“GALLEY SLAVE…
...The only freedom these poor wretches (whose condition is, past all power of description, horrible) are permitted, is to give vent to their agony in a kind of wild chorus expressive of their suffering, which they endeavour to time to the click of their oars in the row-lock, or the dip of their sweeps as they fall into the flashing brine. The galley slave is now only to be found in the Neapolitan, Sardinian, and Venetian states of southern Europe, those of France being now closely allied to the convicts of the English hulks. It was in Genoa and Naples that this frightful state of suffering and degradation, till lately, existed in its most revolting form.”
[The Dictionary of Useful Knowledge, Vol. III. G-N, Philp, 1861]
Robert Kemp Philp (1819 - 1882)