{"collection":"myth-cosmogony","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_75759/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_75759","id":"gutenberg_75759","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/75759","summary":null,"tags":["Category: Archaeology & Anthropology","Category: Mythology, Legends & Folklore","Category: Travel Writing","Geographical myths","Legends"],"text":"THE COASTS OF ILLUSION\n\n [Illustration]\n\n\n [Illustration: THE BOYHOOD OF RALEIGH\n\n _By_ Sir John Millais]\n\n\n\n\n THE\n COASTS OF ILLUSION\n\n A Study of Travel Tales\n\n BY\n\n CLARK B. FIRESTONE\n\n\n _With Drawings by_\n\n RUTH HAMBIDGE\n\n\n [Illustration]\n\n\n \u201c_Westward of Valhalla grows a plant called\n The mistletoe; it seemed too young to swear._\u201d\n\n --FRIGG\n\n\n HARPER & BROTHERS PUBLISHERS\n NEW YORK AND LONDON\n MCMXXIV\n\n\n\n\n THE COASTS OF ILLUSION\n\n Copyright, 1924, by Harper & Brothers\n Printed in the United States of America\n\n _First Edition_\n\n\n\n\nCONTENTS\n\n\n PAGE\n\n MARCO TALKS WITH HIS NEIGHBORS ix\n\n PREFACE xi\n\n CHAPTER\n\n I THE WORLD THAT WAS 1\n\n II THE EARTH ITSELF 5\n\n III INANIMATE NATURE 14\n\n IV THE ANIMAL KINGDOM 27\n\n V THE FABULOUS BEASTS 49\n\n VI FABLE UPON WINGS 68\n\n VII THE DRAGON 79\n\n VIII DENIZENS OF THE DEEP 89\n\n IX THE PEOPLES OF PRODIGY 103\n\n X THE SATYRS 121\n\n XI THE PYGMIES 132\n\n XII THE AMAZONS OF LEGEND 151\n\n XIII THE AMAZONS OF HISTORY 169\n\n XIV THE FOLK OF TRADITION 190\n\n XV THE HORIZON LANDS 201\n\n XVI LANDS OF LEGEND 223\n\n XVII ISLANDS OF ENCHANTMENT 251\n\n XVIII THE TERRIBLE OCEAN 262\n\n XIX THE SARGASSO SEA 274\n\n XX ATLANTIS 281\n\n XXI THE GILDED MAN 298\n\n XXII THE DREAM QUESTS OF SPAIN 312\n\n XXIII THE FABRIC OF ILLUSION 334\n\n XXIV THE TRAVEL TALES OF MANKIND 348\n\n XXV THE GAINS OF FABLE 371\n\n BIBLIOGRAPHY 379\n\n\n\n\nILLUSTRATIONS\n\n\n THE BOYHOOD OF RALEIGH. _By Sir John Millais_ _Frontispiece_\n\n FACING PAGE\n\n A VOYAGE TO THESE STRANGELY PEOPLED COUNTRIES OF\n THE WORLD\u2019S YESTERDAYS WOULD BE A VOYAGE\n ALONG THE BAYS, GULFS, AND PROMONTORIES OF THE\n HUMAN MIND IN ITS STATES OF DREAM 2\n\n CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS AT THE COURT OF FERDINAND\n THE CATHOLIC AND ISABELLA OF CASTILE. _By V. von\n Brozik_ 10\n\n ACCORDING TO TRADITION, A PUTRID STREAM FLOWS\n FROM THE ROOTS OF THE TREE AND THE VAPORS\n THEREOF KILL 24\n\n IN CALDILHE THERE GROWETH A MANNER OF FRUIT, AND\n MEN FIND WITHIN A LITTLE BEAST AS THOUGH IT\n WERE A LAMB WITHOUT WOOL 58\n\n THE FIRST PEOPLE ENGAGED IN SUCH COSMIC ADVENTURES\n AS WARFARE AGAINST STONE GIANTS 116\n\n A SATYR. _By Jacob Jordaens_ 122\n\n MEN FEARED THEM, AS EMBODYING THE LONELINESS OF\n WASTE PLACES 128\n\n THE SWARTHY MEN CALLED PYGMIES 142\n\n THUSNELDA AT THE TRIUMPHAL ENTRY OF GERMANICUS\n INTO ROME. _By C. T. von Piloty_ 172\n\n THE STEEPS OVERHEAD SEEMED FIT ABODE FOR GIANTS\n AND DWARFS AND GRIFFINS--FOR CITIES OF ENCHANTMENT 206\n\n THE ENCHANTED WOODS OF ROMANCE WITH THEIR\n GOBLIN GLOOMS AND TALKING TREES FADED FROM THE\n MINDS OF MEN 216\n\n \u201cBUILD US, O DOUL-KARNAIN,\u201d THEY BEGGED, \u201cA RAMPART\n BETWEEN US AND THEM\u201d 236\n\n IN ISLANDS MEN PLACED THEIR IDEAL STATES.... TO\n REACH FELICITY ONE MUST CROSS WATER 254\n\n ROARING FORTIES. _By F. J. Waugh_ 268\n\n THE THINGS OF THE SPIRIT ANIMATED SPAIN IN SOME OF\n THE QUESTS IT FOLLOWED BESIDE THE STILL WATERS\n OF THE LAKES OF DREAM 314\n\n THE GARGOYLES OF STONE WHICH KEPT WATCH DAY\n AND NIGHT 338\n\n\n\n\nMARCO TALKS WITH HIS NEIGHBORS\n\n\n THE TIME: 1295 A.D.\n THE PLACE: Venice, the Rialto.\n THE SPEAKER: Marco Polo.\n THE CHORUS: Citizens of Venice.\n\n\n _\u201cI fared,\u201d said Marco, \u201cas far as one may----\n From Astrakhan to the ports of Cathay,\n And sailed two years on the Pitch Dark Sea;\n And something I learned of the ways of man.\n There is a place that they call Japan,\n And Russia lies where the north winds be;\n The plain of Lop is haunted by dragons;\n Dark are the damsels and fierce the flagons\n In the Thousand Islands of Spicery.\u201d_\n\n \u201c_Far are these lands and fair is their sheen,\n But tell us, Polo, what have you seen?\u201d_\n\n _\u201cI saw,\u201d said Marco, \u201cthe pagans at masses\n And Tibetan dogs the size of asses,\n And oil from the ground, and black stones, blazing.\n I saw pink pearls from an unknown strand,\n And ten-pound peaches of China-land,\n And bales of silk that were past appraising.\n I saw the Malabar pepper farmers\n And cannibal sharks subdued by charmers,\n But the grunting ox was most amazing.\u201d_\n\n \u201c_Much have you seen where the wild capes curve,\n But tell us, Polo, whom did you serve?\u201d_\n\n _\u201cI served,\u201d said Marco, \u201cthe Khan of Khans.\n His edict runs with the caravans\n As far as the east is from the west.\n The Turk and the Hindu hold his charters,\n He sways Cathaians, Persians, and Tartars,\n Yet Kublai welcomes the stranger guest.\n His deeds are writ upon purple pages,\n A shepherd king but a sage of sages,\n And his thousand damsels are Asia\u2019s best.\u201d_\n\n \u201c_Him must a thousand matters perplex,\n But, Polo, speak yet more of the sex.\u201d_\n\n _\u201cThe men of Gobi,\u201d said Marco, \u201crequire\n Their dames to sit by the stranger\u2019s fire,\n And make his favor the tribal boast.\n Frail are the women in Pin-yang-fu,\n And delicate quin-sai wenches woo\n Ambassadors from the Pepper Coast.\n Though maids with feet as swift as the wind\n May dance, all bare, for the gods of Ind,\n The women of Persia please the most.\u201d_\n\n \u201c_Whimsical, Marco, your travel word.\n Is there aught else that you saw or heard?\u201d_\n\n _\u201cI heard,\u201d said Marco, \u201cbut do not know,\n That Tartar shamans summon the snow,\n And suns shine not for the Samoyed.\n In southern countries its fabled horn\n Means less than its tongue to the unicorn,\n Which licks its victims until they are dead.\n Here is a text for songs or sermons:\n When babes are born to the female Burmans,\n Their foolish husbands hie them to bed.\u201d_\n\n _Rose, then, a shout from a hundred lips:\n \u201cMarco, the tar of a thousand trips,\n Marco the man of a million quips,\n Marco, Marco, Milioni!\u201d\n And they who would hold the East in fee,\n Men of the pitiful midland sea,\n Nobles and commons, laughed shamelessly.\n \u201cWhich the catcher, and who the coney?\n What I have seen is truly averred,\n But what I have heard is--what I have heard!\u201d\n Thus to himself, with a secret mirth,\n The only man who had seen the earth._\n\n\n\n\nPREFACE\n\n\nThe book gives a view of the earth and its inhabitants as seen through\nthe haze of distance, whether of space or of time. Its purpose is to\npresent those myths and half-myths of geography which are loosely and\nyet significantly called travel tales. It treats of various countries\nand races and animals which are, or were, or might have been. Although\ntheir true domain is the imagination, their supposed domain is, or was,\nsomewhere on the earth. The Coasts of Illusion, as glimpsed here, are\nnowhere the shores of the supernatural.\n\nAlways the two tend to merge and the problem has been to keep them\napart. The travel tales of the race have grown out of, or become\nentangled with, myths in which men sought to figure the creation of the\nworld, the journeys of the sun from dawn to darkness, the conflicts of\nlight with storm and night and winter, the high places of the gods and\ntheir incarnations and agents. Yet the tales are touched with reality,\nwhile the myths are unearthly.\n\nUlysses tarried among the Phacakians, and these were a cloud people;\nbut he skirted the land of the lotus-eaters, and these were a mundane\nfolk. Who were the lotus-eaters? Achilles fought with Memnon, son of\nthe Dawn, but also with Penthesilea, the Amazon queen. Who were the\nAmazons? Hercules was of the progeny of Olympian Zeus, but wandering on\nearth he passed through the land of the pygmies. Who were the pygmies?\nWhat reality lies back of the fabulous animals and Deformed Folk that\npeopled the mountains and deserts?\n\nFor thousands of years men accepted the realms and races of prodigy. It\nwas only about a century ago that these disappeared from the maps and\nnatural histories. The frontiers of ignorance had been pushed back so\nfar that the never-never countries dropped off into the sea. There was\nno longer room for the ph\u0153nix to flap its wings, the dragon to hiss and\nroar, the giants to stalk, the kangaroo-men to hop.\n\nThe countries and creatures of legend passed from the scene without\nthe parting word that every passing merits, without even a gesture of\nfarewell. Is it more than a tardy courtesy to summon them back for a\nword that shall be both appraisal and remembrance?\n\nThese are the stories wanderers told in hall when the world was young;\nand in out-of-the-way places still they tell them, and men believe.\nThese are stories the lad Raleigh heard along wharves where sailors\nin outlandish garb recited the wonders of countries below the rim of\nthe sea. If one could recapture Raleigh\u2019s boyish faith, and the faith\nof ages of listeners before him, it might still be possible to behold\nthe King of Is in state beside the menacing ocean, to traverse the\nstreets of the lost Atlantis, to win to the cities of gold which Spain\ncould not find, and to repeople the waste places with their strange\ninhabitants. So might one achieve the purpose of these pages and regain\na picture of things as they were supposed to be.\n\nThis is a survey of the world through the stained glass of men\u2019s\nimaginings.\n\nC. B. F.\n\n[Illustration]\n\n\n\n\nTHE COASTS OF ILLUSION\n\n[Illustration]\n\n\n\n\nChapter I. The World That Was\n\n\nThe geography, anthropology, and natural history of this volume present\na world a little different from that which is outlined in modern\ntext-books and yet one that is familiar. It is the traditional world\nof wonder, which until yesterday was believed to be the real world. A\nmap of it would show the same continents, and some of the same races of\nmen and species of animals that are delineated in any atlas of to-day;\nbut there would be changes. Asia would bear far away into the unknown\nspaces of the East. A shadowy continent would stretch across the open\nwaters of the Indian Ocean. The clouds and darkness of supernatural\nterrors, or dimly remembered fates, would shroud the Atlantic, the\nGreen Sea of Gloom of the Arab geographers. Looming vaguely in the\nmists southwest of Gibraltar one would discern a lost continent. One\nwould see there, also, smaller bodies of land which on a second glance\nare seen no more.\n\nWithin the contours of continents and islands there would be countries\nwhich seem to belong both to fable and to fact. The Incense Kingdom\nwould be there on both sides of the Red Sea, but its sumptuous ritual\nand swooning odors would suggest little now to be found in southern\nArabia and Somaliland. The Spice Islands would be there, but wearing\nthe splendor of a world-desire of which no trace is left to the\nMoluccas. There would be seen the haughty realm of Prester John and the\nvast pastures of Gog and Magog; but on a modern map of Asia one does\nnot find the country of the priest king and must look under other names\nfor the terrifying races of Hebrew and Moslem legend.\n\nOn the map would appear the gold port of Ophir and the golden land of\nHavilah, but the Arab haven was silted up ages ago, and the abandoned\nmine-workings of Rhodesia minister no more to the pride of kings.\nThe Arcadia that it would picture, of pastoral innocence and bucolic\nsong, has faded from the central uplands of the Morea, and the rugged\nmountain land hears no longer the pipes of Pan. There are other regions\nof enchantment--deserts where demon-voices tempted the traveler from\nhis track, mountains where cymbals clashed and lights gleamed at night,\ncountries of serene charm which were placed so far away that few people\never reached them. Of these regions the modern maps know nothing.\n\nIf the map of the traditional world were pictorial, as such maps ought\nto be, it would show strange races of men in Asia, in Africa, in South\nAmerica, in the sea-washed islands, and in the seas themselves. There\nwould be Amazons sweeping down upon the Mediterranean settlements,\npygmies battling with cranes in Upper Egypt, satyrs pursuing women in\nAfrican woodlots, troglodytes of Arabia looking on with indifference\nwhile strangers maltreated their offspring. The vistas of Asia and\nAfrica would disclose men taking their siestas beneath the shade of\ntheir own gigantic feet, sleeping at night under the cover of their\nelephant-like ears, supporting life by smelling flowers rather than\neating food. Sixteenth-century charts of the Spanish Americas would\nreveal the unsuspected fact that these creatures dwelt also in the new\nworld, and that mermaids sang upon its coasts, as upon those of the old.\n\nA pictorial map of the traditional world would show that it was a\nmenagerie of strange animals as well as a museum of prodigious peoples.\nThe lairs and roosts of heraldry would return their tenants to its\nblank spaces. The ph\u0153nix would be seen winging its way from Araby the\nBlest, or mounting its own funeral pyre in the City of the Sun in Lower\nEgypt. The Desert of Gobi would show the griffin, a formidable guard\nfor its stores of fabled gold. The unicorn would be sketched doing the\nelephant to death in the jungles of Asia and Africa. The baleful glare\nof the basilisk would be staged in the recesses of Libya. The dragon\u2019s\nbreath would poison earth and air and water alike. The harpies and the\nStymphalian birds would raise their shrill clamor beside the brink of\nsea or marsh. Among other creatures in the ocean would be depicted the\nmonstrous orc, the kraken of the northern deeps, and the ubiquitous,\nimmemorial, and enigmatic sea serpent. The familiar animals of natural\nhistory would share with the fabled creatures the forests, pastures,\nand waters of the mimic world of the map, but the text would point out\nnovel things about them.\n\n[Illustration: _A Voyage to These Strangely Peopled Countries of\nthe World\u2019s Yesterdays Would Be a Voyage Along the Bays, Gulfs, and\nPromontories of the Human Mind in Its States of Dream_]\n\nA voyage to these strangely peopled countries of the world\u2019s yesterdays\nwould be a voyage along the bays, gulfs, and promontories of the human\nmind in its states of dream.\n\nThere are three chambers in the house of the mind. One of them is a\nplace where pleasant bedtime stories are told. Another is the art\ngallery of hope and memory. The third is a museum where runs the law of\ntopsy-turvy. The name of the house is Illusion.\n\nA glance through a few of the older books of travel will show illusion\nweaving its careless spells over plain records of wandering. \u201cWe fared\non,\u201d says Sindbad, \u201cfrom sea to sea and from island to island and city\nto city in all delight and contentment, buying and selling wherever we\ntouched, and taking our solace and our pleasure.\u201d The words prepare\nthe reader for enchantments. One of the Hakluyt narratives speaks of\n\u201cZanzibar, on the backeside of Africa.\u201d This is geography somehow\ntouched with magic. When Drake was cruising around South America,\nhis chronicler recites that on a certain day \u201cwee had a very sweet\nsmell from off the land.\u201d Simple as are the words, their quality is\ndreamlike. The account of Raleigh\u2019s third voyage to Guiana has this\npassage: \u201cThere being divers whales playing about our pinnesse, one of\nthem crossed our stemme and going under, rubbed her backe against our\nkeele.