Page:History of merchant shipping and ancient commerce (Volume 1).djvu/592

 swore by the "very eyes of God." The Church of Rome reproved in the strongest terms the sailor's oath, alleging that, under an apparently simple expression, it covered one decidedly sinful. In the opinion of the Holy Father, bread, wine, and salt were the bases of their daily food; they were also the sacramental elements; they were the symbols of life itself here and hereafter; to swear, therefore, by bread, wine, and salt, was to commit indirectly, in their judgment, an act of horrible atrocity. Accordingly, by a decree of 1543, the most severe penalties are inflicted upon this most "damnable custom;" and these are renewed in a later decree of 1582.

Sailors have ever been a cosmopolitan race. As citizens of the world, they have had almost a common language as well as a common religion. The song which they still sing in lifting the anchor or in hoisting the sails, of "Ye-ho, cheerily, men!" or some such words, for we have never seen them in print, is the song, or at least the same tune sung a thousand years ago by the Venetian sailors, and resembling, we dare say, that lively and invigorating air re-*echoed along the shores of Syria from the ships of the ancient Phœnicians as they manned their oars or spread their sails for sea.

Their superstitions were universal. These may have varied in name and form, but from a very early period even until now sailors have considered Friday to be an unlucky day, and one on which no vessel