The land-sailing war galley and the performance of the Arsenal corps

 

39a

 

38b

In (38b) the sultan appears seated in the observation tower in the upper right corner. He is accompanied by two pages as he watches the proceedings below. The grand vizier is seated alone in his own tent set up outside the imperial pavilion just left of center. Four sackers in the lower left corner seem to be engaged in some sort of fracas. Figures are scattered here and there inside the pavilion and out. Some are watching the show in the left panel; others are not. A couple seem to be commenting on it. In (39a) the artist depicts the war-galley that was fashioned by the workers of the Arsenal:

In truth, the Arsenal workers had demonstrated their ingenious skill for they had concealed within the ship an arrangement of mechanisms to move its weight without anyone towing it and without need for the help of even a single man who was not on the ship. The crewmen moved the oars with their hands while skillfully employing their feet. Whichever direction the captain turned the tiller towards, the ship moved accordingly. Proceeding now under sail, now under oar, the ship advanced effortlessly without regard for up and down or for near and far, exactly as if it were at sea. Beholding this, the cerebral caiques of those who were sitting along the shore of the sea of humanity that was the festival-ground and were immersed in watching the ship apparently floating over the sea, were caught up in a whirlpool of amazement.

Members of the Arsenal corps carrying flintlocks and sporting a motley assortment of headgear march along either side of the ship as it proceeds apparently under its own power.

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