Chapter III (3)

Nobody doubts that there must be affinities and interdependencies between the race and the crop of ideas that is grown upon it; but the law, _ex nihilo nihil fit_, is as true of ideas as it is of races, and in the relations between them it is as true and has the same value, neither more nor less, as the statement that potatoes do spring out of the ground where no potatoes have been sown. To study culture is, therefore, to trace the history of its development, as well as the qualities of the people amongst whom it flourishes. In doing this it is not sufficient to deal with generalities, as, for example, to ascertain that one people employ bark canoes, whilst another use rafts. It is necessary to consider the details of construction, because it is by means of these details that we are sometimes able to determine whether the idea has been of home growth or derived from without. The difficulty is to obtain the necessary details for the purpose. Travellers do not give them, as a rule, especially modern travellers. The older books are more valuable, both because they deal with nations in a more primitive condition, and also because they are more detailed; books were fewer, and men took more pains with them; now the traveller writes for a circulating library, and for the unthinking portion of mankind, who will not be bothered with details. I have been careful to give the dates to the authors quoted. But we must endeavour to remedy this evil before it is too late. The _Notes and Queries on Anthropology_[221], published by the Committee of the British Association, are drawn up with this object. It is to be hoped that they will receive attention, but I fear not much, for the reasons already mentioned; the supply will be equal to the demand. As long as we have a large Geographical Society and a small Anthropological Society, so long travellers will bring home accurate geographical details, abundance of information about the flow of water all over the world, but the flow of human races and human ideas will receive little attention. With these preliminary remarks I pass on to the subject of my paper.

_Modes of Navigation._

Following out the principle adopted in Parts 1 and 2 of my Catalogue, of employing the constructive arts of existing savages as survivals to represent successive stages in the development of the same arts in prehistoric times, it may be advisable, in order to study the history of each part of a canoe or primitive sailing vessel, to divide the subject under seven heads, as follows: viz.--(1) Solid trunks or dug-out canoes, developing into (2) Vessels on which the planks are laced or sewn together, and these developing into such as are pinned with plugs of wood, and ultimately nailed with iron or copper; (3) Bark canoes; (4) Vessels of skins and wicker-work; (5) Rafts, developing into (6) Outrigger canoes, and ultimately into vessels of broader beam, to which may be added (7) rudders, sails, and contrivances which gave rise to parts of a more advanced description of vessel, such as the _oculus_, _aplustre_, _forecastle_, and _poop_.

1. _Solid Trunks and Dug-out Canoes._

It requires but little imagination to conceive an idea of the process by which a wooden support in the water forced itself upon the notice of mankind. The great floods to which the valleys of many large rivers are subject, more especially those which have their sources in tropical regions, sometimes devastate the whole country within miles of their banks, and by their suddenness frequently overtake and carry down numbers of both men and animals, together with large quantities of timber which had grown upon the sides of the valleys. The remembrances of such deluges are preserved in the traditions of many savage races, and there can be little doubt that it was by this means that the human race first learnt to make use of floating timber as a support for the body. The wide distribution of the word signifying ship--Latin _navis_; Greek ναῦς; Sanskrit _nau_; Celtic _nao_; Assam _nao_; Port Jackson, Australia, _nao_--attests the antiquity of the term. In Bible history the same term has been employed to personify the tradition of the first shipbuilder, _Noah_.

It is even said, though with what truth I am not aware, that the American grey squirrel (_Sciurus migratorius_), which migrates in large numbers, crossing large rivers, has been known to embark on a piece of floating timber, and paddle itself across (Wilson, _Prehistoric Man_, 1862, vol. i. p. 147).

The North American Indians frequently cross rivers by clasping the left arm and leg round the trunk of a tree, and swimming with the right (Steinitz, _History of the Ship_, Pl. 2).

The next stage in the development of the canoe would consist in pointing the ends, so as to afford less resistance to the water. In this stage we find it represented on the NW. coast of Australia. Gregory, in the year 1861, says that his ship was visited on this coast by two natives, who had paddled off on logs of wood shaped like canoes, not hollowed, but very buoyant, about 7 feet long, and 1 foot thick, which they propelled with their hands only, their legs resting on a little rail made of small sticks driven in on each side. Mr. T. Baines, also, in a letter quoted by the Rev. J. G. Wood, in his _Natural History of Man_ (vol. ii. p. 7), speaks of some canoes which he saw in North Australia as being ‘mere logs of wood, capable of carrying a couple of men’. Others used on the north coast are dug out, but as these are provided with an outrigger, they have probably been derived from New Guinea. The canoes used by the Australians on the rivers consist either of a bundle of rushes bound together and pointed at the ends, or else they are formed of bark in a very simple manner; but on the south-east coast, near Cape Howe, Captain Cook, in his first voyage, found numbers of canoes in use by the natives on the seashore. These he described as being very like the smaller sort used in New Zealand, which were hollowed out by means of fire. One of these was of a size to be carried on the shoulders of four men.

