They used helps, undergirding the ship. — The word “helps” answers to what we should call “precautions,” or “remedial measures.” The process described, technically known as “frapping,” consisted in carrying a strong cable several times round the ship from stem to stern, so as to keep the planks from starting, and guard against the consequent leakage. The practice has always been a common one. Thucydides (i. 29) mentions the Corcyreans as having recourse to it. The Russian ships taken in the Tagus in 1808 were kept together in this manner in consequence of their age and unsound condition (Arnold, on Thuc. i. 29). We have probably an allusion to it in the lines of Horace (Od. i. 14).
“Ac sine funibus,
Vix durare carinæ,
Possint imperiosius
Æquor.”
[“And scarcely can our keels keep sound,
E’en with the ropes that gird them round,
Against the imperious wave.”]
Fearing lest they should fall into the quicksands. — Literally, the Syrtis. There were two quicksands of this name, the Greater and the Lesser, on the north coast of Africa. The former lay just to the west of Cyrene, the latter further west, and nearer Carthage. St. Luke probably speaks of the Greater. These quicksands were the terror of all Mediterranean sailors (Jos. Wars, ii. 16, § 4). A fine description of them is given by the Evangelist’s namesake, Lucan, in his Pharsalia (ix. 303-310):
“When Nature gave the world its primal form,
She left the Syrtes neither sea nor land.
There neither sinks the shore and welcomes in
The deep sea’s waters, nor the coast can hold
Its own against the waves, and none can track
Their way within the uncertain region’s bounds.
The seas are marred with shallows, and the land
Is broken by the billows, and the surge
Beats on the shore loud-sounding. Nature leaves
This spot accursed, and of use to none.”
Comp. Milton’s Paradise Lost, ii. 939:
“Quenched in a boggy Syrtes, neither sea
Nor good dry land.
The voyagers knew that the gale was bearing them in that direction, and did not dare to let the ship sail on full before the wind any longer.
Strake sail. — The English fails to give the sense of the original. Had they struck sail altogether the ship would simply have drifted in the very direction which they were anxious to avoid. Some sail was absolutely necessary to keep the ship steady. What is meant is that they “lowered the ship’s gear,” the spars and rigging, and especially, perhaps, the heavy yard and ropes which the ancient ships carried, and which would, in such a gale, make the ship top-heavy.
And so were driven. — Better, thus — i.e., in this state, undergirded and with storm-sails set. They aimed at sailing as close as possible to the wind, making for the north-west, so as to avoid the Syrtes.