xxxn APPENDIX.

the former was the securer guide, and therefore was followed by the Phoenicians, who for skill in marine affairs outstripped not only all the rest of the world, but even the Grecians themselves.

RATES OF SAILING OF ANCIENT VESSELS.

The general rate of sailing of the vessels of the ancients appears to be even lower than we might naturally expect from their clumsy and imperfect construction. This will be sufficiently evident from the examples collected of their voyages, by the justly-celebrated author of the Illustrations of Herodotus, a work which we are sorry to say has become extremely scarce, since there are few books whose circulation would be more advantageous to those who value historical and geographical research.

It will be seen, from a view of the examples in question, that the mean rate of sailing of the best-equipped vessels of antiquity, was no more than thirty-five and thirty-seven geographic miles per day, equivalent to two and a half or three geographic miles an hour, taking the day at twelve hours. We will give them in Major Rennell’s own words.

” Miltiades, under favour of an easterly wind, passed in a single day from Eleeos, in the Chersonese of Thrace, to Lemnos (Herod.

Erato 40) ; the distance is thirty-eight geographic miles only.

“ The fleet of Xerxes sailed in three days from the Euripus to Phalerus, one of the ports of Attica (Urania 66). This is about ninety-six geographic miles, or thirty-two per day. The fleet was unusually great.

“ Nearchus reckoned the promontory of Maceta a day’s sail from him when he first discovered it ; and it is shewn by circumstances that the distance was about thirty-eight geographic miles (Arrian’s Voyage of Nearchus).

Scylax allows seventy -five days and a quarter for the navigation