It has been thought that the use of hollowed canoes may have arisen from observing the effect of a split reed or bamboo upon the water. The nautilus is also said to have given the first idea of a ship to man; and Pliny, Diodorus, and Strabo have stated that large tortoise-shells were used by primitive races of mankind (Kitto, _Pictorial Bible_). It has also been supposed that the natural decay of trees may have first suggested the employment of hollow trees for canoes, but such trees are not easily removed entire. It is difficult to conceive how so great an advance in the art of shipbuilding was first introduced, but there can be no doubt that the agent first employed for this purpose was fire.

I have noticed when travelling in Bulgaria that the gipsies and others who roam over that country usually select the foot of a dry tree to light their cooking fire; the dry wood of the tree, combined with the sticks collected at the foot of it, makes a good blaze, and the tree throws forward the heat like a fireplace. Successive parties camping on the same ground, attracted thither by the vicinity of water, use the same fireplaces, and the result is that the trees by degrees become hollowed out for some distance from the foot, the hollow part formed by the fire serving the purpose of a semi-cylindrical chimney. Such a tree, torn up by the roots, or cut off below the part excavated by the fire, would form a very serviceable canoe, the parts not excavated by the fire being sound and hard. The Andaman islanders use a tree in this manner as an oven, the fire being kept constantly burning in the hollow formed by the flames.

One of the best accounts of the process of digging out a canoe by means of fire is that described by Kalm, on the Delaware river, in 1747. He says that, when the Indians intend to fell a tree, for want of proper instruments they employ fire; they set fire to a quantity of wood at the roots of the tree, and in order that the fire might not reach further up than they would have it, they fasten some rags to a pole, dip them in water, and keep continually washing the tree a little above the fire until the lower part is burnt nearly through; it is then pulled down. When they intend to hollow a tree for a canoe, they lay dry branches along the stem of the tree as far as it must be hollowed out, set them on fire, and replace them by others. While these parts are burning, they keep pouring water on those parts that are not to be burnt at the sides and ends. When the interior is sufficiently burnt out, they take their stone hatchets and shells and scoop out the burnt wood. These canoes are usually 30 or 40 feet long. In the account of one of the expeditions sent out by Raleigh in 1584 a similar description is given of the process adopted by the Indians of Virginia, except that, instead of sticks, resin is laid on to the parts to be excavated and set fire to: canoes capable of holding twenty persons were formed in this manner.

The Waraus of Guiana employ fire for excavating their canoes; and when Columbus discovered the Island of Guanahani or San Salvador, in the West Indies, he found [fire] employed for this purpose by the natives, who called their boats ‘_canoe_’, a term which has ever since been employed by Europeans to express this most primitive class of vessel.

Dr. Mouat says that, in Blair’s time, the Andaman islanders excavated their canoes by the agency of fire; but it is not employed for that purpose now, the whole operation being performed by hand. Symes, in 1800, speaks of the Burmese war-boats, which were excavated partly by fire and partly by cutting. Nos. 1276 and 1277 of my collection are models of these boats. In New Caledonia, Turner, in 1845, says that the natives felled their trees by means of a slow fire at the foot, taking three or four days to do it. In excavating a canoe, he says, they kindle a fire over the part to be burnt out, and keep dropping water over the sides and ends, so as to confine the fire to the required spot, the burnt wood being afterwards scraped out with stone tools. The New Zealanders, and probably the Australians also, employ fire for this purpose [Cook]. The canoes of the Krumen in West Africa are also excavated by means of fire.

A further improvement in the development of the dug-out canoe consists in bending the sides into the required form after it has been dug out. This process of fire-bending has already been described on p. 87 of my _Catalogue_ (Parts i and ii), when speaking of the methods employed by the Esquimaux and Australians in straightening their wooden spears and arrow-shafts. The application of this process to canoe-building by the Ahts of the north-west coast of North America is thus described by Mr. Wood in his _Natural History of Man_, vol. ii. p. 732. The canoe is carved out of a solid trunk of cedar (_Thuja gigantea_). It is hollowed out, not by fire, but by hand, and by means of an adze formed of a large mussel-shell; the trunk is split lengthwise by wedges. All is done by the eye. When it is roughly hollowed it is filled with water, and red-hot stones put in until it boils. This is continued until the wood is quite soft, and then a number of cross-pieces are driven into the interior, so as to force the canoe into its proper shape, which it ever afterwards retains. While the canoe is still soft and pliant, several slight cross-pieces are inserted, so as to counteract any tendency towards warping. The outside of the vessel is then hardened by fire, so as to enable it to resist the attacks of insects, and also to prevent it cracking when exposed to the sun. The inside is then painted some bright colour, and the outside is usually black and highly polished. This is produced by rubbing it with oil after the fire has done its work. Lastly, a pattern is painted on its bow. There is no keel to the boat. The red pattern of the painting is obtained by a preparation of _anato_. For boring holes the Ahts use a drill formed by a bone of a bird fixed in a wooden handle.

