sight of land and fearful of being surprised
by sudden gusts that lash the Mediterranean
to madness. They were fair-weather birds,
were those galleys, and, in a storm, were like
so many butterflies caught in a gusty April
shower. There were five slaves to every oar,
and in all three hundred slaves. The top-
sawyers, or upper end rowers, were generally
shaven Turks, who were willingly granted
the honour, since the place was the most
laborious in the vessel. Honour would not
be so much envied, if it were known with what
labour it was burdened. To keep down these
three hundred chained demons, each galley
had a crew of one hundred and fifty men,
including officers, soldiers, seamen, and
servants. Men who shouted orders, who reefed
and clomb, who dragged out guns and fired
from the rigging, and boys and varlets, who
ran here and there with dishes and salvers,
were unchained slaves. At the stern of each
galley there was a covered chamber, rounded
like a cradle, in which the captain lurked at
night, or in foul weather, but in the
daytime it was frequented by the officers and
chaplain, who repaired here to swear and
quote their texts, while the subaltern officers
had also their several lairs and haunts;
while all the rest of the crew sweltered by
day in the full glare and blaze of Neapolitan
and Genoese suns, or the damp and moon
hours of Corsican or Marseillese nights.
There was, indeed, a sort of tent or awning
suspended by a long cable slung from head
to stern, that afforded some thin shelter, but
only in bright, fair weather; for in the least
cap-full of wind or puff of storm it was
taken down, being dangerous overweight for a
boat like a barque; so that, after blood-
sweats of passionate rowing, whether
pursuing the English or flying from the Turk,
the wretched slaves, off Morocco, often found
their broad backs coated with snow, till they
could reach the open arms of a friendly
port.

The slave's yearly allowance for clothes
was two coarse canvas shirts, and a little
red serge jerkin, slit up on each side to the
arm-holes, to give their brawny arms full
play. The short loose sleeves did not reach
to the elbow. Every three years they
received a coarse frock, and for their shaved
bullet-heads, a little red Phrygian cap, that the
Revolution afterwards rendered so terrible.
Sick or well, their only bed was a board a foot
and a half broad; the sleeping places most
dreaded were those nearest the officers of the
galley, for if the vermin roused the slave, so
that his chains rattled and awoke his neighbour,
he was torn to pieces with the gashes
of rope scourges.

The fatigue of lifting the great oars of a
galley, though pleasant to read of in the
Odyssey, was extreme. The slave rose to
draw his stroke, like those men we see
struggling in a coal barge against the stormy tide
of the Thames, and they then fell back with
a bumping jerk that would have astonished
an Oxford or Cambridge puller. In all
seasons, hot or cold, the perspiration trickled
down their harassed limbs; and, when they
began to grow faint and flag, one of the three
comites (the comites were boatswains) ran
down the gangboard which intersected the
ship, to find out the rascal who did not keep
touch and time with the rest. "Weak or lazy,
dying or worn out, they did not care—he
might be a sapless boy, he might be a
decrepit old man—down came on his bare
shoulders the large centurion's rod; which
was so long, generally, that the two or three
nearest rowers also felt the blow, which left
triple scars and red letters on every back on
which it fell. To scowl, or swear, or groan,
was only to draw down fresh sorrows, and
fresh blasphemies and threats. Renewed toil
was the only received mark of submission.

Reaching port brought no end to the
slave's labours, for rowing ceased only to
bring fresh toil and grief. The comites
prided themselves on dexterously casting
anchor; and, while the cable ran out, their
lash went faster as the prisoners' arms moved
quicker.

To support these hardships, the slaves
received every morning at eight o'clock a
portion of good biscuit, and at ten, a
porridge of hot-water soup, with some rancid
oil, musty peas and beans floating at the
top. When on duty they had handed round
a pischione (two-thirds of a pint) of wine,
morning and evening. When quiet at anchor
in any Mediterranean port, all the slaves
who had any money were allowed to have a
jubilee, and to buy meat; and the Turk who
commanded the oars, that is, who pulled at the
end, and was not chained, was the agent to
the meat market, and was also employed to
watch it dressing in the cook's room. When
the cook was a sullen villain—villains not
being rare cattle in the galleys—he would
sometimes, in a brutal passion at the trouble
or hindrance, break the poor men's earthen
stewpot, and throw it overboard to the
fishes; while the poor fellows, chained by
their ankles, fainting for want of food, were
unable to murmur or complain.

The officer's table, however, was all this
time well furnished both for plenty and
delicacy, the smell of the dainties giving the
slaves a more exquisite sense of their misery,
by seeming to scoff and deride their poverty
and hunger. Sometimes the galleys were
lying in the ports of Morocco or Nice during
the full swing and hubbub of the carnival.
Then the prince or doge, with all his retinue,
armed, comes on board, as Don Quixote
boarded the galleys floating on a stream
of music, with a rustle of perfumed feathers,
and a fluttering of long flags; there was
mirth, and song, and revel, while the slaves
sat doubled-ip upon their benches, ready to
burst their chains, and cut every honourable
throat, if they could or dared. They were