\u201d The lines unlock the frolic wonder of the sea.\n\nThe same quality illuminates reports of other lands and peoples taken\nalmost at random. The ancient Cimbri, says Strabo, explained their\nwandering life and piracy by the fact that once they had dwelt on a\npeninsula and had been driven out by a very high tide. The ancient\nGetae wept at births and laughed at funerals; and in the _Arabian\nNights_ Abdallah of the Sea broke off his friendship with Abdallah of\nthe Land, when he learned that his people mourned rather than rejoiced\nover their dead. Purchas tells of a Livonian people, ignorant but\nunashamed, that \u201caske who learne the Hares in the woods their prayers.\u201d\nThe same writer declares that Ethiopians hold their color in such\nestimation that they paint the saints and angels black, but \u201cthe Divell\nand wicked persons they paint white.\u201d Pinkerton describes a tribe of\nwhite Indians east of the Andes, whose naked and beautiful women use\na guttural speech and emphasize every remark by striking their thighs\nwith great force. The Eskimos attributed the Northern Lights to the\nmerriment of the ghosts. A Florida tribe made a cult of the devil\nbecause the Spaniards feared him.\n\nThe thing these statements have in common is that perhaps none of them\nis quite true, and yet one wishes to believe all of them.\n\nThe shaping influence in the traditional world is the power of wish.\nThe poets may seem to use it more than other men, and children more\nthan grown-ups, but it is the province of mankind.\n\n\n\n\nChapter II. The Earth Itself\n\n\nEnveloping old stories of legendary lands and peoples as with an outer\nhusk are beliefs which relate to the world as a whole. These concern\nthe shape of the earth, the texture of the heavens, the distribution of\nland and water, the contours of continents, and the precise number of\nislands, countries, and cities. What they disclose is the instinct of\nmen working through the apparent confusion of nature toward order. In\nall of them is the sense of symmetry, of balance, and because they are\nexcursions into the unknown, the method of allegory. The true symmetry\nof the universe--the great annual journey of the earth around a sun\nitself in motion in a firmament so vast that through the ages the stars\nseem not to have changed their places--was not grasped. The result was\nerrors, picturesque sometimes, sometimes more useful than truth.\n\nWherever one stands, the meeting line of the sky and earth forms a\ncircle of which one is the center. This picture shaped the primitive\ngeography. The earth was a disk and each people seemed to itself to\nbe at the central point. In Homer it was a disk surrounded by a river\ncalled the Ocean Stream. The farther shore of this river supported\nthe brazen dome of heaven, and earth and heaven were kept apart by\nthe pillars which Atlas bore on his shoulders. Thales taught that the\nearth was a sort of drum floating upright in the wilderness of waters.\nThe ancient Hebrews thought that the earth was a rising plain which\nfloated like a lotus flower in the waters. The Tibetans believed the\nearth to be cone-shaped. The Chinese thought that all other lands were\ngrouped as islands about their own. The Celts thought the earth rested\non columns and in the Irish sea-tales various islands are pictured\nas standing on pillars. In North America the plains tribes thought\nthat the Rocky Mountains supported the sky, the Pacific coast tribes\nconceived of the earth as an island swimming in the cosmic waters, and\nthe Southwestern tribes gave it as many stories as the tallest of their\npublic dwellings. The Shoshones said the vault of the sky was a dome of\nice against which the rainbow-snake rubbed its back, and the Haida said\nthat the firmament regularly rose and fell, the clouds striking the\nmountains with an audible noise. According to many Western tribes the\ncanopy of heaven was pierced with holes at the four cardinal points,\nand these were constantly opening and closing; a sky-world like the\nearth was beyond, into which swans and shamans could pass. All peoples\nbelieved that the earth was immovable, with the sun revolving around\nit. Many thought it rested on the back of some animal--a buffalo, a\ntortoise, a catfish.\n\nSometimes more sophisticated and still more fanciful ideas were\nentertained. To one school of Greek thought the world was a living\nbeing and man himself a microcosm, a little world, as Paracelsus called\nhim. The sun and moon were the two eyes of the world, the earth its\nbody, the ether its intellect, and the sky its wings. It was held that\nthe movements of man and of the world were in exact correspondence;\nhence astrology, which interprets the one by the other. To the\nVenerable Bede the universe was an egg, the earth its yolk, the water\nthe white of the egg, the air its membrane, and the encircling fire the\nshell or cover of all.\n\nCosmas took literally the utterance of St. Paul that the tabernacle was\na figure of the world. In an amazing exercise of ingenuity he found\nthe oblong design, the walls, roof, and floor, the candlesticks, the\nArk of the Covenant, and the table of shewbread of this Jewish desert\nbooth all repeated in the shape and furnishings of the universe. His\nscheme of things has been compared to a traveler\u2019s trunk, with its body\nstanding for the earth, the flat tray for the firmament, and the curved\nlid for the arch of upper heaven. The effects of day and night were\nproduced, Cosmas thought, about as they are on the stage. There was a\ntall mountain in the north. When the sun went behind it darkness fell;\nwhen the sun came out from behind it, there was light. This conception\nlacks both the intelligence and the poetry of the American Indian myth\nwhere the Sun-Carrier is pictured as hanging the sun on a peg on the\nwest wall of his lodge and then unrolling in succession the robe of\ndawn, the robe of blue sky, the robe of golden evening light and the\nrobe of darkness.\n\nThe sense of symmetry demanded that the earth should have a central\npoint, and each country sought it somewhere in its own borders. Homer\nthought that this was on Mount Olympus, where the Greek gods dwelt. The\nHindus thought that it was on Mount Meru, where their own gods dwelt.\nThe Chinese fixed it on Mount Sumeru on a circle of gold and with the\nsun and moon revolving around it; this was surrounded by the seven\nsacred mountains, the seven seas, and the four inhabited continents.\n\nChristian pilgrims said that Jerusalem was in the center of the earth,\nquoting the Psalm, \u201cFor God is my King of old, working salvation in the\nmidst of the earth.\u201d There was a spot not far from the place of Calvary\nwhich the Lord had signified and measured, and this was called Compas.\nIt was something pilgrims could see and touch. For eight centuries\nthe legend was current, and for three centuries, until nearly the\ntime of Columbus, it dominated European maps of the world, which were\nwheel-shaped, with Jerusalem at the hub.\n\nAmong the Eastern nations the sources and courses of rivers had\nsometimes a cosmic significance. They flowed from the center of the\nearth or from the Terrestrial Paradise. From the Cool Lake which was\nin the midst of Asia, to the south of the Fragrant Mountains and to\nthe north of the Snowy Mountains, flowed four great rivers, according\nto the Chinese. The Ganges issued from the eastern side of the lake\nthrough the mouth of a silver ox, and found the southeastern sea. The\nIndus issued from the southern side through the mouth of a golden\nelephant, and found the southwestern sea. The Oxus issued from the\nwestern side through the mouth of a horse of lapis lazuli, and found\nthe northwestern sea. The River of China issued from the northern side\nthrough the mouth of a crystal lion, and found the northeastern sea.\n\nIn the Genesis story a river goes out of Eden to water the garden and\ndivides into four--Pison, which compasses the golden land of Havilah;\nGihon, which compasses Ethiopia; Hiddekel, which goes toward the east\nof Assyria; and Euphrates. Josephus, the Romanized Jew, assimilated\nthe Hebrew geography with the Greek account of an Ocean Stream that\nflowed around the earth. This encircling river, he said, was the source\nof the four biblical streams. The Arabs also accepted the rivers of\nEden and showed ingenuity in tracing their courses to the distant lands\nwhere flowed the streams they had identified with them. So did John\nMarignolli, the fourteenth-century Franciscan traveler.\n\nParadise, he said, was in Ceylon, about forty miles distant from Adam\u2019s\nPeak, which he visited. On this latter peak was Adam\u2019s footprint and\nthe garden he tilled when expelled from the abode of innocence. The\nMount of Eden overtopped it, and almost always the mists brooded there,\nbut one could hear the waters falling from the sacred fount out of\nwhich the four rivers came. These flowed away from the island of Ceylon\nby channels under the ocean, the Gihon becoming the Nile, the Pison\npassing through India and China, and doubling back through the deserts\nto die in the sands and be born again as the Caspian Sea.\n\nWith the greater portion of the earth unknown, a curious custom\nobtained of using definite figures in default of definite facts.\nDicuil, the Irish scholar, said that there were 2 seas, 72 islands, 40\nmountains, 65 provinces, 281 towns, 55 rivers, and 116 peoples; he had\nread this in what he called the cosmography of Julius C\u00e6sar and Mark\nAntony. Idrisi declared that there were 27,000 islands in the Atlantic.\nMariners on the Sea of China told Marco Polo that it contained\nprecisely 7,440 islands, mostly inhabited. In the Indian Ocean, he\nsaid, there were 12,700 islands. The Koreans had an old tradition that\nthere were fourscore and four thousand several countries upon the\nearth, but themselves doubted it. The sun could not warm so many lands,\nthey thought. Their real belief was that there were but twelve kingdoms\nor countries. When the Dutch explorers named other countries to them\nthey laughed; the visitors must be talking of towns and villages.\n\nSometimes the sense of symmetry, sometimes poetic instinct and the\ndesire for graphic imagery, led men to give the habitable world the\noutlines of animate or inanimate objects. Strabo likened it to a\nchlamys, or soldier\u2019s cloak. Dionysius Afer said it was like a sling.\nThe California Indians said it was like a mat with the long way north\nand south. Massoudy likened it to a bird. The head of the bird was at\nMecca and Medina, Africa was its tail, Irak and India its right wing,\nand the land of Gog and Magog its left wing. Other writers pictured\nthe earth in the semblance of a man, with the head in the southern\nhemisphere, and the feet or under part in the northern; the right hand\nwas the east, whence began the movement of the _primum mobile_, and\nthe left the west, whither it trended. As the head was the noblest\npart, governing the rest of the body, so Ptolemy thought, the southern\nhemisphere was nobler than the other parts of the earth, and the stars\nabove it were more resplendent and of greater virtue than those of the\nnorthern.\n\nThe tides were the breath of the living earth, Solinus thought. A\nlarge man on the beach of the ocean gets up and sits down twice a\nday, said the Tahltan Indians of Canada; twice a day a colossal crab\ncomes out of and goes back to its cave at the foot of the world-tree,\nsaid the Malays; for six hours a serpent at the rim of the world\ndraws in its breath and for six hours lets it out, said the Scotch\nislanders--wherefore the tides ebb and flow. The Gauls endowed them\nwith life and attacked them with weapons.\n\nPtolemy pictured Great Britain as a Z written backward. Strabo compared\nSpain to an ox hide. Numantianus likened Italy to an oak leaf. India\nwas thought to be an exact equilateral triangle.\n\nThere were conflicting views as to the south. Although by the beginning\nof the historical period the Sab\u00e6ans and Ph\u0153nicians had gone down the\neastern coast of Africa through the Indian Ocean some twenty degrees\nbeyond the equator to seek the gold of Havilah, these ventures into\nthe zone of torrid heat were not for the Atlantic and the peoples of\nthe west. The insidious fictions of the Semitic mariners had awakened\ntheir fears. No man, they thought, could live in the lands of vertical\nsunlight. In what lay beyond these, they had as little interest as men\nhave now in the possible populations of other planets. Europeans of\nthe early Christian era put aside the notion which enlightened Greeks\nhad entertained that there might be \u201copposite peoples of the south.\u201d\nAssuming the inhuman heat of the torrid zone, it was evident that a\ntropical people could not be of the race of Adam, and heresy was in the\nthought of any other lineage.\n\nLactantius, the Christian Cicero of the third century, is remembered\nbecause he gave popular error rhetorical expression and because his\nwords were flung at Columbus twelve centuries afterward, when he\nappeared before the Council of Salamanca to justify his theory that\none might reach the east by sailing west. \u201cCan any one be so foolish,\u201d\nasked Lactantius, \u201cas to believe that there are men whose feet are\nhigher than their heads, or places where trees may be growing backward\nor rain falling upward? Where is the marvel of the hanging gardens of\nBabylon, if we are to allow of a hanging world at the Antipodes?\u201d Pliny\nhad answered him with another question two centuries before. \u201cIf any\none,\u201d he said, \u201cshould ask why those situated opposite to us do not\nfall, we directly ask in return, whether those on the opposite side do\nnot wonder that we do not fall.\u201d\n\nEven when the ancient world had accepted the theory that the earth was\na sphere, this seemed to it somehow half as long again from east to\nwest as from north to south, and the belief is preserved in the two\nterms, Longitude and Latitude. The limits of the habitable earth were\nThule, or Iceland, to the north; Taprobane, or Ceylon, to the east;\nthe Aromatic Cape, to the south, and the Sacred Promontory in Portugal\nto the west. North of Thule it was too cold, and south of the Cape of\nSpices it was too hot, to support life.\n\nAll that the ancient world knew of geography was gathered up by Ptolemy\nand systematized in a scheme which among learned men was the standard\nof belief for fourteen centuries afterward. This great Egyptian of the\nsecond century eliminated errors, corrected reckonings, and brought\nhis science abreast of facts which traders had gathered. He made,\nhowever, three great errors, each, as it proved, more useful than the\ntruth would have been. Ptolemy estimated the circumference of the earth\nas one-sixth less than the fact, although Eratosthenes had already\nreached the correct figure. Thus the true sailing distance from Spain\nwest to Asia was reduced by about 4,000 miles and the later venture of\nColumbus made to seem a task less formidable. Ptolemy also gave Asia a\nvast extension eastward, further reducing the apparent distance of a\nwestward route from Europe to the Orient.