Page:Arrian's Voyage Round the Euxine Sea Translated.djvu/135

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page has been proofread, but needs to be validated.
132
DISTANCE WHICH THE ANCIENT SHIPS

with rocks, ſhoals, and breakers, and hazy weather. He mentions, that they could not run more than 30 miles on one tack, and that. it was their cuſtom to make one ſhore about ſun-ſet[1], then to tack, and to ſtand for the oppoſite ſhore until day-break. This is nearly the ſame progreſs deſcribed by Herodotus. Mr. Irwin adds, that an Engliſh ſhip had been wrecked[2] there, from the-difficulty of the navigation, not ſix months before; and at one time-he regarded his own ſituation as deſperate.

They were beſides twenty days (from -April 16th to May 6th), in failing from Mocha to Zambo, which is a difference of not; more than 11° of latitude and 6° of longitude, which is little more than 42 Engliſh miles, or about 46 Greek miles, each day of twenty-four hours. Perhaps it was from the difficulty of this navigation that Herodotus intimates, that it was performed with oars only; and indeed Mr.-Irwin's account proves that the management of ſails in this ſea is difficult, even in the preſent age, and to Engliſh ſailors.

The ſixth and laſt inſtance I ſhall examine is the one Mr. Rennel brings from Herodotus, who fays, that the navigation from the Thracian Boſporus on the Euxine ſea to the mouth of the Phaſis is a voyage of eight days and nine nights, or, as Mr. Rennel counts it, of ſixteen days. This diſtance he reckons at 38 miles each day. Herodotus eſtimates this diſtance at 11,100 ſtadia, which gives for 8½ days ſail more than 1300 ſtadia for every twenty-four hours, equal to 162 Greek miles, or 148 Engliſh miles.

  1. Irwin's Voyage, page 20.
  2. Page 22.
Arrian