A precisely similar process to this is employed in the formation of the Burmese dug-out canoes, and has thus been described to me by Capt. O’Callaghan, who witnessed the process during the Burmese War in 1852. A trunk of a tree of suitable length, though much less in diameter than the intended width of the boat, is cut into the usual form, and hollowed out. It is then filled with water, and fires are lit, a short distance from it, along its sides. The water gradually swells the inside, while the fire contracts the outside, till the width is greatly increased. The effect thus produced is rendered permanent by thwarts being placed so as to prevent the canoe from contracting in width as it dries; the depth of the boat is increased by a plank at each side, reaching as far as the ends of the hollowed part. Canoes generally show traces of the fire and water treatment just described, the inner surface being soft and full of superficial cracks, while the outer is hard and close.

It is probable that this mode of bending canoes has been discovered during the process of cooking, in which red-hot stones are used in many countries to boil the water in vessels of skin or wood, in which the meat is cooked. No. 1256 of my collection is a model of an Aht canoe, painted as here described. No. 1257 is a full-sized canoe from this region, made out of a single trunk; it is not painted, so that the grain of the wood can be seen.

The distribution of the dug-out canoe appears to be almost universal. It is especially used in southern and equatorial regions. Leaving Australia, we find it employed with the outrigger, which will be described hereafter (pp. 218-9), in many parts of the Polynesian and Asiatic islands, including New Guinea, New Zealand, New Caledonia, and the Sandwich Islands. It was not used by the natives of Tasmania, who employed a float consisting of a bundle of bark and rushes, which will be described in another place (p. 203). Wilkes speaks of it in Samoa, at Manilla, and the Sooloo Archipelago. De Guignes in 1796 and De Morga in 1609 saw them in the Philippines, where they are called _pangues_, some carrying from two to three and others from twelve to fifteen persons. They are (or were) also used in the Pelew, Nicobar, and Andaman Isles. In the India Museum there is a model of one from Assam, used as a mail boat, and called _dâk nao_. In Burmah, Symes, in 1795, describes the war-boats of the Irrawaddy as 80 to 100 feet long, but seldom exceeding 8 feet in width, and this only by additions to the sides; carrying fifty to sixty rowers, who use short oars that work on a spindle, and who row instead of paddling. Captain O’Callaghan, however, informs me that they sometimes use paddles (Nos. 1276 and 1277). They are made of one piece of the teak tree. The king had five hundred of these vessels of war. They are easily upset, but the rowers are taught to avoid being struck on the broadside; they draw only 3 feet of water. On the Menan, in Siam, Turpin, in 1771, says that the king’s _ballons_ are made of a single tree, and will contain 150 rowers; the two ends are very much elevated, and the rowers sit cross-legged, by which they lose a great deal of power. The river vessels in Cochin China are also described as being of the same long, narrow kind. At Ferhabad, in Persia, Pietro della Valle, in 1614, describes the canoes as being flat-bottomed, hollow trees, carrying ten to twelve persons.

In Africa, Duarte Barbosa, in 1514, saw the Moors at Zuama make use of boats, _almadias_, hollowed out of a single trunk, to bring clothes and other merchandise from Angos. Livingstone says the canoes of the Bayeye of South Africa are hollow trees, made for use and not for speed. If formed of a crooked stem they become crooked vessels, conforming to the line of the timber. On the Benuwé, at its junction with the [Yola], Barth, for the first time in his travels southward, saw what he describes as rude little shells hollowed out of a single tree; they measured 25 to 30 feet in length, 1 to 1-1/2 foot in height, and 16 inches in width; one of them, he says, was quite crooked. On the White Nile, in Unyoro, Grant says that the largest canoe carried a ton and a half, and was hollowed out of a trunk. On the Kitangule, west of Lake Victoria Nyanza, near Karague, he describes the canoes as being hollowed out of a log of timber 15 feet long and the breadth of an easy-chair. These kind of canoes are also used by the Makoba east of Lake Ngami, by the Apingi and Camma, and the Krumen of the West African coast; of which last, No. 1272 of my collection is a model.

In South America the Patagonians use no canoes, but in the northern parts of the continent dug-out canoes are common. One described by Condamine, in 1743, was from 42 to 44 feet long, and only 3 feet wide. They are also used in Guiana, and Professor Wilson says that the dug-out canoe is used throughout the West Indian Archipelago. According to Bartram, who is quoted by Schoolcraft, the large canoes formed out of the trunks of cypress trees, which descended the rivers of Florida, crossed the Gulf, and extended their navigation to the Bahama Isles, and even as far as Cuba, carrying twenty to thirty warriors. Kalm, in 1747, gives some details respecting their construction on the Delaware river already referred to (p. 191), and says that the materials chiefly employed in North America are the red juniper, red cedar, white cedar, chestnut, white oak, and tulip tree. Canoes of red and white cedar are the best, because lighter, and they will last as much as twenty years, whereas the white oak barely lasts above six years. In Canada these dug-outs were made of the white fir. The process of construction on the west coast of North America has been already described (p. 192).