\n\n[Illustration: CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS AT THE COURT OF FERDINAND THE\nCATHOLIC AND ISABELLA OF CASTILE\n\n_By_ V. von Brozik]\n\nHis third error was to assume that another continental mass joined the\nsouthern extension of Africa with a southeastern extension of Asia,\ncompletely landlocking the Indian Ocean. This was the Terra Australis\nIncognita of the older charts. It seemed to be needed to balance the\nland masses of the northern hemisphere and satisfy the persistent\ndemand of the mind for symmetry in the arrangement of the earth. This\nvast domain has disappeared from the maps, but its name and part of its\narea are preserved in the island continent of Australia. Thus Ptolemy\nanticipated the discoveries of the Portuguese, Dutch, and English.\n\nMuch of what Ptolemy knew succeeding ages forgot. The medi\u00e6val\nconception of the world was that of a T within an O with the east at\nthe top of the circle because Paradise was there and deserved the\nhighest place, and Jerusalem as its center. The lower half of the\ncircle was divided by the Mediterranean equally between Europe and\nAfrica, while the upper half was all assigned to Asia. The \u00c6gean and\nRed seas, branching to the left and the right from the head of the\nMediterranean, divided the upper and lower halves of the circle, and\nthese three seas formed the T within the O. Around all flowed the Ocean\nStream.\n\nIntellectually, this presentation of the habitable earth belongs in\nabout the ninth century B. C. rather than the fifteenth century A. D.,\nbut the map, like the Ptolemaic geography, was a brief for discovery.\nIt cut off the south of Africa, and made it seem a short voyage around\nit to India, and thereby it encouraged efforts to open a sea route to\nthe Orient. It immensely extended Asia to the east, and thereby led\nColumbus to believe it might more easily be reached by sailing west.\nAlso, it revived the reign of fable and made a new world of wonder.\nThere were blank spaces on the map of Asia. The monkish map-makers\nfilled them in with pictures of monstrous races and animals drawn from\nthe classics, from Old Testament imagery, and from the Arab repertory.\n\nIt seemed at last that all the mistakes of geography were in conspiracy\nto unlock the unknown half of the world. The apocryphal book of Esdras\nhad said that the earth was one part water and six parts dry land. That\nthree-fourths of its surface was sea, nobody surmised. Marco Polo had\nmoved Zipangu (Japan) a thousand miles east from its real position by\ngiving its distance from the mainland of Asia as 1,500 miles instead\nof 1,500 li--a Chinese measure of about one-third of a mile. In the\nmap of Toscanelli, on which Columbus counted much, the Asiatic coast\nwas placed where California is. The Azores were supposed to lie far\nwest of their true position. Columbus did not dream that 210 degrees\nof longitude lay between Lisbon and Japan by the westward route. He\nbelieved that by sailing from the Azores for about 3,100 miles he would\nfind Zipangu, and not unknown Florida. \u201c_El mundo es poco_\u201d (\u201cthe world\nis small\u201d), he exclaimed, and steered confidently toward the setting\nsun.\n\nThese great errors made the adventures of the Genoese in the New World\na gorgeous illusion--the vestibule into a past where, as he thought,\nother feet had trodden, instead of the threshold of continents his\nfeet were first to press. To him it seemed only that he was reading\nthe book of Marco Polo backward. The gold and aromatics of which he\nfound traces were those of the Golden Chersonese and the Spice Islands\nof the East. An Indian tale of a white-robed cacique aroused his hope\nof an interview with Prester John. He dispatched a mission, including\na converted Jew who knew Hebrew, Chaldaic, and a little Arabic, to a\nchieftain of Cuba, in the hope that thus he might establish relations\nwith the princely house of Kublai Khan. Presently he would sail farther\nand, leaving the tropical islands behind him, would round the Malay\nPeninsula, cross the Bay of Bengal and the Sea of the Arabs, and make\nhis way by land from Ethiopia to Jerusalem, and by ship from Joppa back\nto Spain. It was a soaring dream, yet its wings beat feebly beneath the\npinions of the tremendous reality the man died without comprehending.\n\nColumbus added another chapter to one of the oldest beliefs--the theory\nof a world summit. Aristotle had thought that the highest part of\nthe earth was under the antarctic pole, others that it was under the\narctic pole. Columbus held that it was under the equator. The earth,\nhe thought, had the shape of a pear instead of an orange. It seemed\nto him he knew just when the globe began to swell toward heaven. This\nwas about a hundred leagues west of the Azores. There the magnetic\nneedle swung from northeast to northwest. The airs became more pure\nand genial, the sea grew tranquil. From the climate of oppressive heat\nand unwholesome air, the explorer ascended the back of the sea, as one\nascends a mountain toward heaven. The culminating point was on the\nTierra Firma of South America, which might be approached by way of the\nGulf of Paria. Thence flowed the mighty stream of the Orinoco.\n\nA Spanish historian, excusing this fancy of Columbus, remarks that\nmathematicians have since demonstrated that he was not entirely wrong.\nThe diameter of the earth is twenty-seven miles greater at the equator\nthan at the poles, and the mountain country of Ecuador, beyond the\nheadwaters of Orinoco, is the true world summit, for, of all lands, it\nlies nearest heaven.\n\n\n\n\nChapter III. Inanimate Nature\n\n\nThe progress of knowledge has been an advance from poetry to prose.\nIn part it has consisted in forgetting the things that were not so.\nThrough most of the story of mankind everything was fabulous. There\nwere no inanimate objects at the beginning. Sticks and stones had a\nsoul. This belief passed, but some quality of marvel remained--the\nrhythm of the moon repeated in things terrestrial; the loves and\nantipathies of the plants; the properties of gems to bring good fortune\nor ill, to promote fecundity, to test the continence of men and women.\nThere was an unwieldy mass of topographical legends. Every township had\nits shrine, or wonder-working well, or hill or tree that broke a law\nof nature. There were strange cures for aches and pains. Illusion was\neverywhere. The lumber rooms of history are stored with traditions in\nwhich is the faint fragrance of faded wonder.\n\nSea and sky had each their part in the drama of life. To the Celt the\nvoices of the waves carried warning, or sympathy, or prophecy. The\nninth wave was larger than those before it, and mystery was in it.\nIt was thought that no man or animal beside the Gallic sea died with\na rising tide. The sun sank into the ocean with a hissing sound, and\nthere were races on both sides of the world that heard it. The moon,\nPliny said, \u201cis not unjustly regarded as the star of our life.\u201d All\nseas were purified when it was full, the Nile waxed and waned with it,\nand sap in trees, and even men\u2019s blood, increased or diminished with\nits phases. The time of the rising of the Dog Star was a sort of zero\nhour for many things in nature and husbandry.\n\n\n_The Table of the Sun_\n\nThere was a Table of the Sun, where the earth itself presided as host.\nHerodotus was the first to describe it. He says that when Cambyses,\nthe Persian king, was in Egypt, he sent spies into Ethiopia under\nthe pretense of bearing gifts to court, but in reality to see if the\ntable were a fact. The spies came back with various stories--that the\nEthiopians drank only milk and water, that they lived to be one hundred\nand twenty years old, that the Fountain of Youth bubbled up in that\ncountry, and that they had seen the Table of the Sun. This was set\nby direction of the magistrates in a meadow in the outskirts of the\ncapital city, and the people of the land said that the earth itself\nbrought forth the food spread upon the table for all comers. For a full\ndescription one may use with advantage the idiomatic paraphrase of\nPurchas:\n\n\u201cOf the Table of the Sunne thus writeth Friar Luys de Urreta: that the\nking in a curious braverie, and sumptuous vanitie, caused there to bee\nset by night in a certain field store of white bread, and the choysest\nwines; hanged also on the Trees great varietie of Fowles, rost and\nboyled, and set on the ground, Mutton, Lambe, Veale, Beefe, with many\nother dainties ready dressed. Travellers and hungry persons which came\nhither and found this abundance, seeing no bodie which prepared, or\nwhich kept the same, ascribed it to _Jupiter Hospitalis_ his bounty\nand hospitality, shewing himselfe a Protector of poore Travellers, and\ncalled this field the _Table of the Sunne_. The report hereof passed\nthrough the world, and brought many Pilgrims from farre Countries,\nto visit the same. _Plato_ the Prince of Philosophers entred into\nAethiopia, led with desire to see this renowned _Table_ and to eate of\nthose delicacies. The Aethiopians, since their Christianity, in zealous\ndetestation of Idolatry, will not so much as name this field, and these\nancient Rites.\u201d\n\nIt has been suggested that the legend derives from the system of dumb\ntrading between civilized and savage peoples which in Africa antedates\nhistory. If this be so, the wheat was supplied by merchants rather than\nby the king, the magistrates laid down the rules for the voiceless\nmarket, and the natives, coming after the merchants had withdrawn, left\ngold in exchange for what they took away.\n\n\n_The Mountain of Lodestone_\n\nAgib, son of a sultan and by his vicissitudes become the Third Calendar\nof the _Arabian Nights_, had embarked with all the royal fleet on a\ntour of his provinces. A storm blew them out of their course, and then\nby virtue of the iron in the ships they were drawn irresistibly toward\na black mountain or mine of adamant that loomed before them. They saw\nupon it a dome of fine brass and on the dome a brazen horse, carrying\na rider who had a plate of lead on his breast, on which talismanic\ncharacters were graven. Suddenly \u201call the nails and iron in the ships\nflew toward the mountain, where they were fixed, by the violence of\nthe attraction, with a horrible noise; the ships split asunder, and\ntheir cargoes sunk into the sea,\u201d with all the men save Agib himself.\nHe gained the shore, climbed to the dome, and slept there, in his sleep\nreceiving good counsel. The next day he shot three arrows of lead from\na bow of brass at the brazen horse and its rider. They were toppled\nover, the sea rose and engulfed the mountain, and Agib was ferried off\nto fresh adventures.\n\nSome Bedouin or Persian story-teller of the bazaars may have added the\ndetail of the heaven-kissing statue and its overthrow, but the body of\nthe narrative is one of the oldest of legends. Men have always been\ncurious about the lodestone. The tale of the magnetic mountain to which\nships built with iron bolts are drawn is found in Aristotle, Pliny,\nand Ptolemy, in the Arab geographies, in Chinese writings, and in the\nreports of explorers clear to the close of the medi\u00e6val period. Ogier\nthe Dane in the Charlemagne cycle was wrecked on such a mountain and\nlike Agib was spared for sensuous delights. In a twelfth-century poem,\nwhen the ship of Duke Ernst entered the Klebermeer, it was drawn to the\nrock called Magnes and found itself among \u201cmany a work of keels,\u201d over\nwhich the masts rose like a tangled forest.\n\nPtolemy is the most definite of the early writers. \u201cThere are said to\nbe ten islands,\u201d he says, \u201cforming a continuous group called Maniolai,\nfrom which ships with iron nails are said to be unable to move away,\nand hence they are built with wooden bolts. The inhabitants are reputed\nto be cannibals.\u201d Dampier, Gemelli-Careri, and many others identify\nManiolai with Manila, and assume that the magnetic islands were the\nPhilippines; but Gerini, a sagacious editor of Ptolemy\u2019s eastern\ngeography, believes they were the Nicobars.\n\n\n_The River Sambation_\n\nRising in a pious Jewish fable, first recited in Josephus, the River\nSambation has flowed for eighteen centuries through the geography of\nlegend. It separated the lost Ten Tribes from other Jews, or from the\nsubjects of Prester John. Some said it was in Caucasia, others in\nArabia; and from as far east as China and as far west as Ethiopia it\nwas reported. Josephus placed it between Raphanea and a district of\nAgrippa\u2019s kingdom; it was called the Sabbatic river because it ran only\non Saturdays, its bed being dry the other six days of the week. Pliny\nhad it, however, that on Saturdays the stream rested. Much was heard\nof it in the Middle Ages. Eldad Hadani, a ninth-century traveler, said\nit was in the land of Cush. It had little water, but sand and stones\nrolled restlessly down its bed with a noise \u201clike the waves of the sea\nand a stormy wind\u201d; on the Sabbath their tumult was stilled and flames\nsurrounded the river so that none could pass.\n\nThe stream was in India, spice groves bordered it, and quantities of\nprecious stones went down in its billowing sand to the sea; so said\nthe letter of Prester John. It was fifty days\u2019 journey inland from\nAden, said the Jewish traveler Obadiah di Bertinoro, for thus Arab\ntraders had told him. A Jewish geographer, Abraham Farissol, also of\nthe fifteenth century, identified it with the Ganges. Abraham Yazel, a\nJewish scholar of the next century, told of a bottle filled with its\nsand, and save on the Sabbath the sand was in motion. A Christian whom\nhe quoted had seen the river in the dominions of the Grand Turk. It\nwas from one to four miles broad, with plenty of water, but dangerous\nto navigate because of the rocks and sand that rolled along with the\ncurrent: \u201cships which venture on it lose their way, and indeed no ship\nis yet known to have returned safely from this river.\u201d An Arabian in\nLisbon carried an hour-glass filled with this uneasy sand on Friday\nafternoons through a street of shops run by Jews who had professed\nChristianity. \u201cYe Jews,\u201d he exclaimed, \u201cshut up your shops, for now the\nSabbath comes.\u201d The last word from the Sambation was in 1847, when the\ngovernor of Aden told a messenger seeking aid for Jews of the Holy Land\nthat there was a great Jewish kingdom forty stages inland, but that the\nriver was not there; it was in China.\n\n\n_Magical Springs_\n\nClassic mythology peopled lakes, rivers, brooks, and springs with\nfemale divinities of a minor rank known as naiads, who were endowed\nwith prophetic power and were able to inspire those who drank of\nthese waters. The belief in the nymphs waned, but a belief in the\nsingular properties of the waters long persisted. Many stories relate\nto the mental effects thereof. If you drink of a pool in the cave of\nthe Clarian Apollo at Colophon, says Pliny, you will acquire powers\nof oracle; but you will not live long. Ctesias tells of an Indian\nfountain the waters of which, when drawn, coagulated like a cheese;\nif a little of this were triturated and the powder administered in a\npotion, anybody who drank of it would become delirious, rave all that\nday, and blab out whatever he had done. Therefore did the king use this\nwater as the modern drug, scopolamin, has been used, to detect the\nguilt of persons accused. In Ethiopia, according to Diodorus, Semiramis\ndiscovered a small lake the sweet red waters of which impelled people\nwho drank of them to confess their faults. Pliny recites that at the\ntemple of the god Trophonius in B\u0153otia near the river Hercynnus are two\nfountains, one promoting remembrance and the other forgetfulness; one\nis called Mnemosyne, the other Lethe.