o say, a
case in which the _interests_ of one of the parties in a contest were
so strong that all considerations of justice, consistency, and honor
are to be sacrificed to the promotion of them. Instances of this kind
of political necessity occur very frequently in the management of
public affairs in all ages of the world.

The contest for Messina was, after all, however, considered by the
Romans merely as a pretext, or rather as an occasion, for commencing
the struggle which they had long been desirous of entering upon. They
evinced their characteristic energy and greatness in the plan which
they adopted at the outset. They knew very well that the power of
Carthage rested mainly on her command of the seas, and that they could
not hope successfully to cope with her till they could meet and
conquer her on her own element. In the mean time, however, they had
not a single ship and not a single sailor, while the Mediterranean was
covered with Carthaginian ships and seamen. Not at all daunted by this
prodigious inequality, the Romans resolved to begin at once the work
of creating for themselves a naval power.

The preparations consumed some time; for the Romans had not only to
build the ships, they had first to learn how to build them. They took
their first lesson from a Carthaginian galley which was cast away in a
storm upon the coast of Italy. They seized this galley, collected
their carpenters to examine it, and set woodmen at work to fell trees
and collect materials for imitating it. The carpenters studied their
model very carefully, measured the dimensions of every part, and
observed the manner in which the various parts were connected and
secured together. The heavy shocks which vessels are exposed to from
the waves makes it necessary to secure great strength in the
construction of them; and, though the ships of the ancients were very
small and imperfect compared with the men-of-war of the present day,
still it is surprising that the Romans could succeed at all in such a
sudden and hasty attempt at building them.

They did, however, succeed. While the ships were building, officers
appointed for the purpose were training men, on shore, to the art of
rowing them. Benches, like the seats which the oarsman would occupy in
the ships, were arranged on the ground, and the intended seamen were
drilled every day in the movements and action of rowers. The result
was, that in a few months after the building of the ships was
c