I have since frequently remarked, that our oars created more wonder, or alarm, among the various tribes who first learnt through us the existence of their white brethren, than almost any other instrument of which they could at all understand the use; perhaps, as they propel their frail rafts with a spear, they jumped to the conclusion, that our oars were also immense spears,

"The barge she sat in, like a burnish'd throne, Burn'd on the water; the poop was beaten gold; Purple the sails, and so perfumed that The winds were love-sick with them: the oars were silver, Which to the tune of flutes kept stroke, and made The water, which they beat, to follow faster, As amorous of their strokes.

"I was a man condemned of his fellows, and the oar had been my pride, from childhood to that hour.

When the oars are apeak, they are drawn in a little way, so that the handle of each oar may be passed under a sort of cleat or ledge, which runs along on the inside of the boat near the upper edge of it.

The tide was near the full, and so we went slipping down the dark water by the starlight; and as we saw them shining above us, and then looked down and saw them sparkling up from below,the stars,it really seemed as if Dan's oars must be two long wings, as if we swam on them through a motionless air.

Four oars against two were fearful odds; and it was plainly apparent the yawl must be overtaken.

Hows'ever, my own bein' wringin' wet, an' the sun pretty strong just then, I slipped it off an' hitched it atop o' the oar to dry an' be a flag at the same time, till I could rig up some kind o' streamer, out o' the seaweed.

The oar which it bears is an emblem of thy skill; and among thy associates it will be a mark of the Republic's favor and impartiality, and of thy merit.

An oar is almost as good a club as the lower joint of a fishing-rod, and that was exactly the thought in Dab's mind.