Now we know with certainty that amongst primitive tribes the earliest forms of boats are the log canoe and the coracle. The origin of the former is no doubt simply the fallen tree floating down stream which the savage sees and adapts to his own use. He would easily find out the way of making a kind of inflated wineskin of a hide and using it to help him across a river. From that it is an easy step to attaching such inflated skins to a log canoe or log raft to give greater buoyancy; and this method is one which is still in use in some parts of Central Asia. From the closed inflated oxhide to the coracle is not a very long step; the idea being, of course, to construct out of a buoyant hide a vessel of greater convenience for transport a man might balance himself on a floating hide and so cross a stream, but it would be very difficult to carry goods in such a manner. So a combination of basket and hide was at last hit upon. A framework of wicker was constructed, no doubt round in the first instance, as are the modern Persian coracles, and this was then covered with a hide, the completed vessel being propelled by a branch of a tree which in time developed into a rude paddle.

When the wandering Celtic tribes were thus faced by the problem of crossing a heaving sea to far-off islands that were for the most part enshrouded in mists, they had the choice of the raft or canoe made of logs, or the wickerboat; it is easy to see that some form of the latter must have been decided upon. For the logs being heavy and rigid would be partly submerged by each roll of a heavy sea, whereas the coracle would dance on the crest of the waves. And by modifying the shape of the coracle from that of a round basket to a lengthened form with raised ends, some protection against flooding when the vessel pitched would be gained. If, further, stout timber were used for the framework instead of wicker, and the whole

covered with leather, they would have a stronger yet light-floating transport vessel. The log canoe, on the other hand, was difficult to modify on account of its length and want of breadth. We have a modern example of this in the Travels of Struys (1684), who says of the Cossack canoe: "These boats, which are no more than trunks of trees hollowed, they are fain to drag and trail a day's journey overland before they find the Volga, at the nearest distance these rivers (Don and Volga) lie to each other, and here when they are come they tie heavy balks on each side to keep them above water, and to give them a due balance and poise in their floating.'

As we should expect, these log boats are mainly to be found now in countries where navigation is restricted to the crossing of rivers. Even as near to us as Scandinavia the log ferry still survives in the eka or ekastock (the oakie or oaklog), which are used on the Orkdal river in Norway, and on the inland waters of Wärend in Sweden.

We have no records of British shipping before the Roman period of our history, but at that point we are able to lay hold on certain facts. Pliny the naturalist, who wrote about the Christian era, states that the Britons sailed to the island of Mictis, six days' sail away, in wicker vessels done round with oxhides. A fuller description is given by Caesar, in his account of his first Spanish campaign during the civil war. In order to cross the river Sicoris he ordered the soldiers, he says, to make boats of the build that British usage had taught him in former years. First the keel and the ribs were made of light timber; the rest of the body of the boat was woven together of osiers and covered by hides. And the poet Lucan in his Pharsalia tells us that "first the white willow is woven together into a little craft by soaked osiers, and then, clothed in the hide of a felled young bullock, it swims out on the swollen river obedient to the

passenger. Thus sails the Briton over the broad ocean." With the spread of Roman power and the later restrictions of British tribes to remote parts of these islands, the use of such skin-covered boats naturally gave way before that of the more highly developed vessels of the peoples who conquered the country. But it is curious that just in these remote districts the coracle still survives, and may be seen to this day on certain rivers of Wales and its borders. It is a broad, short framework of interlaced woodwork, covered generally with canvas, leather, or oilcloth. Unlike the old British coracle, it has a central seat, and a strap by means of which it can be carried on a man's back. In Ireland the term curragh or curach is applied to the developed form of the coracle, which is used on the main sea as well as on rivers.

From an early period the inhabitants of Britain were familiar with the sight of large foreign vessels, as we know from the recorded visits of Phoenicians, Greeks, and later of the Romans. But also, and near home, there was an advanced people called the Veneti, who dwelt on the French coast of Brittany in the region now still bearing the Celtic name of Morbihan or Little Sea. Of these people Caesar gives an interesting description in his Gallic War. Of their towns he says: "They are placed at the outermost edge of tongues of land and nesses, and neither was there access to them on foot when the flood tide had arisen, nor by ships, since with the tide ebbing they might come to grief on the shallows." Of their seapower and ships he says: "This state exercises by far the most extensive influence of any, throughout the whole seaboard of these regions, both because the Veneti have a large number of ships in which they are in the habit of sailing to Britain, and because they excel all the rest in matters nautical; and because, in consequence of the great violence of the vast and open sea with harbours