tion can be taken is the very slight
character of the connection between the top sides and the body of the
boat, and even this defect was probably not very serious when we take
into account the lightness of the loading, and the fact that it probably
consisted chiefly of live cargo, so that there was little dead weight to
cause serious straining.

Vessels of the type of the Viking ships were built in Denmark at a very
early date. In 1865 three boats were discovered buried in a peat bog in
Jutland. Danish antiquaries consider that they were built about the
fifth century of our era. The largest is 70 ft. in length and of such an
excellent type that boats of somewhat similar form and construction are
in universal use to this day all round the coasts of Norway. Such an
instance of persistency in type is without parallel in the history of
shipbuilding, and is a wonderful proof of the skill of the Norsemen in
designing and building vessels. The boat in question is clinker-built,
the planks having the same peculiarities as those of the Viking ship
just described. It is of the same shape at both ends, and has great
sheer at both stem and stern. The rowlocks, of which there are thirty,
prove that the vessel was intended to be rowed in either direction. This
also is a peculiarity of the modern Norwegian rowboat. The steering was
effected by means of a large oar, or paddle. There is no trace of a
mast, nor of any fitting to receive one; nor was the vessel decked. The
internal framing was admirably contrived. In fact, it would be
difficult, even at the present time, to find a vessel in which lightness
and strength were better combined than in this fifteen-hundred-year-old
specimen of the shipbuilder's art.

CHAPTER IV.

MEDIAEVAL SHIPS.

In the times of the Norman kings of England both the war and the
mercantile navies of the country were highly developed. William the
Conqueror invaded this island without the assistance of a war navy. He
trusted to good luck to transport his army across the Channel in an
unprotected fleet of small vessels which were built for this purpose,
and which were burnt by his order when the landing had been effected. We
possess illustrations of these transport vessels from a contemporary
source--the Bayeux tapestry, which was, according to tradition, the work
of Queen Matilda, the Conqueror's consort. Fig. 27 represents one of
these vessels. It is obviously of Scandinavian type, resembling in som