Page:History of merchant shipping and ancient commerce (Volume 1).djvu/539

 MALTESE GALLEYS.

Besides the galleys we have named, the Venetians had others, which were about one hundred and thirty-five feet long, carrying three sails, very rapid in their movements, and so easily manœuvred, that they were kept almost exclusively for warlike purposes. A third description of galleys, carrying four sails, known by the name of the Mossane, were chiefly employed in the commerce of the Levant. Beyond these, the whole of the Italian republics owned a description of ship called coccas, or cocches, of very large capacity, which were also frequently employed in the trade of the Levant. The accompanying drawing of two modern Maltese galleys, running side by side, which exhibits a great resemblance to another plate given by M. Jal from a drawing by an artist of the end of the fourteenth century, no doubt fairly represents the Venetian war galley of that period, and is at the same time not unlike