Our knowledge of the early maritime routes to the far East is almost exclusively confined to what has been already stated with reference to those between Europe and Arabia and the western shores of Hindustan. Beyond those shores, all that is certain is, that vessels from China, from Bengal, and from other parts of the East, traded with Ceylon, and that some of the products of China found their way by circuitous routes, probably after passing through many hands, to the great central mart of Alexandria; nor, indeed, is there any greater certainty or knowledge about the character of the early Indian vessels, for, like the Egyptians, the Indians were not, and are not, as a nation, a seafaring people. Those Indians who followed seafaring pursuits, were then, as now, of the lowest caste; hence the inference is natural that their shipping would exhibit a corresponding inferiority in construction. Pliny[253] says that their boats consisted chiefly of a large description of cane or bamboo, split down the middle, and capable of carrying three persons; and Arrian remarks that, in his time, the vessels employed on the Malabar coast were very inferior to those of most other nations. He says the small vessels, called _madara_, have their planks sewn together with coir—the inner fibre of the cocoa-nut—like some of the native vessels of Arabia. Others, he adds, were long vessels, _trappaga_ and _cotymba_ (in the native dialect),[254] used by fishermen and pilots of the port of Barygaza. But besides these, there were double canoes, which were lashed together, and were by his description not unlike, though much inferior to, those of the South Sea Islands, of which, from Captain Cook’s description, the following is an illustration (Page 131). The Chinese junk of the present day probably affords a tolerably accurate representation of the Chinese merchant vessel of two or perhaps three thousand years ago; for all that is known of China, and of the habits of its population, tends to show that they have adhered to established types with even more than Oriental tenacity.[255] In the “Asiatic Researches” (vol. vi. p. 204) is a representation of one of the oldest Chinese merchant vessels which have been preserved: it exhibits a model almost as perfect as any of their vessels of our own time. [Illustration] [Illustration: SMALL JUNK. PARO.] [Sidenote: A comparison of the Chinese boats with those of the ancient Britons.]