1618, although the Genoese statutes had ordained this as early as 1330. When in 1592 the English captured the “huge carak” called the _Madre de Dios_ belonging to Portugal, there were found stowed in her capacious channels about 200 tons of goods. This will give some idea of the extent to which these channels grew in size. Hakluyt contains a long and detailed account of the capture and dimensions of this carack, which was the largest the English seamen had yet encountered. She was 1600 tons, having between 600 and 700 souls aboard, besides her rich cargo of jewels and spices and silks and other goods. She was eventually brought into Dartmouth, and is said never again to have left the harbour. When surveyed, Hakluyt says that she measured from beak-head to the stern, 165 feet, extreme beam, 46 feet 10 inches. Her draught when laden had been 31 feet, which, being about the draught of one of the largest modern liners, would seem exaggerated did not the account definitely state that the survey was exactly made by “one M. Robert Adams, a man in his faculty of excellent skill.” When, after being lightened, she was taken into Dartmouth, she drew only 26 feet, which is still enormous. Her decks at the stern comprised a main orlop and three closed decks. At the bows she had a forecastle and a spar-deck “of two floors apiece.” The length of her keel was 100 feet, of the mainmast 121 feet, while the circuit at the partners was 10 feet 7 inches, the main yard being 106 feet long. The following year another enormous carack was fired and sunk by the English. Her name was _Las Cinque Llagas_ (“The Five Wounds”), and she is said by some to have been bigger even than the _Madre de Dios_. [Illustration: FIG. 57. MEDITERRANEAN GALLEY.]