“When the seventy-four in question has displaced its weight of water, its own weight is substituted for the water, and is in consequence virtually annihilated; it does not, in point of fact, weigh anything at all, and therefore is easily impelled by the wind.”

“When there is any, understood,” added Jack.

“And a yard or so of canvas,” suggested Willis.

“True,” continued Fritz, “a sail or two would be very desirable; these instruments of propulsion do not appear, however, to have been used by the ancients.  We first hear of a sail being employed at the time when Isis went in search of her husband Osiris, who was killed by his brother Typhon, and whose quarters were scattered in the Nile.  This lady, it seems, took off the veil that covered her head, and fastened it to an upright shaft stuck in the middle of the boat, and, much to her astonishment, it impelled her onwards at a marvellous speed.”

“A clever young woman that,” said Willis; “but I doubt whether veils would answer the purpose on board a seventy-four, particularly as regards the mainsail and mizentops.”

“The Phoenicians were the most enterprising of the early navigators.  They appeared to have sailed round Africa without a compass, for they embarked on the Red Sea and reappeared at the mouth of the Nile, and the compass was not invented till the fourteenth century.”

“And who was the inventor of the compass?” inquired Willis.

“According to some authorities, it was invented by a Neapolitan named Jean Goya; according to others, the inventor was a certain Hugues de Bercy.”

“Then,” said Jack, “you do not admit the claims of the Chinese and Hindoos, who assert priority in the discovery?”

“I neither deny nor admit their claims, because I do not know the grounds upon which they are founded; like the invention of gunpowder and printing, the discovery of the compass has many rival claimants.”

“I am of opinion,” said Jack, “that Guttenberg is entitled to the honor of discovering printing, and that Berthold Schwartz invented gunpowder.”

“Perhaps you are right; but there is scarcely any invention of importance that has not two or three names fastened to it as inventors; they stick to it like barnacles, and there is no way to shake any of them off.  So, in the case of illustrious men, nations dispute the honor of giving them birth; there are six or seven towns in Asia Minor that claim to be the birth-place of Homer.  National vanities justly desire to possess the largest amount of genius; hence, no sooner does anything useful make its appearance in the world, than half a dozen nations or individuals start up to claim it as their offspring.  The wisest course, under such circumstances, is to side with the best accredited opinion, which I have done in the case of the compass.”

“It was no joke,” said Willis, “to circumnavigate Africa without a compass.”