Passing now to the two coins of Sidon, these are both probably of about the year 450 B.C. Fig. 9 is from a coin in the British Museum. It is a little indistinct, but the Egyptian stern is still seen, though the ram, as already referred to, is at the bows. The double steering oars are faintly visible, though the long line of shields, which survived well into the middle ages, is clearly defined. The curve of the keel-line is very beautiful, and she must have been very fast, as indeed we know from historians similar shaped vessels in Greece were. Although such a ship was of great length, yet by reason of the curve of the keel, having the greatest depth amidships, and because of the design of the stern, she would probably steer pretty easily. This, of course, was essential in the naval manœuvres that were undertaken in fights. As to the sails, if the reader has already followed us in the previous chapter, these call for but little explanation again. The yard is ordinarily kept fixed. The sails hang apparently in two sections like so many curtains, being divided at the mast. The same peculiarity is to be seen in the Irrawadi junks referred to previously. For shortening sail in a blow, or for stowing when coming to anchor, the six brails seen depending from the yard would be wound round the sail, once or twice, by sending a couple of men to the top of the yard, the crew below throwing up the rope to be passed round sail and yard. It was a clumsy method, but it sufficed. The reader may remember that the Dutchmen have used this principle since the sixteenth century, and the Thames barge of to-day still follows the general idea. The only real difference is that in the Dutchman and Thames barge, being fore-and-aft rigged, the brail comes horizontally—at right angles to the mast—instead of vertically, and parallel to the mast, whilst, of course, going aloft is unnecessary. Even this Dutch brailing system was derived from that used by the lateen-sails of the Mediterranean. (See the mizzen of the _Santa Maria_, in Fig. 45.) In detail, too, there is a slight difference, for the modern ships we are mentioning have a ring, or fair-lead, for the brail to come through, one end being fastened to the sail, the standing part passing through the ring on the leach of the sail and so back to the mast.