Besides the chief pilot, there was a subordinate one, whose duty it was to keep a look out at the prow, to manage and direct the sails and rowers, and to assist the principal pilot by his advice:  the directions of the subordinate pilot were conveyed to the rowers by another officer, who seems to have answered to the boatswain of our men of war.  The rowers were enabled to pull all at once, or to keep time, by a person who sung and played to them while they were employed.  During the night, or in difficult navigations, the charge of the sounding lead, or of the long poles, which were used either for the same purpose, or to push the ship off, when she got a-ground, was committed to a particular officer.  There were, besides, men whose duty it was to serve out the victuals, to keep the ship’s accounts, &c.

The usual day’s sail of a ship of the ancients was five hundred stadia, or fifty miles; and the course run over, when they sailed night and day, double that space.

We have confined ourselves, in this account of the ships of the ancients, principally to those particulars that are connected with the construction, equipment, &c. of those employed for commercial purposes, and shall now proceed to a historical sketch of the progress of discovery among the Greeks, from the earliest records to the era of Herodotus, the father of geographical knowledge.

The first maritime expedition of the Greeks, of which we have a particular narration, and certainly one of the most celebrated in ancient times, is the Argonautic expedition.  As we purpose to go into some length on the subject of this expedition, it may be proper to defend ourselves from the charge of occupying too much space, and giving too much attention to an enterprize generally deemed fabulous, and so obscured by fable and uncertainty, as to be little capable of illustration, and little conducive to the improvement of geographical knowledge.  This defence we shall borrow from a name deservedly high among those who have successfully illustrated ancient geography, for the happy and successful mutual adaptation of great learning and sound judgment, and not less worthy of respect and imitation for his candour and liberality:  we allude to Dr. Vincent, the illustrator of the Voyage of Nearchus, and the Periplus of the Erythraean Sea.

“The reality of the Argonautic expedition, (he observes in the Preliminary Disquisition to the latter work), has been questioned; but if the primordial history of every nation but one is tinctured with the fabulous, and if from among the rest a choice is necessary to be made, it must be allowed that the traditions of Greece are less inconsistent than those of the more distant regions of the earth.  Oriental learning is now employed in unravelling the mythology of India, and recommending it as containing the seeds of primaeval history; but hitherto we have seen nothing that should induce us to relinquish the authority we have been