In Europe Pliny mentions the use of canoes hollowed out of a single tree by the Germans. Amongst the ancient Swiss lake-dwellers at Robenhausen, associated with objects of the stone age, a dug-out canoe, or _Einbaum_, made of a single trunk 12 feet long and 2-1/2 wide, was discovered (Keller, _Lake Dwellings_, Lee^2, p. 45). In Ireland, Sir William Wilde says that amongst the ancient Irish dug-out canoes were of three kinds. One was small, trough-shaped, and square at the ends, having a projection at either end to carry it by; the paddlers sat flat at the bottom and paddled, there being no rowlocks to the boat. A second kind was 20 feet in length and 2 in breadth, flat-bottomed, with round prow and square stern, strengthened by thwarts carved out of the solid and running across the boat, two near the stem and one near the stern. The prow was turned up; one of these was discovered in a bog on the coast of Wexford, 12 feet beneath the surface. The third sort was sharp at both ends, 21 feet long, 12 inches broad, and 8 inches deep, and flat-bottomed. These canoes are often found in the neighbourhood of the crannoges, or ancient lake-habitations of the country, and were used to communicate with the land; also in the beds of the Boyne and Bann. Ware says, that dug-out canoes were used in some of the Irish rivers in his time, and to this day I have seen paddles used on the Blackwater, in the south of Ireland. Professor Wilson says that several dug-out canoes have been found in the ancient river-deposits of the Clyde, and also in the neighbourhood of Falkirk. In one of those discovered in the Clyde deposits, at a depth of 25 feet from the surface, a stone almond-shaped celt was found. Others have been found in the ancient river-deposits of Sussex and elsewhere, in positions which show that the rivers must probably have formed arms of the sea, at the time they were sunk.

_2. Vessels in which the Planks are Stitched to each Other._

All vessels of the dug-out class are necessarily long and narrow, and very liable to upset; the width being limited by the size of the tree, extension can only be given to them by increasing their length. In order to give greater height and width to these boats, planks are sometimes added at the sides and stitched on to the body of the canoe by means of strings or cords, composed frequently of the bark or leaves of the tree of which the body is made. In proportion as these laced-on gunwales were found to answer the purpose of increasing the stability of the vessel, their number was increased; two such planks were added instead of one, and as the joint between the planks was by this means brought beneath the water line, means were taken to caulk the seams with leaves, pitch, resin, and other substances. Gradually the number of side planks increased and the solid hull diminished, until, ultimately, it dwindled into a bottom-board, or keel, at the bottom of the boat, serving as a centre-piece on which the sides of the vessel were built. Still the vessel was without ribs or framework; ledges on the sides were carved out of the solid substance of each plank, by means of which they were fastened to the ledges of the adjoining plank, and the two contiguous ledges served as ribs to strengthen the boat; finally, a framework of vertical ribs was added to the interior and fastened to the planks by cords. Ultimately the stitching was replaced by wooden pins, and the side planks pinned to each other and to the ribs; and these wooden pins in their turn were supplanted by iron nails.

In different countries we find representations of the canoe in all these several stages of development. Of the first stage, in which side planks were added to the body of the dug-out canoe, to heighten it, the New Zealand canoe, No. 1259 of my collection, is an example. Capt. Cook describes this as solid, the largest containing from thirty men upwards. One measured 70 feet in length, 6 in width, and 4 deep. Each of the side pieces was formed of an entire plank, about 12 inches wide, and about 1-1/2 inch thick, laced on to the hollow trunk of the tree by flaxen cords, and united to the plank on the opposite side by thwarts across the boat. These canoes have names given to them like European vessels.

On the Benuwé, in Central Africa, Barth describes a vessel in this same early stage of departure from the original dug-out trunk. It consisted of ‘two very large trunks joined together with cordage, just like the stitching of a shirt, and without pitching, the holes being merely stuffed with grass. It was not water-tight, but had the advantage,’ he says, ‘over the dug-out canoes used on the same river, in not breaking if it came upon a rock, being, to a certain degree, pliable. It was 35 feet long, and 26 inches wide in the middle.’ No. 1258 of my collection is a model of one of these. The single plank added to the side of the Burmese dug-out canoe has been already noticed (p. 193). Although my informant does not tell me that these side planks are sewn on, I have no doubt, judging by analogy, that this either is or was formerly the case.

The Waraus of Guiana are the chief canoe-builders of this part of South America, and to them other tribes resort from considerable distances. Their canoe is hollowed out of a trunk of a tree, and forced into its proper shape partly by means of fire and partly by wedges, upon a similar system to that described in speaking of the Ahts of North America (p. 192) and the Burmese; the largest have the sides made higher by a narrow plank of soft wood, which is laced upon the gunwale, and the seam caulked. This canoe is alike at both ends, the stem and stern being pointed, curved, and rising out of the water; there is no keel, and it draws but a few inches of water. This appears to be the most advanced stage to which the built-up canoe has arrived on either continent of America, with the exception of Tierra del Fuego, where Commodore Byron, in 1765, saw canoes in the Straits of Magellan made of planks sewn together with thongs of raw hide; these vessels are considerably raised at the bow and stern, and the larger ones are 15 feet in length by 1 yard wide. They have also been described by more recent travellers. Under what conditions have these miserable Fuegians been led to the employment of a more complex class of vessel than their more advanced congeners of the north?

