Note 409 — Chapter XII

Their mode of rowing.

In the best class of these vessels, the cabin projects from the ship about 2 feet on each side, and there are folding windows round it, which may be opened or shut as pleasure or occasion may require. In the furthermost part are the rooms for passengers, separated from each other by folding-screens or doors, with the floors covered with fine mats. The outer cabin is always considered the best, and is accordingly assigned to the most distinguished passengers. The roof, or upper deck, is flattish, and constructed of neat boards, curiously joined together. In rainy weather, the mast is let down upon the upper deck, and the sail extended over it for the sailors and the people employed in the ship’s service to take shelter under it, and to sleep at night. Sometimes, the better to defend the upper deck, it is covered with straw mats, which, for this purpose, are kept at hand. There is but one sail, made of canvas, and very large; and one mast, standing up about midships, but somewhat towards the stern. This mast, which is of the same length as the ship, is wound up by pulleys, and again lowered upon deck when the ship comes to anchor. The anchors are of iron. Ships of this burden have commonly thirty to forty hands to row them, if the wind fails. The rowers’ benches are towards the stern. They row in unison with the air of a song, or tune with words, which serves at the same time to direct and regulate their work, and to encourage each other to exertion. They do not row after the European mode, extending their oars straight forwards, with the blades just below the surface, but they let them fall down into the water almost perpendicularly, and then lift them up again. This way of rowing not only answers the same purpose as our own, but is performed with less labour, and seems to be more adapted to circumstances, considering the narrowness of the passage through which ships sometimes pass, or when vessels pass each other, or when the benches of the rowers are raised considerably above the surface of the water. The oars are made in a peculiar manner, suitable for this mode of rowing, being not all straight, like the Europeans’ oars, but somewhat bent.