For, if you will, we are to consider not why the dug-out became in time an ocean carrier, but rather how men managed to build, launch, equip, and fit out different craft in all ages. We shall see the vessels on the shipyards rising higher and higher as they approach completion, until the day comes for them to be sent down into the water. We shall see royalty visiting the yards and the anxious look on the shipwright’s face lest the launching should prove a failure, lest all his carefully wrought plans should after months of work prove of naught. We shall see the ships, at last afloat, having their masts stepped and their rigging set-up, their inventory completed, and then finally, we shall watch them for the first time spread sail, bid farewell to the harbour, and set forth on their long voyages to wage war or to discover, to open up trade routes or to fight a Crusade. And then, when once they have cleared from the shelter of the haven we are free to watch not merely the ship, but the ways of ship and men. We are anxious to note carefully how they handled these various craft in the centuries of history; how they steered them, how they furled and set sail, how these ships behaved in a storm, how they fought the ships of other nations and pirates, how they made their landfalls with such surprising accuracy. As, for instance, seeing that the Norsemen had neither compass nor sextant, by what means were they able in their open ships to sail across the Atlantic and make America? In short, we shall apply ourselves to watching the evolution of seamanship, navigation, and naval strategy down the ages of time. [Illustration: Frigate. A 74-Gun Ship. Portsmouth Pilot Cutter SPITHEAD IN THE EARLY NINETEENTH CENTURY.] But we shall not stop at that; for we want to obtain an intimate picture of the life lived on board these many ships. We would, so to speak, walk their decks, fraternise with the officers and men, adventure into their cabins, go aloft with them, join their mess, keep sea and watch in their company in fine sunny days and the dark stormy nights of winter. We are minded to watch them prepare for battle, and even accompany them into the fight, noting the activities, the perils, and the hardships of the seamen, the clever tactics, the moves and counter-moves, the customs of the sea and of the ship especially. Over boundless, deep-furrowed oceans not sighting land for weeks; or in short coasting voyages hurrying from headland to headland before impending tempest; or pursued by an all-conquering enemy, we shall follow these ships and men in order to be able to live their lives again, to realise something of the fears and hopes, the disappointments, and the glories of the seaman’s career in the past.