\n\n\n_The Fountain of the Sun_\n\nThe Fountain of the Sun was rediscovered by a modern traveler, Belzoni,\nin the oasis of Jupiter Ammon. He found that the ruins of the temple of\nJupiter Ammon served as a basement for nearly a whole village, in the\nvicinity of which was this famous fountain in a deep well. According\nto old report it was warm at midnight and cold at noon. The fact is\nits temperature does not vary between night and day, and its apparent\nchanges are due to the greater or less heat of the surrounding air, as\nthe day advances or declines.\n\n\n_The Tree of the Sun_\n\nBest known of all trees was the Tree of the Sun. This grew in Persia,\nand Maundeville says of it: \u201cWithin those Deserts were the Trees of the\nSun and of the Moon, that spoke to King Alexander and warned him of his\nDeath. And Men say that the Folk that keep those Trees, and eat of the\nFruit and of the Balm that groweth there live well four hundred Year or\nfive hundred Year, by virtue of the Fruit and of the Balm.\u201d Sir John\nsaid he would have gone toward the trees \u201cfull gladly,\u201d but because\nof the wild beasts, serpents, and dragons \u201cI trow that one hundred\nthousand Men of Arms might not pass the Deserts safely.\u201d However, Marco\nPolo passed them safely, and gives one of his terse descriptions of\nthe tree \u201ccalled the tree of the sun and by Christians _arbo secco_,\nthe dry or fruitless tree.\u201d It looked like the chestnut, but its husks\ncontained no fruit, and probably it was the Oriental plane tree. Here\nAlexander fought Darius.\n\n\n_Wonder-working Trees_\n\nCtesias has a characteristic traveler\u2019s account of the parebon, an\nIndian tree about the size of the olive, but with neither flowers nor\nfruit. It has, however, fifteen thick roots, which, like the diviner\u2019s\nrod, will attract the precious metals. If a cubit\u2019s length of root be\ntaken, says the Cnidian, \u201cit attracts lambs and birds, and with this\nroot most kinds of birds are caught.\u201d If you cast it into wine, it\nsolidifies the liquor so that it can be held in your hand like a piece\nof wax.\n\nThe ancients had much to say of the properties of other trees and\nplants. It was thought that the laurel or bay tree was never struck\nby lightning, and so the peasants of the Pyrenees hold to this day;\nthe Emperor Tiberius wore a laurel wreath during thunderstorms. The\noak, planted near the walnut, would perish. The shadow of the walnut\nwas injurious to men and productive of headache. The shadow of the elm\nwas refreshing. The olive, if so much as licked by a she-goat, became\nbarren. There was a moral feud between the vine and the cabbage, and\nbetween the vine and the radish, so that the latter was prescribed for\ndrunkenness. The virtue of the mistletoe, says Pliny, was to resist\nall poisons and make fruitful any that used it. The cocoanut and the\nbetel nut were powerful aphrodisiacs. The gum of the camphor tree bred\nimpotency. The smell of the basil begat scorpions in the brains of men.\nMoly would neutralize sorcery. There was a plant called the eriphia\nwith a hollow stem, inside of which was a beetle which kept ascending\nand descending its narrow home the while it bleated like a kid; this\nplant was beneficial to the voice.\n\nThe fable of the deadly upas, or poison tree of Macassar, Erasmus\nDarwin\u2019s \u201chydra tree of death,\u201d is modern. According to tradition, a\nputrid stream flows from the roots of the tree, which grows in Java,\nand the vapors thereof kill. Foersch, a Dutch physician who published\na book in 1783, is mainly responsible for the ill repute of this tree.\nHe declares that \u201cnot a tree nor blade of grass is to be found in the\nvalley or surrounding mountains. Not a bird or beast, reptile or living\nthing lives in the vicinity.\u201d He even asserts that \u201con one occasion\nsixteen hundred refugees encamped within fourteen miles of it, and all\nbut three hundred died within two months.\u201d Investigation has disproved\nall of this. The tree grows in a region where vegetation is luxuriant,\nmen make a garment of its fiber and walk under its branches, and there\nbirds roost. The venom known as Macassar poison with which Malays tip\ntheir arrows is, however, made from its gum.\n\nThere grows on the island of Hierro in the Canaries a remarkable tree,\nif one may credit Richard Hakluyt and others of his time. Hierro is six\nleagues in circuit and produces ample foodstuffs for its inhabitants\nand their flocks of goats, although no rain falls and no springs gush.\nThere is, however, a great stone cistern standing at the foot of a tree\nwith leaves like the olive\u2019s. Clouds hover over the tree \u201cand by means\nthereof,\u201d says Hakluyt, \u201cthe leaves of the sayd tree continually drop\nwater, very sweet, into the sayd cisterne, which cometh to the sayd\ntree from the clouds by attraction.\u201d\n\nThe rain tree of Peru is described as tall, rich in leaves, and\npossessed of \u201cthe power of collecting the dampness of the atmosphere\nand condensing it into a continuous and copious supply of rain.\u201d \u201cIn\nthe dry season,\u201d says a Spanish newspaper quoted in Walsh\u2019s _Handy Book\nof Curious Information_, \u201cwhen the rivers are low and heat great,\nthe trees\u2019 power of condensing seems at the highest and water falls\nin abundance from the leaves and oozes from the trunks. The water\nspreads around in veritable rivers. These rivers are canalized so as to\nregulate the course of the water.\u201d This singular statement closes with\nan estimate that a Peruvian rain tree will yield nine gallons of water\na day, and that 10,000 trees producing daily 385,000 liters of water\ncan be grown on a square kilometer.\n\nThe Weather Bureau at Washington examined (1905) the facts as to the\nrain tree, and declared that such a tree never existed. The American\nconsul-general at Callao reported (1911) that he could find no rain\ntrees in Peru. Then the Department of Agriculture made a statement that\nthe rain-tree legend was centuries old, but had no basis. In partial\nexplanation thereof an English botanist said that cicada-swarms,\nsettling upon trees, tap their juices, which fall on the ground.\n\nAustralia has planted many so-called rain trees.\n\nUlloa, the Spanish astronomer, brought back to Europe a related story\nin 1736. He found at Quito, he said, a species of cane from thirty-five\nto fifty feet high and half a foot thick. Until the canes reach full\nsize most of the tubes contain a quantity of water, and this rises and\nfalls and is clear or turbid, according to the phases of the moon.\n\n\n_The Mandrake Myth_\n\nLegends of the mandrake are perhaps a legacy of the ancient dark white\nrace whose gloomy imaginings and orgiastic practices survived to\ncolor the brighter religions of Greece and Rome, and emerged again in\nthe witch-burnings of the Middle Ages. These legends are widespread,\nuniformly sinister, often obscene. Their basis may be in homeopathic\nmagic--the belief that like cures like, and also may kill like; or\nit may be in the sea, where affinities with the pearl myth have been\nnoted. It is possible that the mandrake of forbidding fable is just a\nstranded cowry, the shell which has been called the first deity.\n\nThe mandrake is a member of the potato family growing in Mediterranean\ncountries. It is an emetic, a purgative, a narcotic poison. Usually its\nflesh-colored roots are forked, so that, like a transplanted carrot or\nparsnip, it resembles a miniature human figure. On this resemblance,\nand on its sleep-producing properties, men have thought that the\nlegends were based, and in China, ginseng, which also has man-like\nroots, has inherited them. The possessor of the mandrake could win good\nluck for himself, bring bad luck to others, sway the passions, and even\nin some measure command the elements.\n\nHence the popular notions that the mandrake was an aphrodisiac, that\nit relieved barrenness and promoted pregnancy, as in the triangular\nepisode in Genesis in which Jacob, Rachel, and Leah figured; it was\nknown as the love-apple, and Venus was called Mandragorotis, while\nthe Emperor Julian wrote Calixenes that he drank its juices as a love\npotion. Hence, also, the belief that it dripped blood when pulled\nfrom the earth and, as Homer says, emitted a deathly shriek fatal\nto the man who heard it; according to Josephus it was the custom\nin a certain Jewish village to use a dog to pull up the roots, the\ndog being killed by the shrieks that followed. Grimm describes this\nprocess, which consisted in Germany of loosening the soil about the\nroot, tying the root to the dog\u2019s tail, retreating to a safe distance\ndown the wind, and then decoying the dog with a piece of bread. The\ndead canine was buried on the spot with religious honors, and the root\n\u201cwashed with wine, wrapped in silk, laid in a casket, bathed every\nFriday, and clothed in a little new white smock every new moon. If thus\nconsiderately treated, it acts as a familiar spirit, and every piece of\ncoin laid by it at night doubles in the morning.\u201d\n\nThus the mandrake legend entered its medi\u00e6val phase of devil worship.\nThe root was used as a charm against nightmare, and against robbers,\nand to locate buried treasure. It was supposed to be a living creature\n\u201cengendered,\u201d as Thomas Newton says, \u201cunder the earth of the seed of\nsome dead person put to death for murder,\u201d or, as Grimm says, \u201cgrowing\nup beneath the gallows from which a thief is suspended.\u201d Heads were\ncarved on the mandrakes and these elaborated images went by the names\nof manikin and erdman, or earth-man. As much as twenty-five ducats\nin gold was paid for them. They were often carried on the person\nin bottles, and bottle imps were credited with the magic powers of\nhomunculi. But if a man died with one of these upon his person, the\ndevil owned him forthwith. Joan of Arc was charged with carrying such\nan image about with her, but replied that she did not know what a\nmandrake was. Margaret Bouchey was hanged near Orl\u00e9ans in 1603 on the\nground that she kept a living mandrake fiend, in form of a female ape.\n\nMandrake manikins were counterfeited from the root of a yam-like plant,\nwhich had been manipulated into a complete likeness of the human body.\nSir Thomas Browne describes the process: \u201cThe roots which are carried\nabout by imposters to deceive unfruitful women are made of the roots of\ncanes, briony, and other plants; for in these, yet fresh and virent,\nthey carve out the figures of men and women, first sticking therein\nthe grains of barley or millet where they intend the hair should grow;\nthen bury them in sand until the grains shoot forth their roots, which,\nat the longest, will happen in twenty days; they afterward clip and\ntrim those tender strings in the fashion of beards and other hairy\nteguments. All which, like other impostures, once discovered, is easily\neffected, and in the root of white briony may be practiced every\nspring.\u201d\n\nA century ago mandrake images were still seen in French seaport towns,\nbut now mandragora has lost its vogue even as a medicine. In Africa and\nthe East, however, it is still used as a narcotic and anti-spasmodic,\nwhile ginseng, which is a surrogate, maintains its spell in China,\nwhere as much as four hundred dollars has been paid for an ounce of it.\n\n\n_Precious Stones_\n\nAmong minerals jade held a place as distinct as that of the mandrake\namong plants, but its associations were all auspicious. Its place is\nthe highest among the precious stones, although it is not a precious\nstone at all. It is a substance to which heliolithic culture attached\nmagical power and which it carried quite around the world before\nhistory began, Aryans, Kanakas, and red Indians holding it in equal\nregard. Axes and hatchets of jade or jadeite have been uncovered in\nthe burial grounds of neolithic Europe, and there are jade celts,\ncylinders, and amulets bearing Greek, Babylonian, and Egyptian\ninscriptions. In a sense the civilization of China has been built up\naround this stone. Eighteen centuries before the Christian era the\nemperors of the Shang dynasty used it in the state ritual, paying\nhomage to the east with a green jade tablet, to the south with a red\ntablet, to the west with a white tablet, and to the north with a black\ntablet. According to Confucius, \u201cits sound, pure and sonorous, with its\npeculiarity of ceasing abruptly, is the emblem of music; its splendor\nresembles the sky, and its substance, drawn from mountain and stream,\nrepresents the earth.\u201d An ancient caravan trade in this stone is\ncommemorated by a portal in the Great Wall called the Jade Gate.\n\nThe Amazon stone which the Spaniards obtained from the South American\nIndians was jadeite. By them as well as by their conquerors it was\nthought to be a cure for diseases of the kidneys, hence its name of\nnephrite. A revived interest in jade followed American exploration.\nHistorically it has been treasured as a cure for colic and for diseases\nof the spleen and loins; hung against the stomach, Galen believed it\na remedy for cramps. It was a good-luck charm, and, fashioned into\ndrinking cups, a detector of poisons, which foamed against the brim.\nIt survives in art and symbolism after having passed out of magic and\nmedicine.\n\nMany of the old traditions about stones persist in popular belief,\nwhich holds certain kinds of gems and individual jewels as lucky or\nunlucky; and in fashion, which assigns to each month its appropriate\nbirthstone. It was supposed that the garnet preserved health, that\nthe ruby was a remedy for plague, that the turquoise protected from\naccident, that the eagle-stone would promote childbirth, that the\nemerald would prevent epilepsy, that the topaz would cure insanity,\nthat lapis lazuli was a purgative, and bezoar antidotal. Jasper was\na febrifuge and rock crystal quenched thirst. An amethyst would\nprevent intoxication, a bloodstone would confer the gift of prophecy,\na chrysoprase would cure cupidity, a sapphire would defend against\nenchantments, an agate would avert a tempest, a carbuncle would give\nlight in the dark, an opal would dispel despondency, an emerald would\nbreak if worn in the commerce of the sexes, and a diamond under a\nwoman\u2019s pillow would discover her incontinency.\n\n[Illustration: _According to Tradition, a Putrid Stream Flows from the\nRoots of the Tree and the Vapors Thereof Kill_]\n\nIn Christian symbolism, jasper signified the foundation of the\nchurch, emerald the freshness of piety, beryl the illumination of the\ndivine spirit. Sapphires typified the heavenly-minded, chrysolite those\nwho let their light shine in word and deed, chalcedony those who fast\nand pray in secret.\n\nHowever vain the pagan jewel-lore from which Christian borrowings were\nmade, the ideas it arrays are older than the conception of precious\nstones as mere adornment. These things were sought and worn at first\nas life-givers and luck-bringers, and not because they were beautiful.\nJustinus Kerner is of those writers who contend that primitive man was\nso attuned to nature that \u201ceven the spirit of the stone, now grown\ndull and sluggish, was capable of affecting him.\u201d Only when persons\nare under the influence of magnetism, says this writer, are they\nsusceptible to the inherent powers of precious stones; because that\nstate was in a measure the normal state of early men they found greater\nmedicinal virtue in gems than in roots and herbs.\n\n\n_The Wonders of Countries_\n\nThe travelers of yesterday found marvel awaiting them in every land.