[989] De Militia Navali Veterum. Upsaliæ, 1654, 4to, lib. ii. cap. 5.
[990] In Stephens’s Thesaurus he says, “Usus ancoralibus navium; int. sustinendis, et minuendo pondere ancorarum.”
[991] Pausanias, viii. 12, p. 623, where he speaks of the different kinds of oak in Arcadia. When any one had the misfortune to fall into the sea, the cork affixed to the anchor, ancoralia, was thrown overboard, in order that the person in danger might catch hold of it. This we learn from the account of Lucian (Epist. i. 1, p. 7), when two men, one of whom had fallen into the sea and another who jumped after him to afford him assistance, were both saved by these means.
[992] And to conceal contraband goods in them, of which I have seen instances during my travels.
[993] Xenophon De Tuenda Re Famil. and Clemens Alexand. lib. iii. Pæda.
[994] Plutarchus in Vita Camilli.
[995] De Re Rustica, cap. 120.
[996] Lib. iii. od. 8, 10.
[997] Before cork came to be used for this purpose pitching was more necessary, and therefore mention of pitch occurs so often in the Roman writers on agriculture. When the farmer, says Virgil (Georg. i. 275), has brought his productions to the city, he carries back articles of every kind, such, for example, as pitch. On such occasions our poets would have mentioned articles entirely different. Strabo (lib. v. p. 334) also extols Italy, because together with wine it had a sufficiency of pitch, so that the price of wine was not rendered dearer.
[998] As proofs of this may everywhere be found, it is hardly worth while to quote them. Columella, xii. 12, teaches the manner of preparing cement for stopping up wine-casks. The earthen wine-jars found at Pompeii appear to have had oil poured over them, and to have had no other care bestowed upon them. In Italy, even at present, large flasks have no stoppers, but are filled up with oil.