[1682]. See on vanes, flags, &c., Beckmann, History of Inventions, iv. 161. As many of our sailors carry about their persons a child’s caul as an amulet to protect them against the dangers of the ocean, so the mariners of Greece attributed a sort of miraculous power to the skins of the seal and the hyæna, which they bound around the summits of their masts as a safeguard against lightning and thunderbolts. Plut. Sympos, iv. 2. 1.
[1683]. Athen. v. 40.
[1684]. By what ceremonies a ship-launch was accompanied in antiquity, I have nowhere discovered. Those which take place on the occasion in modern Greece are extremely pleasing, and may, perhaps, have had a classical origin. A crown of flowers “is suspended from the prow of a vessel when it is first launched, and the ‘καρόβακηρι,’ or master of the ship, raises the jar of wine to his lips as he stands upon the deck, and then pours it on the ground. Surely, nothing can be more beautifully classical; and it were to be wished that we could trace some part of a ceremony that takes place with us upon the same occasion to this source, and not consider it as an imitation of one of the most sacred rites of our religion.” Douglas, p. 65.
[1685]. Cf. Schol. Aristoph. Eq. 432.
[1686]. Cf. Artemid. Oneirocrit. ii. 23, p. 110, with the amusing conjectures of Goguet, &c., on the origin of anchors, Origine des Loix, ii. 221. Pausanias attributes the invention of the anchor to Midas, i. 4. 5. Schol. Aristoph. Eq. 753. If we may trust to the testimony of Lucian, a small boat-anchor could be bought for five drachmas. Dialog. Mortuorum, iv. 1.
[1687]. The great attention paid to navigation by the Egyptians, under the government of the Ptolemies, may be inferred from the fact, that they possessed at one time upwards of four thousand ships of all sizes. Athen. v. 36.
[1688]. Theoph. Hist. Plant. v. 6. 5. Plat. de Legg. iv. t. vii. 333.
[1689]. Cf. Artemid. Oneirocrit. ii. 25, p. 113.
[1690]. Theoph. Hist. Plant. v. 7. 5.
[1691]. Id. iv. 5. 5. v. 6. 5. There were cedars on Mount Lebanon eighteen feet in circumference, v. 8. 1.