\nThe sun of India, Ctesias says, appears to be ten times larger than in\nother countries, and for four finger-breadths downward the surrounding\nseas are so hot that fish cannot come near the surface. It is so hot\nin Ormuz, says Maundeville, that \u201cthe Folk lie all naked in Rivers and\nWaters, Men and Women together, from nine o\u2019clock of the Day till it\nbe past the Noon.\u201d In the Persian city of Susis, says Strabo, \u201clizards\nand serpents at midday in summer cannot cross the streets quick enough\nto prevent their being burnt to death midway by the heat.\u201d Setting one\nthing against another, Diodorus says that in Scythia by the force of\ncold even brazen statues are burst asunder, while \u201cin the utmost coasts\nof Egypt and the Troglodytes the sun is so scorching hot at midday that\ntwo standing together cannot see each other by reason of the thickness\nof the air.\u201d\n\nCtesias speaks of a fountain in India which swims every year with\nliquid gold, and out of which are drawn a hundred earthen pitchers\nfilled with the metal--melted ore, suggests Lassen. There is growing\nupon Mount Ida in Scandia, says Father Jerom Dandini, \u201ca herb whose\nvirtue is to gild the teeth of those animals that eat of it; one may\nbelieve, and with good reason, that this proceeds from the golden\nmines which are in that ground.\u201d Herodotus reports the Thracians as\nsaying that the country beyond the Ister (Danube) is possessed by\nbees, wherefore travelers cannot penetrate it; these may have been\nmosquitoes. At the altars of Mucius in the country of the Veii, and\nabout Tusculum and in the Cimmerian Forest, says Pliny, there are\nplaces in which things that are pushed into the ground cannot be pulled\nout again.\n\nGeographical marvel may be brought down almost to date with Humboldt\u2019s\nreport on the moving \u201cstone of the eyes\u201d in South America, which the\nnatives believed to be both stone and animal; and with Irving\u2019s account\nof the extinct thunderbolts which the plains Indians told him they\nsometimes used for arrow heads. So armed, a warrior was invincible, but\nhe vanished if a thunderstorm arose during battle.\n\n\n\n\nChapter IV. The Animal Kingdom\n\n\nMuch of the literature of marvel relates to real animals. The savage\ncould see no great difference between them and himself; that their\nbodies were unlike his did not seem important. They could reason like\nhim, they could understand what he said to them, they had souls which,\nlike his own, lived after death. A beast could assume human shape, a\nman could become a beast, and it was totemic theory that some beasts\nwere ancestors of some men.\n\nThere were tribes that acted as if they were beasts, or birds. The\nBororo Indians identified themselves with gorgeous red birds that lived\nin the heart of the Brazilian forest, and treated them as if they were\nfellow mortals. Travelers have told of savages who ate maggots bred\nin the carcasses of animals, and on ceremonial occasions thereafter\nwrithed, roared, barked, or grunted, in keeping with the nature of the\nsnake, lion, jackal, or hippopotamus whose body had been the table of\ntheir feast. The people of an Alaskan island mistook the first Russian\nparty that landed there for cuttlefish, because the men had buttons on\ntheir clothes.\n\nAbundant traces of a belief that animals were beings of a higher order\nthan men are found in early religion, magic, and medicine. Many of them\nwere worshiped. Out of a fear that their spirits might work harm, all\nof them were propitiated even when pursued or killed. Portions of their\ndead bodies were used as amulets and to work spells. Their brains,\nblood, entrails, and excrements were a principal part of the Roman\npharmacop\u0153ia in the most brilliant age of the Empire; the witches\u2019\nbroth in Macbeth is an Augustan brew. Along with hundreds of like\nprescriptions, Pliny recites that a mole\u2019s right foot and the earth\nthrown up by ants are remedies for scrofula, that a bat\u2019s heart is an\nantidote for ant venom, that a hen\u2019s brains will cure snake poison and\nthe owlet\u2019s a bee sting, that profuse perspiration may be checked by\nrubbing the body with ashes of burnt goats\u2019 horns mixed with oil of\nmyrtle, and that catarrh may be relieved by kissing a mule\u2019s nostrils.\n\nCurious as these things may seem, they come naturally from the fact\nthat primitive man had mainly to do with animals. Outside of his tribal\ngroup he knew other men only as enemies. But all about were furred and\nfeathered and not unfriendly creatures whose acts had a certainty and\nfinality lifting them above the doubts and fears that harassed him. He\nseemed a late comer and guest in an animal world. So he did what timid\npeoples are wont to do. He put himself under the protection of beings\nmore gifted than himself. He became a vassal of the beasts. This was\nthe first feudalism.\n\nThe savage was glad to assert his kinship with the brute. In the Indian\nwest it was through the First People, who had the human shape but an\nanimal nature, and were transformed into beasts and birds; a beast or\na bird then created the second race of men. The natives of Vancouver\nIsland thought that when nobody was about animals laid aside their\nskins and were people. In places the tradition lingers that migratory\nbirds become men when in other lands. A traveler far from home was\namazed when a stranger called him by name and asked about each member\nof the family. The mystery was solved when he learned how this intimate\nknowledge was gained; the stranger was the stork that each year built\nits nest upon his roof.\n\nBoth in skin-shifting and shape-shifting the blood relationship between\nman and brute was avowed. In the one, the hero of savage epic, by\ndonning or doffing an animal skin, put on or put off the beast nature.\nIn the other, the human or animal actor strutted for a space on his\ncousin\u2019s stage. Wizards could transform themselves, as men thought,\ninto wolves and hyenas; the world-wide legend of the werewolf traces\nfrom the time when metamorphosis was the alpha and omega of myth.\nIts survivals strew the classics. Io became a heifer, Act\u00e6on a stag,\nAntigone a stork, Arachne a spider, Itys a pheasant, Philomela a\nnightingale, and Progne a swallow.\n\nAnimals took on human form to get better acquainted with men. Indian\nstory tells of a man who unwittingly married a female buffalo. An\nIndian woman wedded a stranger who bade her always throw the bones\nin a certain place, and whenever he went out to eat she heard the\nbarking of a dog near the bone-heap; that was what he was. There are\nstories from every continent of the union of women with reptiles that\nmasqueraded as men. Perhaps because they can assume the erect posture,\nbears were often parties to alliances of this kind. It was thought in\nIceland that they were men bewitched and that their progeny were born\nhuman but turned into cubs at a touch of the dam\u2019s paw. The Votiaks\nof the American northwest say the bear traces back to man and knows\nhis speech. When the hide is off, the California Indians aver that\nbears are just like people. In a Coos Indian story a girl married\na fine-looking man whom she met while picking berries; but when he\ntook her to the ancestral lodge, she found herself in a bear camp.\nThere is a Tlingit tale of a hunter who was captured by a female\ngrizzly--object, matrimony.\n\nThe mitigation of these world stories is that they are literalistic\nmisreadings of old totemistic custom. Yet it is pleasant enough to\nlearn from a Tahltan tale that caribou \u201clike to be called people.\u201d\n\nUnder totemism, men chose their elder brothers, the brutes, for\nguardians, took their names, deposited their own souls with them for\nsafekeeping, and, after death, entered their bodies. Where totemism\nwas unknown it was thought that the larger prowling animals might be\ntenanted by demons and that their weird howls at night were incidents\nof beast debates which had the destinies of men as their topic. It\nwas well not to affront them even by naming them; better to use\ningratiating epithets, such as \u201cblue-foot,\u201d \u201cgold-foot,\u201d \u201cgray-beard,\u201d\n\u201cbroad-brow,\u201d \u201cflash-eye,\u201d \u201cforest-brother.\u201d The lesser sort were rogue\nheroes in the beast epics--among the Hottentots the jackal; among the\nBantus, the rabbit; among the Orientals, the fox; among the American\nIndians, the turtle, coyote, and raven.\n\nAs a memorial of the antique relation between man and beast, three out\nof every hundred persons in England and America bear animal names.\nThere is a wealth of detail as to how that relation was carried\ndown through legend into history. The woodpecker directed the Aryan\nmigrations, the wolf suckled the founders of Rome, the nest of the\neagle determined the winter camps of the legions, the flights of birds\nfixed the sites of cities, and their entrails decided for nations\nthe issues of war and peace. Animal forms range the entire field of\nearly man\u2019s interests. Deified bulls, rams, crocodiles, hawks, and\nibises thronged the hospitable pantheon of Egypt. In the speculation\nof various peoples the snake, the elephant, the whale, the boar, the\nturtle, or the catfish supported the world, and when the creature moved\nitself earthquake followed. The dove of Hebrew deluge story found the\nearth. The larger animals were in the sky as constellations before\nhistory began. When the moon is in eclipse there are men to believe\nthat it has been swallowed by a snake, a wolf, a frog, a crab.\n\nIn their primitive judicial processes men took oath in the name of\nthe sacred animal. In their agriculture they conceived of the life\nof the grain as residing in an animal corn spirit--a horse, a pig, a\ngoat, or a dog, which hid itself in the last clump of grain to be cut.\nIn their marriage ceremonies, the cock, duck, goat, or goose was a\nfertility emblem. Totem beasts are tattooed on the bodies of savages.\nAnimal outlines, at first as a strong magic, were used upon pottery,\nclothes, and weapons, and as decoration are still used. In animal masks\nand with magical intent, dances are performed which mimic the ways of\nbeasts. Their feet, horns, claws, and teeth enter the medicine bag of\nthe shaman. When at last death comes to the savage, perhaps a turkey\nbuzzard or a humming bird convoys his soul to the other world, or a dog\nguards the bridge over which it is to pass to a happier realm, where\nthe hunting of animals begins anew.\n\nThe reverence paid to the least considered of animals may serve to\nshow in what regard all of them were held and to explain the marvels\ntold about them. Scattered through the literature and folklore of\nvarious peoples is a copious mass of traditions as to vermin worship\nand to practices just suggested by the fact that Beelzebub, the\ndevil of Jewish Scripture, is the Semitic god of flies. There was a\nclassic deity known as the mouse-Apollo and tame mice were kept in\nhis sanctuary. The Philistines sent to Israel, with the captured Ark,\ngolden images of mice. Isaiah bears witness that certain of the Jews\nmet secretly in gardens and ate swine\u2019s flesh and mice for sacramental\npurposes. In old stories the soul is pictured as issuing from the\nmouths of dying or sleeping persons in the form of a mouse. The\nChams of Indo-China erected a pillar to the god rat. Herodotus tells\nof the destruction of an Assyrian army in Egypt by the aid of mice\nauxiliaries. It is still the custom in some districts of Europe for\npeasants to exorcise mice from the crops by running wildly with lighted\ntorches around the fields on the eve of Twelfth Day; to put the milk\nteeth of children in a rat runway, so that the second teeth shall be\nas white and strong as the rodent\u2019s; to treat white mice with kindness\nso as to bring luck to the house, and even to post a writing with a\nmessage of good will where rats and mice can see it.\n\nWhile domestic animals which had killed or maimed persons were\nregularly tried in the criminal courts of ancient Greece and medi\u00e6val\nEurope, ecclesiastical courts long exercised jurisdiction over smaller\nanimal offenders. The curse of the Church was relied upon to reach\nvermin against which the secular law knew itself to be powerless; yet\nanathema was not pronounced without judicial process. On complaint of\nravaged parishes, field mice, locusts, and beetles were summoned to\nappear in court on a certain day and counsel was appointed to defend\nthem. In defense of accused rats in the diocese of Autun, Chassen\u00e9e,\nthe brilliant French advocate of the sixteenth century, laid the\nfoundations of his fame. He cited biblical and classical writers,\ninterposed various technical objections, attributed the failure of his\nclients to appear to the absence of safe conducts, and demanded that\nthe plaintiffs give bond that their cats would not molest the defendant\nrodents in their journey to court. On their refusal to give bond the\ncase was adjourned without day.\n\nMany such cases were compromised by setting aside a plot of land\nto which the accused creatures might repair for sanctuary. In the\nsuit of Franciscan friars in Brazil in 1713 against white ants which\nhad invaded their monastery, the compromise was influenced by the\nplea of counsel that the defendants not only had prior possession\nof the ground, but were more industrious than the complaining\nmonks. Ecclesiastical suits were brought at various times against\ncaterpillars, cockchafers, flies, leeches, moles, snails, slugs,\nweevils, and worms. From the ninth to the nineteenth century there is\na record of 144 successful prosecutions of animals, vermin included,\nand these are thought to be only a fraction of the total number of such\nlitigations. The age which brought them was no less sure that insects\nhad rights, including the right of subsistence, than that the Church\nhad effectual power over them.\n\n\n_The Elephant_\n\nAbout the larger creatures fable has been busy and the foremost figure\nis naturally the hugest of the land animals; only with medi\u00e6val and\nheraldic times did the lion win pre-eminence. Classic tradition\nrevolves around the elephant\u2019s intelligence, morality, and social\ntraits. There are stories of its understanding Greek, and even writing\nit. As Pliny repeats, \u201cit is sensible alike of the pleasures of love\nand glory, and, to a degree that is rare among men even, possesses\nnotions of honesty, prudence, and equity; it has a religious respect\nalso for the stars, and a veneration for the sun and the moon.\u201d\n\nWhen surrounded by hunters, report had it that elephants placed\nthemselves in battle line, with the smaller-tusked animals in front, so\nthat the enemy might see that the spoil was unworthy the seeking. When\nthey perceived themselves about to be overcome, they broke off their\nteeth against a tree in order to pay their ransom. While other animals\navoided fire, they resisted and fought it because they saw it destroyed\nthe forests. When worn out by disease, they have been seen lying on\ntheir backs and casting grass up into the air, \u201cas if deputing the\nearth to intercede for them with its prayers.\u201d\n\nJohn Lok, in his _Voyage to Guinea_, paraphrases an ancient belief as\nto the feud between the elephant and what he calls the dragon: \u201cThey\nhave continual warre against Dragons, which desire their blood, because\nit is very colde; and therefore the Dragon lying awaite as the Elephant\npasseth by, windeth his taile, being of exceeding length, about the\nhinder legs of the Elephant, & so staying him, thrusteth his head into\nhis tronke and exhausteth his breath, or else biteth him in the Eare,\nwhereunto he cannot reach with his tronke, and when the Elephant waxeth\nfaint, he falleth downe on the serpent, being now full of blood, and\nwith the poise of his body breaketh him: so that his owne blood with\nthe blood of the Elephant runneth out of him mingled together, which\nbeing colde, is congealed into that substance which the Apothecaries\ncall Sanguis Draconis, (that is) Dragons blood, otherwise called\nCinnabaris, commonly called Cinoper or Vermilion, which the Painters\nuse in certaine colours.