Read the following account of Marco Polo and answer the questions that follow: These ships [playing is Arabian Sea] are wretched affairs, and many of them get lost; for they have no iron fastenings, and are only stitched together with twine made from the husk of the Indian nut. They beat this husk until it becomes like horse-hair, and from that they spin twine, and with this stitch the planks of the ships together. It keeps well, and is not corroded with the sea-water, but it will not stand well in a storm. The ships are not pitched, but are rubbed with fish-oil. They have mast, sail and rudder, and have no deck, but only a cover spread over the cargo when loaded. This cover consists of hides, and on the top of these hides, they put the horses, which they take [from Hormuz] to India for sale. They have no iron to make nails of, and for this reason they use only wooden tree-nails in their ship-building, and then stitch the planks with twine as I have told you. Hence it is a perilous business to go on a voyage in one of those ships, and many of them are lost, for in the Sea of India the storms are often terrible63. In the Indian ships, in joining planks, which of the following techniques was used?

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