In order to trace the further development of the canoe in this direction, we must return to Africa and the South Seas. On the island of Zanzibar, Barbosa, in 1514, says that the inhabitants of this island, and also Penda and Manfia, who are Arabs, trade with the mainland by means of ‘small vessels very loosely and badly made, without decks, and with a single mast; all their planks are sewn together with cords of reed or matting, and the sails are of palm mats.’ On the river Yeou, near Lake Tchad, in Central Africa, Denham and Clapperton saw canoes ‘formed of planks, rudely shaped with a small hatchet, and strongly fastened together by cords passed through holes bored in them, and a wisp of straw between, which the people say effectually keeps out the water; they have high poops like the Grecian boats, and would hold twenty or thirty persons.’ On the Logon, south-east of Lake Tchad, Barth says the boats are built ‘in the same manner as those of the Budduma, except that the planks consist of stronger wood, mostly _Birgem_, and generally of larger size, whilst those of the Budduma consist of the frailest material, viz. _Fogo_. In both, the joints of the planks are provided with holes, through which ropes are passed, overlaid with bands of reed tightly fastened upon them by smaller ropes, which are again passed through small holes stuffed with grass.’ On the Victoria Nyanza, in East Central Africa, Grant speaks of ‘a canoe of five planks sewn together, and having four cross-bars or seats. The bow and stern are pointed, standing for a yard over the water, with a broad central plank from stem to stern, rounded outside (the vestige of the dug-out trunk), and answering for a keel.’

Thus far we have found the planks of the vessels spoken of, merely fastened by cords passed through holes in the planks, and stuffed with grass or some other material, and the accounts speak of their being rarely water-tight. Such a mode of constructing canoes might serve well enough for river navigation, but would be unserviceable for sea craft. Necessity is the mother of invention, and accordingly we must seek for a further development of the system of water-tight stitching, amongst those races in a somewhat similar condition of culture, which inhabit the islands of the Pacific and the borders of the ocean between it and the continent of Africa.

The majority of those vessels now to be described are furnished with the outrigger; but as the distribution of this contrivance will be traced subsequently (p. 218 ff.), it will not be necessary to describe it in speaking of the stitched plank-work.

In the Friendly Isles Captain Cook, in 1773, says ‘the canoes are built of several pieces sewed together with bandage in so neat a manner that on the outside it is difficult to see the joints. All the fastenings are on the inside, and pass through _kants_ or ridges, which are wrought on the edges and ends of the several boards which compose the vessel.’ At Otaheite he speaks of the same process, and says that the chief parts are formed separately without either saw, plane, or other tool. La Perouse gives an illustration of an outrigger canoe from Easter Island, the sides of which are formed of drift-wood sewn together in this manner. At Wytoohee, one of the Paumotu, or Low Archipelago, Wilkes, in 1838, says that the canoes are formed of strips of cocoa-nut tree sewed together. Speaking of those of Samoa, he describes the process more fully. ‘The planks are fastened together with _sennit_; the pieces are of no regular size or shape. On the inside edge of each plank is a ledge or projection, which serves to attach the sennit, and connect and bind it closely to the adjoining one. It is surprising,’ he says, ‘to see the labour bestowed on uniting so many small pieces together, when large and good planks might be obtained. Before the pieces are joined, the gum from the husk of the bread-fruit tree is used to cement them close, and prevent leakage. These canoes retain their form much more truly than one would have imagined; I saw few whose original model had been impaired by service. On the outside the pieces are so closely fitted as frequently to require close examination before the seams can be detected. The perfection of workmanship is astonishing to those who see the tools with which it is effected. They consist now of nothing more than a piece of iron tied to a stick, and used as an adze; this, with a gimlet, is all they have, and before they obtained their iron tools, they used adzes made of hard stone and fish-bone.’ The construction of the Fiji canoe, called _drua_, is described by Williams in great detail. A keel or bottom board is laid in two or three pieces, carefully scarfed together. From this the sides are built up, without ribs, in a number of pieces varying from three to twenty feet. The edges of these pieces are fastened by ledges, tied together in the manner already described. A white pitch from the bread-fruit tree, prepared with an extract from the coco-nut kernel, is spread uniformly on both edges, and a fine strip of _masi_ laid between. The binding of sennit with which the boards, or _vanos_, as they are called, are stitched together is made tighter by small wooden wedges inserted between the binding and the wood, in opposite directions. The ribs seen in the interior of these canoes are not used to bring the planks into shape, but are the last things inserted, and are for uniting the deck more firmly with the body of the canoe. The carpenters in Fiji constitute a distinct class, and have chiefs of their own. The Tongan canoes were inferior to those of Fiji in Captain Cook’s time, but they have since adopted Fiji patterns. The Tongans are better sailors than the Fijians. Wilkes describes a similar method of building vessels in the Kingsmill Islands, but with varieties in the details of construction. ‘Each canoe has six or eight timbers in its construction; they are well modelled, built in frames, and have much sheer. The boards are cut from the coco-nut tree, from a few inches to six or eight feet long, and vary from five to seven inches in width. These are arranged as the planking of a vessel, and very neatly put together, being sewed with sennit. For the purpose of making them water-tight they use a slip of pandanus leaf, inserted as our coopers do in plugging a cask. They have evinced much ingenuity,’ he says, ‘in attaching the uprights to the flat timbers.’ It is difficult, without the aid of drawings, to understand exactly the peculiarities of this variety of construction, but he says they are secured so as to have all the motion of a double joint, which gives them ease, and comparative security in a seaway.