\u201d\n\nThe elephant is polygamous, although, as Lok says, \u201cPlinie and Soline\nwrite that elephants use none adulterie.\u201d It was thought that the\nintercourse of the sexes took place every second year, in a honeymoon\nof five days\u2019 length, and that the couples purified themselves in a\nriver before rejoining the herd. Of these nuptial journeys Buffon says,\n\u201cIn their march love seems to precede and modesty to follow them, for\nthey observe the greatest mystery in their amours.\u201d To this day the\nEast Africans think that if their wives are unfaithful while they are\non an elephant hunt, themselves will be killed or maimed by their\nquarry.\n\nIt was a Roman belief that when elephants met a man who had lost his\nway in the woods they would go gently before him and bring him to a\nplain path. Sindbad had a kindred experience on his seventh voyage when\na herd conducted him to their cemetery so that henceforth \u201cI should\nforbear to kill them, as now I knew where to get their teeth without\ninflicting injury on them.\u201d It is still widely believed that somewhere\nin Central Africa, perhaps in a remote valley of the western Sudan, is\nan elephant graveyard whither all the aged and ailing pachyderms of\nthe continent repair, sometimes traveling thousands of miles in order\nto die in peace amid the relics of their kind. No elephants dead of\nnatural causes are ever found, tradition avers, and from time to time\nexpeditions have sought the vast riches of this storehouse of mortuary\nivory.\n\nTo the elephant various peoples have accorded royal honors. Akbar,\nthe great Mogul, erected a monument to a favorite elephant, which\nstill stands near the deserted city of Fatephur Sikri; it is a tower\nseventy-two feet high, studded with hundreds of artificial tusks. At\nthe court of Siam the traditional rank of the chief white elephant\nhas been next to the queen and before the heir-apparent. The chief of\nthe Burmese court herd has the residence and honors of a minister of\nstate. \u201cThe king of Pegu,\u201d says one of the Hakluyt travelers, \u201cis\ncalled the King of the White Elephants. If any other king have one, and\nwill not send it him, he will make warre with him for it; for he had\nrather lose a great part of his kingdome than not to conquere him.\u201d\nThis was history when penned. In the sixteenth century a long war was\nwaged between Pegu, Siam, and Aracan, wherein five kings were killed,\nin order to obtain possession of one white elephant. These albinos are\nregarded as an appurtenance of royalty and lack of them is an ill omen.\nSiam is the Land of the White Elephant.\n\n\n_The Rhinoceros_\n\nThe ancients had less to say of the rhinoceros than of the monoceros or\nunicorn, for which fabulous beast it may have provided the pattern; but\nthey wove legends about the virtues of its horn and its feud with the\nelephant. Cosmas Indicopleustes wrote that when the rhinoceros walked\nits horn shook, but that rage tightened it so that the beast was able\nto uproot trees. Its skin was four fingers thick, and so hard that from\nit, instead of iron, men made plowshares. In later ages the horn was\nkept for the cure of diseases and detection of poison. Drinking cups\nwere made of it on a turner\u2019s lathe, and the medi\u00e6val west accepted the\ntradition of the east that these would sweat at the approach of poison.\nHorns taken from young bull rhinoceroses which had never coupled with\nfemales were preferred. Set in gold and silver, the goblets were an\nacceptable present for kings. Thunberg was one of the first inquirers\nto put the superstition to the test by bringing the horn and various\npoisons together; there was no chemical reaction.\n\nThe tongue, not the horn, of the rhinoceros was its weapon of offense,\naccording to old belief. Marco Polo says that this member, in the\nSumatran species, is armed with long sharp spines, wherewith, after\ntrampling its enemies, it licks them to death. Pliny has a like story.\n\n\n_The Hippopotamus_\n\nOf the hippopotamus two travelers\u2019 tales may be noted. Pliny gives it\non hearsay that the river horse enters a cornfield backward, so that\nthere will be no one waiting to waylay it when it comes out. The\nstatement of Father Joano dos Santos in his history of eastern Ethiopia\n(1506) may best be set down verbatim: \u201cThe hippopotamus is naturally\nof a sickly constitution, and subject to gouty paines, which it cures\nby scratching the stomach with the left foot; and it has further been\nnoticed, when it wishes to effect a perfect cure that it falls on the\nhorn of the hoof of the left foot; this, entering the stomach, appeases\nand terminates the pain. Hence the Caffres and Moors make use of this\nhorn as a remedy for the gout.\u201d\n\n\n_The Hyena_\n\nThe foul countenance and abject gaze of the hyena, its misshapen body,\nits slinking tread, its affinities with both the wolf and the cat\ntribes, have been provocative of legend. It lurks in caves and ruins\nby day, it prowls for carrion food at night, it despoils graveyards\nof their dead, it roams through unlighted villages, and its howl when\nexcited has a weird note, as of a demon\u2019s laughter; so antique fable\nhad much to work upon. \u201cOf prodigious strength,\u201d Ctesias called the\nbeast under its Indian name of Krokottas; and, indeed, no animal of\nits size has jaws so powerful. He credited it with the courage of the\nlion, the speed of the horse, and the strength of the bull. It imitated\nthe human voice, he said, and, pronouncing their names, called men out\nat night, when it fell upon and devoured them. \u201cWe cannot in the least\ncredit this,\u201d is however, the comment of Diodorus Siculus.\n\nPliny, and Solinus after him, thought that the hyena was male one\nyear and female the next--an opinion challenged by Aristotle. It was\nsupposed to carry a stone in its eye which, placed under a man\u2019s\ntongue, would enable him to prophesy. Purchas says the beast \u201chath\nno necke joynt, and therefore stirres not his necke but with bending\nabout his whole body.\u201d Improving upon Ctesias, he says the animal draws\nnear to sheepcotes at night in order to learn the names of herdsmen,\nwhom afterward it decoys to destruction. Its eyes are \u201cdiversified\nwith a thousand colours\u201d and the touch of its shadow \u201cmakes a dogge\nnot able to barke.\u201d Buffon mentions, only to scout, the notion that\nthe hyena fascinates shepherds so that they cannot move, and renders\nshepherdesses distracted in love. As a supposed hybrid, Raleigh\nexcludes it from the Ark. A kind of worship is still paid it in East\nAfrica, where the oath of the hyena is administered; it is a crime to\nkill one and a misdemeanor to mimic its voice. Stories are told of\ngold rings found in the ears of dead hyenas similar to those worn by\nsorcerers and workers in iron.\n\n\n_The Gnu_\n\nNear the headwaters of the Nile, according to Pliny, roams the\ncatoblepas, an animal of moderate size and of movements made cumbersome\nby a head immoderately heavy, which is always bent down toward the\nearth. This is a fortunate thing, for otherwise \u201cit would prove the\ndestruction of the human race,\u201d since \u201call who behold its eyes fall\ndead upon the spot.\u201d In this demon-beast of dejected aspect Cuvier\nrecognizes the antelope-gnu, a horned creature apparently compounded of\na bison\u2019s head, a horse\u2019s body, and an antelope\u2019s legs; a fantastic and\nmournful silhouette of the African prairies.\n\n\n_The Crocodile_\n\nThe standing of the crocodile in ancient Egypt, and among the savages\nof the East Indies to this day, has been that of a sacred, or at least\na tabooed, animal. It had its own temple at Memphis, where it was\nworshiped as a divinity, and tame crocodiles took part in the religious\nprocessions. The Dyaks of Borneo and the Minangkabauers of Sumatra\nnever kill a crocodile unless it has killed a man. Its privileged\nposition among animals is due to a variety of reasons, of which only\nthree need be noted: it is a dangerous reptile, it flourishes mainly\nwhere other food is plenty, and its meat is not agreeable to most\npalates, having, as Sir Samuel Baker puts it, \u201cthe combined flavor of\nbad fish, rotten flesh, and musk.\u201d Such a creature it is both savage\nsuperstition and policy to let alone, and even to flatter.\n\nThe older explanations of crocodile worship are more fantastic.\nAccording to Plutarch, this reptile is a symbol of deity because it\nis the only aquatic animal which has its eyes covered with a thin\nmembrane, so that, like divinity, it sees without being seen. He adds\nthat the Egyptians worship God symbolically in the crocodile, that\nbeing the only animal without a tongue, like the Divine Logos, which\nis in no need of speech. One species has something more than a hundred\nteeth, wherefore Achilles Tatius declares, \u201cthe number of its teeth\nequals the number of days in a year.\u201d\n\nIn his pilgrimage to the Holy Land, Ludolf saw a crocodile which the\nKnights Templars, by extracting certain of its teeth, had converted\ninto a serviceable beast of burden. \u201cIn winter,\u201d says Maundeville, \u201cthe\nCockodrills lie as in a dream.\u201d Purchas provides a detail on a matter\nof peculiar interest to the medi\u00e6vals: one lobe of the crocodile\u2019s\nliver is poison, the other counter-poison.\n\n\u201cCrocodile tears\u201d are defined as simulated weeping, and back of this\nuseful metaphor is the venerable tradition set down in Hakluyt\u2019s\ncollection: \u201cHis nature is ever when hee would have his prey, to cry\nand sobbe like a Christian body, to provoke them to come to him, and\nthen hee snatcheth at them, and thereupon came this proverbe that is\napplied unto women when they weepe, _Lachrmy\u00e6 Crocodili_, the meaning\nwhereof is, that as the Crocodile when hee crieth, goeth then about\nmost to deceive, so doeth a woman most commonly when shee weepeth.\u201d\n\n\n_Snakes_\n\nMost of the numerous snake traditions have a religious significance.\nThe older writers, however, have left observations which belong to\nnatural history. Pliny recites it as \u201ca well-known fact\u201d that a serpent\n120 feet in length was taken at the river Bagrada in the Punic Wars\nby the Roman army under Regulus. The monster was besieged as if it\nwere a fortress, balist\u00e6 and other engines being used. Of India, known\nfrom earliest time for its immense serpents, the most striking reptile\nstory Ctesias has to tell is of a snake only a fathom long, and without\nfangs. It is purple with a white head and does execution by vomiting.\nFlesh putrefies wherever the vomit falls. Suspended by the tail, it\nyields two kinds of poison, amber-hued when the snake is living, black\nwhen obtained from a carcass. A sesame seed\u2019s bulk of the former brings\ninstant death to him who swallows it, his brains oozing from his\nnostrils, while the latter brings death from consumption after about a\nyear.\n\nOut of many traditions that snakes have power to fascinate or injure\nwithout striking, two opinions from respectable sources may be given.\nUlloa, the Spanish explorer, thinks the breath of the cobra produces \u201ca\nkind of inebriation,\u201d in persons, as does \u201cthe urine of the fox\u201d and\n\u201cthe breath of the whale.\u201d Lobo, the Portuguese friar, reports that\nwhile lying on the ground in Abyssinia, he was seized with a pain which\nforced him to rise, when he discovered a serpent something more than\nfour yards from him. He revived himself with \u201cthat sovereign remedy\u201d a\nbezoar stone. These serpents, he explains, have wide mouths and swallow\nair in great quantities, which they presently eject with such force\nthat it kills at four yards.\n\n\n_Grasshoppers_\n\nClassic writers knew the grasshopper less as a pest than as a food,\nand it has a pleasant place in myth. Tithonus, beloved of Aurora and\ndowered by the gods with immortality but not with eternal youth, was\nchanged by her into a grasshopper after he shrank up with old age.\nThere is a grasshopper fable to which Strabo gives a naturalistic and\nSolinus a supernatural tinge. In southern Italy, Rhegium and Locris are\ndivided by a river flowing through a deep ravine. The insects on the\nLocrian side sing, while those on the other side are silent.\n\nStrabo suggests that this is because it is sunny on the Locrian side,\nand densely wooded across the river. In the one case the membranes used\nin stridulation are dry and horny and therefore resonant when rasped\ntogether; in the other, they are so softened by shade and dew that they\nproduce no sound. Solinus has a simpler explanation. Hercules passed\nby Rhegium and its grasshopper orchestra irritated him. So he bade the\ninsects be silent, and, resentful or forgetful, failed to lift the\nembargo.\n\n\n_The Salamander_\n\nThe best account of the salamander appears in the _Memoirs_ of\nBenvenuto Cellini. \u201cOne day,\u201d he said, \u201cwhen I was about fifteen\nyears of age, my father was in a cellar where they had been scalding\nsome clothes for washing. He was alone, and was playing upon the viol\nand singing in front of a good fire of oakwood, for the weather was\nvery cold. On looking at the fire accidentally, he saw a small animal\nresembling a lizard, gambolling joyously in the midst of the fiercest\nflames. My father instantly perceiving what it was, he called my\nsister and me, pointed out the animal to us, and gave me a severe box\non the ear, which caused me to shed a perfect deluge of tears. He\ngently wiped my eyes and said to me, \u2018My dear boy, I did not strike you\nas a punishment, but only that you should remember that that lizard\nwhich you behold in the fire is a salamander, an animal which has never\nbeen seen by any known person.\u2019 He afterwards kissed me and gave me a\nfew quattrini.\u201d\n\nThat the salamander is able to live in flames, Aristotle thought, and\n\u00c6lian, and Nicander, and Pliny. The last named tells why: This lizard\nis so cold that it extinguishes fire like ice. There is great danger in\nits venom. Unless precautions are taken it might destroy whole nations,\nfor if it crawls up a tree it infects all the fruit and those who eat\nthereof are killed. It will also poison water or wine in which it is\ndrowned. Sir Thomas Browne concedes that it may resist a flame or put\nout a coal, but \u201cthus much will many humid bodies perform.\u201d\n\n\n_The Spider Dance_\n\nThe tarantula is a large, brown mining spider which is found on both\nshores of the Mediterranean, and is said to be numerous near Taranto\nin southern Italy, whence its name. Its bite is painful, although not\ndangerous, but in the fifteenth century the superstition arose that it\ncaused what is called tarantism, a nervous affection with some of the\nsymptoms of hydrophobia, and now classed with St. Vitus dance. Those\nwho were bitten, or believed themselves to be, assumed a livid color,\nlost the senses of sight and hearing, and sank into a deep depression;\nnausea and sexual excitement were also remarked. Only music could\narouse the sufferer; under the influence of lively strains he would\ndance himself into a perspiration and the poison of the spider bite\nwould escape through the skin. If the dance was continued to exhaustion\nthe patient was cured, at any rate for a time.