(    196    )
 

CHAPTER  XVIII,

VAEIOUS NOTES ON THEIR COUNTRY, THEIR RIVERS, AND
THEIR OCEAN, ITINERARIES OF THE DISTANCES BE¬
TWEEN THEIR SEVERAL KINGDOMS, AND BETWEEN
THE  BOUNDARIES   OF  THEIR   COUNTRY.

The inhabit- The   reader  is  to  imagine  the  inhabitable world, n

able world         ,           ,                  ...                            tip

and the       oLKovjxevr], as lying IU the northern half of the earth,
 

ocean.
 

and more accurately in one-half of this half—i.e. in
one of the quarters of the earth. It is surrounded by
a sea, which both in west and east is called the compre¬
hending one; the Greeks call its western part near their
country w/<eavos. This sea separates the inhabitable
world from whatever continents or inhabitable islands
there may be beyond it, both towards west and east; for
it is not navigable on account of the darkness of the
air and the thickness of the water, because there is
no more any road to be traced, and because the risk
is enormous, whilst the profit is nothing. Therefore
people of olden times have fixed marks both on the sea
and its shores which are intended to deter from enter¬
ing it.

The inhabitable world does not reach the north on
account of the cold, except in certain places where it
penetrates into the north in the shape, as it were, of
tongues and bays. In the south it reaches as far as
the coast of the ocean, which in west and east is con¬
nected with the comprehending ocean. This southern
ocean is navigable. It does not form the utmost
southern limit of the inhabitable world.    On the con-