Turning now to the Malay Archipelago, Wallace speaks of a Malay _prahau_ in which he sailed from Macassar to New Guinea, a distance of 1,000 miles, and says that similar but smaller vessels had not a single nail in them. The largest of these, he says, are from Macassar, and the Bugi countries of the Celebes and Boutong. Smaller ones sail from Ternate, Pidore, East Ceram, and Garam. The majority of these, he says, have stitched planks. No. 1268 of my collection is a model of a vessel employed in those seas. Wallace says that the inhabitants of Ke Island, west of New Guinea, are the best boat-builders in the archipelago, and several villages are constantly employed at the work. The planks here, as in the Polynesian Islands, are all cut out of the solid wood, with a series of projecting ledges on their edges in the inside. But here we find an advance upon the Polynesian system, for the ledges of the planks are pegged to each other with wooden pegs. The planks, however, are still fastened to the ribs by means of _rattans_. The principles of construction are the same as in those of the Polynesian Islands, and the main support of the vessel still consists in the planks and their ledges, the ribs being a subsequent addition; for he says that after the first year the rattan-tied ribs are generally taken out and replaced by new ones, fitted to the planks and nailed, and the vessel then becomes equal to those of the best European workmanship. This constitutes a remarkable example of the persistency with which ancient customs are retained, when we find each vessel systematically constructed, in the first instance, upon the old system, and the improvement introduced in after years. I wonder whether any parallel to this could be found in a British arsenal. The psychical aspect of the proceeding seems not altogether un-English.

Extending our researches northward, we find that Dampier, in 1686, mentions, in the Bashee Islands, the use of vessels in which the planks are fastened with wooden pins. On the Menan, in Siam, Turpin, in 1771, speaks of long, narrow boats, in the construction of which neither nails nor iron are employed, the parts being fastened together with roots and twigs which withstand the destructive action of the water. They have the precaution, he says, to insert between the planks a light, porous wood, which swells by being wet, and prevents the water from penetrating into the vessel. When they have not this wood, they rub the chinks, by which the water enters, with clay. In the India Museum there is a model of a very early form of vessel from Burmah, described as a trading vessel. The bottom is dug out, and the sides formed of planks laced together. A large stone is employed for an anchor. Here we see that an inferior description of craft has survived, upon the rivers, in the midst of a higher civilization which has produced a superior class of vessel upon the seas.

Turning westward, we have the surf-boat of Madras, called _massoola_, which, on account of its elasticity, is still used on the seashore. Its parts are stitched together in the manner represented in the model, No. 1267 of my collection. On the Malabar coast the ships of the Pardesy, who consisted of Arabs, Persians, and others who have settled in the kingdom of Malabar, are described by Barbosa in 1514. They build ships, he says, of 200 tons, which have keels like the Portuguese, but have no nails. They sew their planks with neat cords, very well pitched, and the timber very good. Ten or twelve of these ships, laden with goods, sail every year in February for the Red Sea, some for Aden and some for Jeddah, the port of Mecca, where they sell their merchandise to others, who transmit it to Cairo, and thence to Alexandria. The ships return to Calicut between August and October of the same year. The earliest description we have of these vessels in this part of the world, in historic times, is in the account of the travels of two Mahomedans in the ninth century. In these travels it is related that there were people in the Gulf of Oman who cross over to the islands that produce coco-nuts, taking with them their tools, and make ships out of it. With the bark they make the cordage to sew the planks together, and of the leaves they make sails; and having thus completed the vessel, they load it with coco-nuts and set sail. Marco Polo, at the commencement of the fourteenth century, confirms this, and says, speaking of the ships at Ormuz, in the Persian Gulf, that they do not use nails, but wooden pins, and fasten them with threads made of the Indian nut. These threads endure the force of the water, and are not easily corrupted thereby. These ships have one mast, one sail, _and one beam_, and are covered with but one deck. They are not caulked with pitch, but with the oil and fat of fishes. When they cross to India they lose many ships, because the sea is very tempestuous, and they are not strengthened with iron. In the Red Sea, Father Lobo, in 1622, describes the vessels called _gelves_, which, he says, are made almost entirely of the coco-nut tree. The trunk is sawn into planks, the planks are sewn together with thread which is spun from the bark, and the sails are made of the leaves stitched together. They are more convenient, he says, than other vessels, because they will not split if thrown upon banks or against rocks.

