In its leading features, a French galley, constructed somewhere about the close of the seventeenth century, would appear to have resembled those of Venice and of Rome of a similar class. She is described as having been one hundred and fifty feet long and _fifty feet broad_; but there is evidently a mistake in the description of her width, as there is no record of any war galley, either ancient or modern, where the length was only three times the breadth of beam. They were invariably from five to ten times longer than they were wide. All writers on the ships of the ancients or of the middle ages are agreed upon this point; nor is there any account of a vessel propelled by oars of our own times, which is not at least six times longer than she is wide; therefore, it is safe to assume that the French galley of one hundred and fifty feet in length did not much exceed thirty feet in width. In other respects, with the exception of the length of oars, the description of this single-banked galley is evidently quite reliable. The author says, that she “consists but of one deck, which covers the hold; this hold is in the middle nine feet, but at the sides of the galley only six feet high. By this we may see that the deck rises about a foot in the middle, and slopes towards the edges to let the water more easily run off; for when a galley is loaded, it seems to swim under water, at least the sea constantly washes the deck. The sea would then necessarily enter the hold by the apertures where the masts are placed, were it not prevented by what is called the _coursier_. This is a long case of boards fixed on the middle or highest part of the deck, and running from one end of the galley to the other. There is also a hatchway into the hold as high as the _coursier_. From this superficial description, perhaps, it may be imagined that the slaves and the rest of the crew have their feet always in the water; but the case is otherwise; to each bench there is a board raised a foot from the deck, which serves as a footstool to the rowers, under which the water passes. For the soldiers and marines there is, running on each side along the gunwale of the vessel, what is called a _bande_, which is a bench about the same height with the _coursier_, and two feet broad. They never lie here, but each leans on his own particular bundle of clothes in a very incommodious posture. The officers themselves are not better accommodated, for the chambers in the hold are designed only to hold the provisions and naval stores of the galley.”