The largest ships of the Vikings were ornamented with a dragon’s head at the stem, and often a dragon’s tail at the stern, whence their name _Dragons_. The dragon’s head and tail might be covered with thin sheets of gold, if its owner were a great king. Its prow and sides might also be coated with iron to aid in ramming other vessels. [Illustration: A VIKING SHIP ON A CHURCH DOOR. Norman Ironwork at Stillingfleet. ] These ships were driven along by the use of a large square sail, and also by the use of oars. Twenty or thirty rowers’ benches was the usual number allowed for, and the space between two benches was known as a ‘room.’ Each ‘room’ would hold seven or eight men; so that a thirty-seater, which would be in length about 150 feet, would have a crew of something over two hundred men. Cnut the Great had a monster ship 300 feet long, and containing sixty ‘rooms.’ The Norsemen were very fond of bright colours, and the sails of their long-ships were made of woollen material striped red, blue, green, and white. The sides were painted red, purple, and gold, and along each were ranged the warriors’ shields, alternately yellow and black. Picture to yourself what a fleet of some two or three hundred of these long-ships must have looked like when it sailed up the Humber. What terror it must have struck into the hearts of those who watched its arrival! Then picture another scene. A single ship, the home of a renowned Viking, drifting slowly down the Humber on an ebb tide, with sail set, bearing in its bosom the dead bodies of its owner and his favourite horses, and alight from stem to stern with blazing tallow, tar, and oil. This is the picture that a great English poet has painted for us in his poem called _Balder Dead_:— Soon, with a roaring, rose the mighty fire, And the pile crackled; and between the logs Sharp, quivering tongues of flame shot out, and leapt, Curling and darting, higher, until they licked The summit of the pile, the dead, the mast, And ate the shrivelling sails. But still the ship Drove on, ablaze above her hull with fire. [Illustration: THE ANCIENT SEAL OF THE CORPORATION OF HEDON. ] With the passing of centuries came more peaceful times, when the ships that passed up and down the Humber were no longer ships of war, but ships of peace. They were ships ‘that sailed from Hull ... to Bergen with English wares, and brought back cargoes of salt fish; that fetched iron from Sweden, and wine from the Rhine vineyards, and oranges and spices and foreign fruits from Bruges; and that carried out the English woollen cloths to Russia or the Baltic ports, and brought back wood, tin, potash, skins and furs.’