Under the bowsprit was another small sail, the sprit-sail, which re- 

 mained in use for several centuries on all boats of any importance. 



One hardly worried at all, on the boats of this epoch, about where the 

 crew would sleep. There was only one cabin near the stern for the cap- 

 tain. Everyone outside of him who lived on board slept on the deck, on his 

 own personal bedding in the shelter of the rear house, from which all were 

 excluded in order to always be ready to jump up for manouevers. 



Under the decks were arranged the hold for cod, the bins for sails and 

 supplies, and the storerooms. 



Because of their seaworthiness and their speed, the caravels enjoyed 

 the first advantage of being nearly the only boats of the period which were 

 capable of making their way, in spite of contrary winds, to their objective. 

 They held, in fact, the advantage, even taking account of leeway, of sailing 

 six points to the wind (67-1/2°), which gave them an excellent advantage in 

 tacking. 



During the 16th century, appeared vessels with better square rigging 

 and with two or three masts. The caravels disappeared in the succeeding 

 centuries. 



On board the first vessels of the great fishery, besides his prerogatives 

 of general authority, the captain was the fishing master. As on all boats of 

 the period, it was the pilot, a specialist in navigational problems, who under- 

 took the responsibility of getting the boat to its destination, of determining 

 its daily position and of fixing, in consequence, the routes to follow in the 

 course of crossing. 



At the beginning of the 16th century, most of the pilots knew how to de- 

 termine latitude by the height of the pole star above the horizon, or by the 

 meridional height of the sun. But the instruments which they used then, the 

 astrolabe or arbalete , also called Jacob's rod, gave very imprecise angular 

 measurements of the astronomical observation of latitude which was accepted 

 as the basic element for daily navigation. Also the navigators had no means 

 of determining longitude at sea and, practically, means for this was not pos- 

 sessed before the 19th century. 



Navigation was done by "estimation", the pilot determining position and 

 course by basing it on compass readings and on speed, the latter having to 

 be guessed since the ship's log was not yet in existence. 



16 