\n\nThe disease soon assumed the form of a contagion communicated from one\nperson to another. Dancers were violently affected by bright colors.\nRed was the favorite, and then green and yellow, and one man\u2019s hue\nmight be another\u2019s madness. Sufferers sought water, some plunging into\nthe sea, others immersing their heads in a tub or carrying globes\nof water while dancing. Old and young, skeptical visitors as well as\nnatives, and women more than men, were the victims. Attacks lasted from\ntwo to six days, and recovery was effectual until warm weather came the\nfollowing year, when the symptoms had again to be exorcised to music.\nOne woman was a tarantant for thirty summers.\n\nThe earliest mention of the mania is in the writings of Nicolas\nPerotti, a contemporary of Columbus. It broke out at the same time that\nthe St. Vitus dance appeared in Germany. A like superstition and a like\ncure are known in a Persian province. The northern nations were first\nto recover and since the seventeenth century the epidemic has slowly\nwaned. The lively Neapolitan folk dance, called the tarantella, is a\nmemorial of the madness that set the Middle Ages dancing with a spider\ncalling the tune.\n\n\n_The Swallow_\n\nSwallows show themselves suddenly in the northern climes in April, and\nas suddenly vanish at the threshold of autumn. They are often seen\nskimming the surface of water. Doctor Kalm, the Swedish traveler,\nreports that in April, 1750, he saw great numbers perched upon posts,\n\u201cand they were as wet as if they had just come out of the sea.\u201d That\nthe swallow comes out of the sea in the spring and returns to it in\nthe fall is a belief of unknown antiquity. Thus, thought Luther, it\nrepeated each year the process of creation recorded in Genesis, when\nthe water obeyed the command to bring forth \u201cfowl that may fly above\nthe earth in the open firmament of heaven.\u201d\n\nThere is a considerable literature on the reputed hibernation of the\nswallow. It has been credited with electing at will the winter economy\nof the wild goose, the bear, or the batrachian. In Mediterranean\ncountries it is conceded that swallows migrate. In England and Germany,\naccording to one eighteenth-century observer, they \u201cretire into clefts\nand holes in rocks, and remain there in torpid state.\u201d In the colder\nnorthern countries popular opinion has been that they submerge in the\nsea. Regnard, the French comic poet, who made a journey to Lapland in\n1681, accepted this on the word of trustworthy Danes and Swedes.\n\nIn the eighteenth century the secretary to the city of Dantzig obtained\nsworn testimony in support of this opinion from collectors of the\nrevenues of the king of Prussia. The mother of the Countess Lehndorf\nreported that she saw \u201ca bundle of swallows\u201d brought from under water\nto a warm room, where they revived and fluttered about. Count Schlieben\nsaid that while fishing on his estate he saw several swallows netted,\none of which he carried into a warm room; it lay there for an hour and\nthen began to stir and fly around. Collector-General Witkowski said\nthat in 1741 he got two swallows from the great pond at Didlacken, and\nthat these birds revived in a warm room, \u201cfluttered about, and died\nthree hours later.\u201d Six other witnesses made their several oaths to\nsimilar incidents.\n\nA final touch of poetry is given by the statement of Doctor Wallerius,\nthe celebrated Swedish chemist, who deposed \u201cthat he had seen more than\nonce swallows assembling on a reed till they were all immersed and\nwent to the bottom; this being preceded by a dirge of a quarter of an\nhour\u2019s length.\u201d Holy, luck-bringing, and inviolate, men everywhere have\nthought the swallow, and the solemn descents into the sea with which\nlegend credited it deepened this character.\n\n\n_Wild Geese_\n\nAbout wild geese a still more fantastic belief obtained up to four\ncenturies ago, when the Dutch discovered Spitzbergen. It was thought\nthat goslings grew upon trees in the form of nuts. The nuts fell into\nthe sea and the chicks came forth. Therefore a decree at the Sorbonne\nin Paris adjudged that wild geese were not birds and could be eaten\nin Lent. In Spitzbergen, Barentz came upon the breeding grounds of\nthese migratory fowl, and, breaking open the eggs, discovered the\nunhatched young in them. So the myth passed. \u201cIt is not our fault,\u201d he\nremarked, \u201cthat we have not known this before, when these birds insist\nupon breeding so far northward.\u201d Two variants of the story are found\namong Norwegian writers. Jonas Ramus says that \u201ca particular sort of\nGeese found in Nordland leave their seed on old trees and stumps and\nblocks lying in the sea\u201d; a shell forms around the seed, and from the\nshell, as from an egg, young geese are hatched by the sun. Pontoppidan\ndescribes what seems to be the goose barnacle which contains \u201cthe\nlittle creature reported to be a young wild goose.\u201d It looks like\n\u201clittle crooked feathers squeezed together\u201d and is merely a \u201cliving\nsea insect.\u201d While the legend was credited it was used to confirm the\ndoctrine of the Immaculate Conception.\n\n\n_Animal Politics_\n\nFable dowered various creatures with the political institutions and\nsocial sense of the ant and bee. Pearl oysters were said to live in\nsettlements under the rule of the oldest. Cranes placed sentinels on\nguard at night, each with a stone in its claw; if the bird nodded\nthe stone fell to the ground, betraying its neglect of duty. Cranes,\nrooks and storks, even modern observers assert, hold criminal courts.\nTwice a year a pair of ravens was assigned to each farm in Iceland\nby a parliament of their fellows. The storks of Egypt were supposed\nevery winter to make the Mecca pilgrimage and were regarded as hajjis.\nBecause the panther\u2019s diet was aromatic roots and herbs, its breath\nwas balmy and medicinal, and when it walked abroad all the other\nbeasts attended it. Wild beasts and apes tended a mountain shrine near\nSrinagar in India, bringing daily offerings of flowers. In Ceylon \u201cvery\npious and credible persons\u201d told Ibn Batuta that the bearded black\nmonkeys had their own sultan, who wore a green turban woven of leaves,\nas if he wished to seem an Islamite, and maintained a council of state\nand a harem.\n\n\n_Other Animal Marvels_\n\nMarvel tales about animals might be recited almost indefinitely,\nand a respectable authority ancient or modern, named for each. A\nfew representative ones may be noted. It is a well-known fact, says\nSolinus, that magpies have died because they could not master the\npronunciation of a difficult word. In South America, according to\nPurchas, men make clean their teeth with the beards of seals, \u201cbecause\nthey bee wholesome for the toothache.\u201d The she-camel, so says Launcelot\nAddison, father of the essayist, \u201cbrings forth her young in a negligent\nslumber.\u201d The toucan, says Humboldt, makes an extraordinary gesture\nwhen preparing to drink, which the monks assert is the sign of the\ncross upon the water, and so the creoles call it _diostede_ (God gives\nit to thee). Bordering the country of the grasshopper-eaters in Africa,\nsays Diodorus, is a fair land which has been untenanted since rain bred\na multitude of venomous spiders that stung many persons to death and\ndrove away the remainder. Plutarch thought that the ibis became more\nsacred by standing with straddled legs so as to form a triangle. Buffon\nconfutes the notion, based on the noisome odor of the shrewmouse, that\nits bite is dangerous to cattle. Isaac Walton cites a polygamous fish\nwhich \u201cgoes courting she-goats on the grassy shore.\u201d Even Linn\u00e6us\nthought that birds of paradise had neither wings nor feet.\n\n\n_Pliny\u2019s Mirabilia_\n\nPliny is authority for the fables which follow: The ant rests from\nher labors at the changes of the moon. The sea remains calm while the\nhalcyon is hatching her young upon it. When the sun is in Cancer the\nbodies of dead crabs on the seashore are transformed into serpents.\nWhen the porcupine stretches its skin it discharges its quills like\nmissiles. Lions resent it if a man looks at them asquint. The breath\nof the elephant will draw serpents from their retreats. Only by using\nthe left hand can one pull snakes from their holes. They will flee from\na naked man, but pursue one clothed. The best way to catch eels is to\nput the bait in the end of a hollow fishing rod and suffocate them by\nblowing through it.\n\nBears crawl into their dens on their backs in order to leave no\nbetraying trail. Ostriches throw stones at their pursuers. Vultures\nwill entice a bull over a precipice by holding their wings before its\neyes. The boding raven is most so when it swallows its voice as if\nchoked. If a horse follows in the track of a wolf it will burst asunder\nbeneath its rider. If a shrewmouse crosses the rut of a wheel it will\ndie at once. The pastern bones of swine promote discord. Madness in\nhe-goats may be calmed by stroking their beards. She-goats in pasture\nnever look at one another at sunset. Goats breathe through their ears,\nare never quite free from fever, and are therefore more lascivious than\nsheep. Roebucks grow fat on poisons.\n\nAs to birds and insects, it is doubtful if they dream; yet pigeons\n\u201chave a certain appreciation of glory.\u201d At a certain season cuckoos\nbecome hawks. The crow is at enmity with the weasel, the duck with\nthe sea-mew, but there is friendship between the peacock and the\npigeon, the turtle-dove and the parrot, the heron and the crow. Quails\nsometimes settle so thickly on ships at night as to sink them. Locusts\nmake their whirring noise by grinding their teeth. Hornets, wasps, and\nbees will not attack a person stung by a scorpion. In high winds bees\ncarry small stones for ballast. It is not certain whether their honey\nis \u201cthe sweat of the heavens, or whether a saliva emanating from the\nstars, or a juice exuding from the air while purifying itself.\u201d\n\nStranger than these classic beliefs is the early Christian tradition of\nthe small hole found in the forefeet of pigs when the hair is removed.\nTherein of old time passed the legion of devils in the country of the\nGadarenes. The rings about the hole which seem branded in the skin are\nthe marks of demons\u2019 claws as they entered their unclean habitation.\nJavanese Moslems have it that the peacock was gatekeeper of Paradise\nand admitted the devil by swallowing him. A third domestic creature,\nthe cock, could scatter ghosts and demons by his dawn cry.\n\n\n_Browne Catalogues Vulgar Errors_\n\nThe treatise upon _Vulgar Errors_ which Sir Thomas Browne made in the\nseventeenth century attacks many notions that had come down to his time\nfrom a past without date. Among them are the following: Swans sing\ntheir own death songs. The badger has the legs of one side shorter\nthan the other. Spermaceti is the spawn of the whale. Lampries have\nnine eyes. There is antipathy between the toad and the spider. There\nis a lucky-stone in the toad\u2019s head. The pelican pierces her breast\nand feeds her young with her own blood. The clicking sound made in a\nwainscoting by the beetle called the death-watch presages bereavement.\nPeacocks are ashamed of their legs. Storks will live only in republics\nor free states. Lions are afraid of cocks.\n\nEach of these beliefs the great physician confutes in turn, remarking,\nfor example, that storks nest in kingly France and in the dominions of\nthe Great Turk, and that a lion, escaped from a menagerie, had robbed a\nhen roost in Bavaria.\n\n\n_Beasts of the Hermits_\n\nA chapter of charming legends has for its theme not the remarkable\ntraits of different species of animals, but the conduct of single\ncreatures that came under the influence of holy men who went out into\nthe deserts in the early days of the Christian era. In the absence of\nhuman society the fowls of the air and the beasts of the field formed\nfor the hermit the society of the waste. The crocodile, protected and\nworshiped by pagan Egypt, the gross-looking hippopotamus, the venomous\nserpents, and above all the hyena, with its fearful laughter, rimmed\nthe anchorite\u2019s life with a horizon of supernatural terror; these were\nembodied d\u00e6mons with designs upon his very soul. But sometimes he could\ncast out the evil spirit that tenanted them, and there were other and\ngentler beasts that became his servants and companions. In them the\nunfriendly deserts were made to repeat the polity of Eden, where all\ncreated things obeyed man.\n\nWild asses, lions, stags, wolves, and fowls were the hermit\u2019s domestic\nanimals. Stags, harnessed to plow, cultivated the field of St. Leonor,\nand took the place of St. Colodoc\u2019s cattle when these were driven away\nbecause he had sheltered a hunted deer. St. Helenus rode on the back\nof a crocodile. Dragons guarded the cell of Abbot Ammon. The lion from\nwhose foot St. Gerasimus extracted a thorn protected his ass. St.\nCostinian saddled and rode a bear. St. Sulpicius tells of a she-wolf as\ntame as a dog and of a lioness under a palm tree that moved modestly\naside at a hermit\u2019s command until he had eaten his fill of dates.\nSwallows sang upon the knees of St. Guthlac.\n\nNot all of this, it may be, is the mere poetry of pious imaginations.\nAfter the breakdown of Roman civilization in the west, many of the\noxen, horses, and dogs returned to the wild state, and what the\nhermits did in some cases was merely to recall them to their ancient\nallegiance. Here and there among so many thousands of solitaries, so\nKingsley urges, were men such as become horse-tamers and bee-takers\nin settled communities, whose natures won them friends in the world\nof brutes. The very quietude of the hermits, their habit of silent\nmeditation in field and forest, would disarm the fears of wild things\nand draw them toward companionship.\n\n\n_The Invasion of the Cathedrals_\n\nThe church had yet another chapter to write in the story of the\nbeasts, and this time they became hieroglyphs on the vast scroll of\nthe cathedrals. The early significance of animals in the life of man\nwas completely revived in the medi\u00e6val fanes, but as allegory rather\nthan reality. Brute and fowl were created, it was thought, only to\nillustrate the truth of God\u2019s word and to convey some spiritual\nmessage. Did not Job say, \u201cAsk the beast and it will teach thee, and\nthe birds of heaven and they will tell thee\u201d? What they taught and\ntold was set forth at large in the cathedral, which became in very\nfact a rebus carved in stone. With effects that were indescribably\nquaint, and beautiful at times, Christian symbolism wrought itself in\necclesiastical architecture in an age when few could read other writing.\n\nFrom Egypt, where cenobites were already in communion with desert\ncreatures, the impulse came; and from India, where Buddhist ascetics\nwere taught to pattern their humility from the ass that sleeps by the\nroadside, their aloofness from the rhinoceros that wanders alone. Its\nimmediate source was the _Physiologus_, or Naturalist, the compilation\nby an Alexandrian Greek of what the ancient world reported of animals\nand plants, with moral reflections added. The compendium was translated\ninto all of the languages of Europe and several African and Asiatic\ntongues, and, being in the vernacular, may have been for a time more\nwidely read than the Bible itself. For the unlearned a source of\npleasant stories and forerunner of the bestiaries, for the learned\nit was a theological treatise. Its subject-matter entered patristic\nwritings and popular sermons and was at length transferred to stone.