Ordinary travelling by road may not have averaged more than sixty or seventy miles a day, although hundred miles could be done without much difficulty, while a courier on urgent business could greatly increase that speed.

Next let us suppose that our friend proposes to travel by sea.  As a rule navigation takes place only between the beginning of March and the middle of November, ships being kept snug in harbour during the winter months.  The traveller may be sailing from Alexandria to the capital or from Rome to Cadiz or to Rhodes.  If a trader of sufficient boldness, he may even be proceeding outside the empire as far as India.  If so, he will pass up the Nile as far as Coptos, then take either the canal or the caravan route to Myos Hormos on the Red Sea, and thence find ship for India, with a reasonable prospect—­if he escapes the Arab pirates—­of completing his business and returning home in about six months.  Over 120 ships, small and great, leave the above-mentioned harbour each year on the voyage to India, for Alexandria is the great depot for the trade round the Indian Ocean, and the products of India are in lively demand at Rome.

[Illustration:  FIG. 4.—­SHIP BESIDE THE QUAY AT OSTIA. (Wolf and twins on mainsail.)]

On such a remote course, however, we will not follow.  Let us rather suppose that our traveller is proceeding from Alexandria, the second city of the empire, to Rome, which is the first.  In this case he may enjoy the great advantage of going on board one those merchantmen belonging to the imperial service, which sail regularly with a freight of corn to feed the empire city.  His port of landing will be Puteoli (Puzzuoli) in the Bay of Naples, which was then the Liverpool of Italy.  The rest of the journey he will either make by the Appian Road, or, less naturally, by smaller freight-ship, putting in at Ostia, the port of Rome recently constructed by the Emperor Claudius at the mouth of the river Tiber.  His ship, a well-manned and strongly-built vessel of from 500 tons up to 1100 or more, will carry one large mainsail, formed of strips of canvas strengthened by leather at their joinings, a smaller foresail, and a still smaller topsail.  It will be steered by a pair of huge paddles on either side of the stern.  There will be a crow’s-nest on the mast, and at the bows a rehead of Rome or Alexandria or of some deity, perhaps of Castor and Pollux combined.  A tolerable, but by no means a liberal, amount of cabin accommodation will be provided.  A good-sized ship might reach 200 feet in length by 50 in breadth.  One of them brought to Rome the great obelisk which now stands in the Piazza of St. Peter’s; another ship had brought another obelisk, 400,000 bushels of wheat and other cargo, and a very large number of passengers.  At a favourable season, and with a quite favourable wind, the ship may expect to reach the Bay of Naples in as little as eight or nine days:  sometimes it will take ten days, sometimes as many as twelve.