_ 50 _ the nails used are small, but they serve well enough. The galleys are very slender, their holds have little depth and they can withstand very little artillery. Their prows are very plain. Item: Outside the shipyard in front of the fortress there is a beached galley with twenty benches. It is newly repaired and is one of those brought by Pir Beque. Next to it there is a galliot with seventeen benches and a brig with fifteen benches, which were built a year and a half ago. They are now being repaired because they have rotted a great deal. On the river, upstream from the pontoon bridge, there is another galliot and another brig in the same state which are used only when necessary. There are also four small copra boats which fire a small metal cannon from their prows. These four boats are used continuously to go to Al Quarna and Medina to send aid and carry messages to the Gizares, because they are very easy to manoeuvre. Item: Thus the whole armada consists of eight ships, with as previously mentioned from sixteen to twenty two benches, two brigs with eleven benches and the above four small boats which together come to fourteen vessels. Item: They have no more because the fustas which they took from the Arabs in Cairo and another which they took
RkJQdWJsaXNoZXIy OTg0NzAy