This is an exceedingly easy mode of attempting to solve an intricate question; but Mr. Howell, instead of overcoming the difficulty, only increases it when he says that there must have been six men to an oar, for six men would be less easily placed at each of the lower tiers of oars than five. Nor does he aid in the solution of this vexed problem when he comes to deal with vessels of five banks. Practically his arguments are the same, and show the mistakes which learned men are liable to make when dealing with questions requiring experience as well as learning. “Polybius,” remarks Mr. Howell, “informs us the crew of a quinquereme was three hundred rowers, and one hundred and twenty fighting men. Now a quinquereme,” he reasons, “having five banks, thus— [Illustration] pulled fifty oars, or twenty-five aside, the same number as the modern galley. As by this arrangement, adding to the banks of the galley,” he continues, “did not add to her height, and not in any great degree to her length, seven feet being sufficient for a bank, I think the addition of one man to an oar was all she could require. Six times five is thirty, and ten times thirty, three hundred. Both of these,” he concludes, by saying with evident self-satisfaction, “are remarkable coincidences, and tally better with the description of ancient authors than any solution that has yet been given.” “I shall now,” he continues, “show how remarkably it agrees with Athenæus; thus taking in the whole range and applying to all, a thing it could never do were it not near the truth. The tesseracontoros having,” he adds, “forty banks, five oars to a bench, makes her have two hundred oars of a side, or four hundred in all. Considering her size, she could not have less than ten men to an oar.” The Liburnia of Caligula, according to the testimony of Suetonius, had, he states, that number of men to an oar, forgetting that she was a single-banked galley, and consequently he concludes that that number was attached to each of the four hundred oars in Philopator’s ship, which “gives four thousand, the number mentioned by Athenæus.” Here again he overlooks the impracticability of placing ten men at each of the lower tier of oars. [Sidenote: Our own views.] [Sidenote: Biremes.]