We have now arrived in the region which is usually regarded as the cradle of Western civilization, certainly the land in which Western culture first began to put forth its strong shoots; and we must expect to find that the art of shipbuilding advanced in the same ratio as other trades. But, unlike the Phoenicians, the Egyptians confined their navigation chiefly to the Nile, and had an abhorrence of Typhon, as they termed the sea, because it swallowed up the great river, which, being the chief source of their prosperity, they regarded as a god.

Here it may be desirable to digress for one moment from the chain of continuity which we have been following, in order to say a few words about the most primitive form of vessel used on the Nile, viz. that mentioned by Isaiah (xviii. 2) as being of Ethiopian origin, the vessel of bulrushes to which the mother of Moses entrusted her infant progeny. What the coco-nut tree was to the navigators on the eastern seas, the papyrus was to the Egyptians, and from it every part of the vessel--rope, planks, masts, and sails--was constructed. Adverting to the earliest and simplest of these papyrus vessels, the common use for a bundle of faggots, for such it was, is not, perhaps, one of those coincidences which, viewed by the light of modern culture, we should select as evidence of connexion between distant lands. And yet there are peculiarities of form which make the bulrush float of the Egyptians worthy of comparison with those used in the rivers of Australia.

The Australian float, as represented by a model in the British Museum, consisted of a bundle of bark and rushes, pointed and elevated at the ends, and bound round with girdles of the same material. The only vessel, according to Mr. Calder, used in Tasmania, on the west coast, is thus described by him in the _Journal of the Anthropological Institute_, iii. 22. ‘It was of considerable size, and something like a whale-boat, that is, sharp-sterned, but a solid structure, and the natives, in their aquatic adventures, sat on the top of it. It was generally made by the buoyant and soft, velvety bark of the swamp tea-tree (_Melaluca_ sp.), and consisted of a multitude of small strips bound together.’ Professor Wilson says that the Californian canoe consists of a mere rude float, made of rushes, ‘in the form of a lashed-up hammock.’ A woodcut in Sir Gardner Wilkinson’s _Ancient Egypt_, No. 399 of his work, represents three persons making one of these papyrus floats. It is the _baris_, or Memphite bark, bound together with papyrus, spoken of by Lucan, and it is of precisely similar form to those above described, elevated and pointed at the ends, and the men are in the act of binding it round with girdles. This is the kind of boat in which Plutarch describes Isis going in search of the body of Osiris through the fenny country; a bark made of papyrus. Pliny attributes the origin of shipbuilding to these vessels (vii. 56); and speaks (vi. 22) of their crossing the sea and visiting the Island of Taprobane (Ceylon, according to Sir G. Wilkinson); but it seems probable that he must refer to a more advanced form of vessel than the mere bulrush float.

The racial connexion between the Australians and the Egyptians, first put forward by Professor Huxley, has hardly met with general acceptance as yet; but, startling as it at first sight appeared, the more we look into the evidence bearing upon it, the less improbable, to say the least, it becomes, when viewed by the light of comparative culture. I have already shown, in another place,[222] how closely some of the Australian weapons correspond to some of those still used on the Upper Nile, and the remarkable resemblance here pointed out in a class of vessels which might well have been used in passing short distances from island to island of the now submerged fragments of land that are supposed to have formerly existed in parts of the southern hemisphere, is, at least, worthy of attention amongst other evidence of the same kind that may be collected, although I fully admit that it is not of a character to stand alone. I will not exceed my province by attempting to defend the theory of the Australioid origin of the Egyptians on physical grounds, preferring to leave the defence of that theory in the hands of its author, who is so well able to support his own views; but I may take this opportunity of commenting on some remarks made by Professor Owen in his valuable paper, published in the last number of our _Journal_, on the psychical evidence of connexion between them and the black races of the southern hemisphere. Adverting to the fresco painting, in the British Museum, of the ancient Egyptian fowler, who holds in his hand a stick, which he is in the act of throwing at a flock of birds, I am inclined to agree with Professor Owen in thinking there is nothing in its shape to denote that it is a boomerang. Other figures, however, in Rosellini’s _Egyptian Monuments_, show the resemblance more clearly, and if these are not enough, the specimen of the weapon itself in the glass case in the Egyptian room of the British Museum proves the identity of the weapon beyond possibility of doubt. I have elsewhere stated at length,[223] that having made several facsimiles of this weapon from careful measurements, so as to obtain the exact size, form, and weight of the original, for the purpose of experiment, I found that it possessed all the properties of the Australian boomerang, rising in the air, and returning in some cases to within a few paces of the position from which it was thrown. In fact, it was easier to obtain the return flight from this weapon than from many varieties of the Australian boomerang, with which I experimented at the same time.

But supposing the ancient Egyptian to be ‘convicted of the boomerang’, says the learned professor, ‘common sense repudiates the notion of the necessity of inheritance in relation to such operations.’ Against this I would urge, that the application of the general quality of common sense to the determination of questions of psychical connexion, between races so far removed from us, as the Australians or the predecessors of the earliest Egyptian kings, is inconsistent with all that we know of the phenomena of mental evolution in man, seeing that there must necessarily be many stages of disparity between them and any intelligent member of the Anthropological Institute to whose common sense this appeal was made.

