Page:The American encyclopedia of history, biography and travel (IA americanencyclop00blak).pdf/770




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were. The smallest were not probably decked. As for the larger ones, they doubtless had a deck like the galleys; and beneath this deck a hold, apportioned according to their wants, to rooms, magazines and stables for their horses. The Scandinavian vessels had only one mast, with a vane and four or five shrouds. The sail was square, attached to a yard, furnished with sheets at its lower angles, and managed by two braces that belayed aft. The yard had a halyard passing through a block at the mast head. As for the rudder, it consisted of two blades, large, crutchhandled oars, near the stern, on the right, and also left of the vessel. The anchors of the Normans were like oars, but they did not have that cross-bar of wood we call the stock. In the twelfth century we see the galleys, accord-*