But the other disciples came in the little boat. Either what was first described as τὸ πλοῖον is now more minutely described as πλοιάριον, "the (same) little boat," or else they had transferred themselves from the more cumbrous fishing-smack to the smaller craft which was tethered to the larger one.
The reason why the other disciples came in the boat is given in the parenthesis: (for they were not far from the land, but as it were two hundred cubits off); i.e. about three hundred feet, half a stadium, a hundred yards.
ἀπὸ to denote distance from, is used in this Gospel (see note, John 11:18) and the Revelation (Revelation 14:20). The disciples came in the boat over this distance, dragging the net (full) of fishes.
The net was not broken, though filled. They did not further attempt to lift it; they hauled it to the shore as it was. Strauss, who tries to show that we have a glorifying myth framed out of an amalgam of the narratives of the first miraculous draught and that of Peter walking on the water, is singularly unfortunate; for there is less of the supernatural in the story than in either of the two narratives to which he refers.