I used the cut off portion of the gourd neck. I also sealed it with bees wax. It makes a stopper, drinking or measuring cup. Mine holds exactly 1/4 cup. The gourd itself holds five cups or one cup more than a quart.
Total cost was:
gourd $1.00
bees wax $2.00
Dog chew bone $3.00
So for about $6.00 I have a perfectly good mountain man Nalgene bottle.