If the common sense of the nineteenth century does not repudiate the fact that the steam engine, the electric telegraph, vaccination, free trade, and a thousand other contrivances for the benefit of our race, have sprung from special centres, and have been inherited, or otherwise received, by the highly cultivated races to which they have spread in modern times, neither would the common sense of the Australian or prehistoric Egyptian, after its kind, bar the likelihood of such contrivances as the boomerang, the parrying-shield, or the ‘baris’ having been handed from one savage people to another in a similar manner. Wherever two or three concurrent chains of connexion, whether of race, language, or the arts, can be traced along the same channel, such evidence is admissible, and is indeed frequently the only evidence available in dealing with prehistoric times.

The peculiar elevated ends of the papyrus floats are almost identical in form, but not in structure, with those now used in parts of India, especially on the Ganges; and the word _junk_ is said to be related to _juncus_, a bulrush. Somewhat similar rafts, but flat, turned up in front but not behind, and called _tankwa_, are described by Lieut. Prideaux as being still used on Lake Tsana, in Soudan, and they are also used by the Shillooks, who make them of a wood as light as cork, called _ambads_ (_Anemone mirabilis_). A paper by Mr. John Hogg, in the _Magazine of Natural History_ (1829, ii. p. 324 ff.), to which my attention has been kindly drawn by Mr. John Jeremiah, contains some useful information on the subject of Egyptian papyrus vessels. Denon describes and figures a very primitive float of this sort, consisting of a bundle of straw or stalks, pointed and turned up in front, and says that the inhabitants of the Upper Nile go up and down the river upon it astride, the legs serving for oars; they use also a short double-bladed paddle. It is worthy of notice that the only other localities, that I am aware of, in which this double paddle is used, are the Sooloo Archipelago and among the Esquimaux. Belzoni also describes the same kind of vessel. Mr. Hogg, in his paper, gives several illustrations of improved forms of these solid papyrus floats, derived from a mosaic pavement discovered in the Temple of Fortune at Praeneste. From these it seems that they were bound round with thongs, pointed, and turned up and over at both ends. But Bruce, in 1790, describes more particularly the class of vessel used in Abyssinia in his time, called _tankwa_, or, as he writes it, _tancoa_, and says that it corresponds exactly to the description of Pliny (_Nat. Hist._, xiii. 2, compare v. 9). His description appears possibly to indicate that there was a separate line of development of hollow vessels derived from the flat raft. A piece of acacia tree was put in the bottom to serve as a keel, to which plants were joined, being first sewed together, then gathered up at the ends and stern, and the ends of the plant tied fast there. On Lake Tsana they are only turned up in front: see above. Belzoni describes a similar kind of vessel on Lake Moeris, which seems clearly to be hollow. The outer shell or hulk was composed of rough pieces of wood, scarcely joined, and fastened by four other pieces wrapped together by four more across, which formed the deck; no tar, no pitch, either inside or out, and the only preventive against the water coming in was a kind of weed which had settled in the joints of the wood. The only other locality, that I know of, in which similar vessels to these are used, is Formosa, a description of which is given by Mr. J. Thomson (_The Straits of Malacca, Indo-China, and China_, London, 1875, p. 304), for the sight of which I am indebted to Mr. W. L. Distant. He says: ‘We went ashore in a catamaran, a sort of raft made of poles of the largest species of bamboo. These poles are bent by fire, so as to impart a hollow shape to the raft, and are lashed together with rattan. There is not a nail used in the whole contrivance.’

But the boats ‘woven of’ the papyrus, mentioned by Pliny, certainly refer to something more complex than the papyrus bundle above described. Lucan describes them as being sewn with bands of papyrus, and Herodotus describes them more fully. This passage has been variously translated by different authors, but the version given by Sir Gardner Wilkinson is as follows:--‘they cut planks measuring about two cubits, and having arranged them like bricks, they build the boat in the following manner: they fasten the planks round firm long pegs, and, after this, stretch over the surface a series of girths, _but without any ribs_, and the whole is bound _within_ by bands of papyrus.’ The exact meaning of this is obscure; but I would suggest, that as the ‘fastening within’ clearly shows it was not a solid structure, the more reasonable interpretation of it is by supposing that the planks, arranged in brick fashion, were fastened on the inside by cords, in the manner practised in the South Sea Islands and elsewhere. What the long pins were is uncertain; but as Sir Gardner Wilkinson says that the models found in the tombs show that ribs were used at a time probably subsequent to this, these pins may have been rudimentary ribs of some kind, and they also may have been ‘bound within’ to the planks in the same manner. It seems not unlikely that these boats may have also been bound round on the outside to give them additional strength, after the manner of the papyrus floats above described.[224] With this vessel, which was called _baris_, they used a sort of anchor, consisting of a stone with a hole in it, similar to one on a Burmese vessel, of which a model is in the India Museum.

The larger class of Egyptian vessels were of superior build, the planks being fastened with wooden pins and nails, and their construction somewhat similar to those still used on the Nile.