\n\nThe vogue of animal symbolism in Christian churches covered half a\nmillennium, was at its height in the eleventh and twelfth centuries,\nwas still alive at the Reformation, and left its marks in sacred\nvessels and ecclesiastical vestments as well as in sculpture. Fa\u00e7ades,\nportals, buttresses, and gargoyles of church exteriors, and cloisters,\nchancels and chapels of interiors, were decorated with animal forms.\nAs an emblem of priestly chastity, the elephant was embroidered on\nsacerdotal vestments. Lamps, censers, and sacramental vessels repeated\nthe outline or carried the effigy of the griffin, the pelican, the\ndolphin. Sculptured lions ramped at cathedral doors, lizards peeped\nfrom crevices, and all about the sanctuary were the figures of foxes\nand ferrets, harts and hedgehogs, panthers and partridges, the whale,\nthe crocodile, the tortoise, and a hundred other flying, walking,\ncreeping, or swimming things.\n\nThough St. Bernard denounced this as \u201cthe foul and tattered vesture of\npagan allegory,\u201d every animal was a text, or was designed to be. The\nlion typified majesty, the ox patience, the ram spiritual leadership,\nthe turtle-dove constancy, the skin-sloughing snake the repentant\nbeliever, the salamander the righteous who extinguish the flames of\ndesire. The sun-staring, youth-renewing eagle was an admonition to\nthose grown old in sin to face the day star of revelation. Ravens\nsymbolized Jews who battened on the carrion of the Law. Sometimes\nvirtues and vices were pictured as women riding animals or bearing\nanimal devices--Humility on a panther, Chastity on a unicorn, Devotion\non an ibex, Patience with a swan helmet, Love with a pelican shield,\nLust with a siren-buckler.\n\nAnimal symbolism had also its secular phases. Amorous troubadours\nlikened themselves to flame-walled salamanders; or, disappointed in\nlove, likened woman to the double-natured dragon and the hooting owl.\nBy degrees the secular impulse invaded the churches. Animal sculptures\nwere admitted as such and not as cipher characters of divine script;\nand satire, inspired or tolerated by the regular body of clergy, raided\nthe sheepfold of allegory. This was directed against the preaching\nfriars and the failings of the monastic orders, all the actors in\nthe beast-epos of Reynard the fox entering the sanctuary as its\nauxiliaries. The animals overran windows, balustrades, cornices, and\ncapitals; foxes were significantly depicted in palmer weeds; a stall\nin the cathedral at Amiens showed Reynard preaching to a flock of\nfowls and with pious gesture reaching for the nearest hen. Death, \u201cthe\nsarcastic and irreverent skeleton,\u201d capered among the creatures in the\ndance macabre. At the outset an attack on religious abuses, the secular\nphase became in effect a lampoon of the very rites of the church.\n\nAmong other figures that caricatured its principal ceremonies under\nits own roof, says Evans in his authoritative study of the period,\nwere \u201capes in choristers\u2019 robes, swine in monks\u2019 hoods, asses in\ncowls chanting and playing the organ, sirens in the costume of nuns\nwith their faces carefully veiled and the rest of their persons\nexposed, stags in chasubles ministering at the altar and wolves in the\nconfessional giving absolution to lambs.\u201d The ass, which the east had\nlong celebrated for its devoted service and which has a high niche in\nbiblical story, attained a place in the churches of the west which\nneither fact fully accounts for. There was thought to be some mystic\nrelation between its anatomy and the architecture of a cathedral. In\na catechism of the last century used in a French town it was recited\namong other details that the head of the ass signified the bell of the\ntown cathedral, its paunch the poor-box and its tail the aspergill\nfor sprinkling holy water. In the one-time popular Feast of the Ass,\na living ass was led up the nave into the chancel, the chants were\nsung in a braying tone, and the officiating priest dismissed the\ncongregation with a loud hee-haw.\n\nThe ceremony has passed. Most of the beast figures have been removed\nfrom the cathedrals. Animal symbolism still lives, but more in letters\nthan in stone.\n\n\n\n\nChapter V. The Fabulous Beasts\n\n\nIn the world that was, the fabulous animals that roved the land were\ncreatures of unusual interest, though of limited number. More species\nwere to be found in the deep. Thither, Pliny explains, fall the seeds\nfrom the innumerable figures of beasts impressed as constellations\nupon the heavens, and these seeds, being mixed together in the watery\nelement, produce a variety of monstrous forms.\n\nWith animal life abounding in the thickets and fields of the earth,\nand for every bird and beast a fable, there was less incentive to\ninvent new species of them than there was to make stories of ghosts,\nd\u00e6mons and faeries, or of men with beast attributes or lineage or some\nquality of caricature in their anatomy. With the coming of heraldry\nthe category of strange creatures is greatly enlarged, but the shapes\nadded by blazonry do not purport to be living things and have no place\nin geography or in literature, save in massive volumes where the quaint\ndesigns and quainter jargon of a curious erudition are preserved.\n\nThe ancient had na\u00efve ideas about cross-breeding. Every unusual\nanimal seemed a hybrid of two known species. These were produced in\nhot climates. Hence, says Pliny, arose the saying, common even in\nGreece, that \u201cAfrica is always producing something new.\u201d The males and\nfemales of various species in that singular land, he thought, coupled\npromiscuously with each other, but not always with impunity. \u201cThe lion\nrecognizes, by the peculiar odor of the pard, when the lioness has been\nunfaithful to him, and avenges himself with the greatest fury.\u201d\n\nThere was a belief, which lasted nearer to the present time, that the\nsavage dogs of India, two of which would make no scruple of attacking\nthe lion, had tigresses for their dams. Diodorus noted that eastern\nArabia produced beasts of double nature and mixed shape, and he deemed\nit reasonable that \u201cby the vivifying heat of the sun in southern parts\nof the world many sorts of wonderful creatures are there bred.\u201d Among\nthese he cites the crocodiles and river horses of Egypt. He strains\na point in support of his theory in the account of what he calls the\nStruthocameli of Arabia, \u201cwho have the shape both of a camel and an\nostrich.\u201d He describes their bodies \u201cbig as a camel, newly foaled,\u201d\ntheir small heads with large black eyes, their long necks, the \u201chairy\nfeathers\u201d on their wings, their strong thighs, and \u201ccloven hoofs.\u201d\nThis creature, says the Sicilian geographer, \u201cseems both terrestrial\nand volatile, a land beast and a bird\u201d--after all, only an inexact yet\ngraphic portrait of the ostrich. That this fowl is a cross between a\ncamel and a bird is an Arab notion; according to Aristotle it is of an\nequivocal nature, part bird and part quadruped. So its Persian name\nsignifies, and sacred writers liken its voice to the bellowing of a\nbull.\n\nEven the breezes take part in the creation of hybrids, so men have\nthought. That there is actual generative power in the wind is a belief\nolder than the discovery of its function in carrying the fertilizing\npollen of plants. Pliny records the popular belief that barren eggs are\nbreeze-begotten; hence their name of Zephyria. The modern \u201cwind-egg\u201d\nfor an egg without a shell laid by a fat hen, but supposed by Doctor\nJohnson not to contain the principle of life, comes from a similar\nnotion. Male sheep are conceived when the northeast wind blows, and\nfemales when the south wind blows, according to the Romans. One of the\nheroic ballads of the Tartars personifies the wind as a foal which\ncourses about the earth. The fable about Portuguese mares, widely\ncredited by the ancients and roundly asserted by Pliny, is an echo\nof sailor reports on the fertility of Lusitania: \u201cIn the vicinity of\nOlisipo and the river Tagus, the mares, by turning their faces toward\nthe west wind as it blows, become impregnated by its breezes, and the\nfoals thus conceived are remarkable for their fleetness; but they never\nlive beyond three years.\u201d\n\n\n_The Unicorn_\n\nBest known animal of legend is the unicorn. There are two veritable\nunicorns, or animals with one horn--the rhinoceros and the narwhal.\nThe accepted description of this animal gives it the narwhal\u2019s straight\nand spirally twisted horn but none of the parts of the rhinoceros. It\nis pictured with the legs of a buck, the tail of a lion, and the head\nand body of a horse. Its markings suggest the zebra\u2019s; its head is red,\nits body white, its eyes blue, while its horn is red at the tip, white\nat the base and black in between. The high authority of Aristotle has\ndetermined these points.\n\nThe ancients mention five different animals as having one horn set in\nthe middle of the forehead. The most famous of these were the Egyptian\noryx and the Indian ass. Pliny says the oryx gazes at the Dog Star\nwhen it rises, and sneezes in a sort of worship. It has the stature\nof a bull, the form of a deer, and hair that sets forward instead\nof backward. The Indian ass is described by Ctesias as having the\ntraditional shape and hues of the unicorn, solid hoofs, and a horn a\ncubit in length. Filings of this horn, if taken in a potion, are an\nantidote to poison. Drinking cups made from it give immunity also from\nepilepsy. The Indian ass is so fleet it can be seized only when it\nleads its foal to pasture. In defense of its young it uses its horn,\nteeth, and feet, killing horses and men. It is sought for the horn and\nhuckle bones, the latter, Ctesias declares, \u201cthe most beautiful I have\never seen\u201d; they are as heavy as lead, he says, and of the color of\ncinnabar.\n\nThe third animal was the monoceros, on which the Ors\u00e6an Indians preyed.\nIt had the head of the stag, the feet of the elephant, and the tail of\nthe boar, while the rest of its body was horse-like. The single black\nhorn projecting from the middle of its forehead was two cubits long. It\nlowed like a bull, was of ferocious nature, wandered alone, and could\nnot be taken alive. The two other unicorns of ancient story were the\nsingle-horned horse and the single-horned ox.\n\nThere was a second growth of the fable in the Middle Ages and the\nunicorn took on new dignities. It was the only animal that would\nattack the elephant, disembowelling the pachyderm with one blow of its\nsharp-nailed foot; and it charged the lion at sight. The king of beasts\nwas constrained to kingly craft, dodging behind a tree. His assailant,\nsays Topsell, \u201cin the swiftness of his course runneth against the tree,\nwherein his sharp horn sticketh fast\u201d; and the lion dispatches him at\nleisure. In his _Display of Heraldry_ (1724) Guillim says the unicorn\nis never taken alive because \u201cthe greatness of his mind is such rather\nto die.\u201d Medi\u00e6val intelligence at last hit upon a characteristic device\nto secure this creature without slaying him, and the bestiaries of\nthe time record it. This was to place a young virgin near his haunts.\nAs soon as he saw her he would run to her and lie down at her feet,\nplacing his head in her bosom, when the hunters could halter him.\n\nIt was the alexipharmic virtues of the unicorn\u2019s horn that most engaged\nthe ages of faith, when the poisoning of princes was almost an article\nof statecraft. As late as 1789 it was used to test food at the court of\nFrance, and horns, usually of the narwhal, were in the royal museums.\nThe ancients had made little of this. The reference of Ctesias to the\nhorn of the Indian ass as an antidote for poison and a cure of the\nfalling sickness stands alone. What was later made of this reputed\npower is shown in a passage from John of Herse, who pilgrimed to\nJerusalem in 1389: \u201cNear the field Helyon in the Holy Land is the river\nMara, whose bitter waters Moses struck with his staff and made sweet,\nso that the children of Israel could drink thereof. Even now evil and\nunclean spirits poison it after the going down of the sun, but in the\nmorning after the powers of darkness have disappeared, the unicorn\ncomes from the sea and dips its horn into the stream, and thereby\nexpels and neutralizes the poison, so that the other animals can drink\nof it during the day.\u201d\n\nAccording to Guillim, it became \u201ca general conceit that the wild beasts\nof the wilderness used not to drink of the pools, for fear of venomous\nserpents there breeding, until the unicorn hath stirred them with his\nhorn.\u201d Thus its office was that of water-conner for the other beasts of\nthe forest.\n\nCosmas Indicopleustes said he had seen the brazen statues of four\nunicorns set upon towers in the royal palace of Ethiopia. Frobisher\nfound a dead \u201csea unicorne\u201d on the Canadian coast with a broken horn\ntwo yards long. Into the hollow of the horn the sailors put spiders,\nwhere they presently died. In his second voyage (1564) Sir John Hawkins\nfound the Florida Indians wearing pieces of the unicorn\u2019s horn about\ntheir necks.\n\nThe unicorn was celebrated in Christian symbolism before it found a\npermanent niche in heraldry. When Balaam blesses Israel he says, \u201cGod\nled him out of Egypt even as the glory of the unicorn.\u201d According to\nthe _Bestiare Divine de Guillaume Clerc de Normandie_, the animal\nrepresents Christ, and its horn signifies the Gospel of Truth. It\nbecame a favorite charge in Scottish heraldry and James I of England\nmade it the sinister support in the arms of Great Britain, replacing\nthe red dragon of Wales.\n\nPurchas the Pilgrim was always expecting news of the unicorn, hearing\nof it and doubting report. Browne avows his belief in the animal in a\nsardonic dissertation. Far from doubting its existence, he says, \u201cwe\naffirm there are many kinds thereof,\u201d and he mentions the five classic\nanimals, several fishes, and \u201cfour kinds of nasicornous beetles.\u201d What\nhe wants to know is which one possesses the alexipharmic horn. He\ncomplains that the animal is not uniformly described: \u201cPliny affirmeth\nit is a fierce, terrible creature; Vartomannus, a tame and mansuete\nanimal; those which Garcias ab Horto described about the Cape of Good\nHope were beheld with heads like horses; those which Vartomannus beheld\nhe described with the head of a deer: Pliny, \u00c6lian, Solinus, and Paulus\nVenetus affirmeth the feet of the unicorn are undivided and like the\nelephant\u2019s; but those two which Vartomannus beheld at Mecca were footed\nlike a goat. As \u00c6lian describeth, it is in the bigness of an horse; as\nVartomannus, of a colt; that which Thevet speaketh of was not so big as\nan heifer; but Paulus Venetus affirmeth that they are but little less\nthan elephants.\u201d\n\nBrowne proceeds remorselessly: The horns of the unicorn, as described\nby writers or preserved in collections, are too various. Some are red,\nsome are black, and some have spiral markings, while \u201cthose two in the\ntreasure of St. Mark are plain and best accord with those of the Indian\nass.\u201d Albertus Magnus describes one ten feet long, a narwhal\u2019s, Browne\nsuggests. Others are but fossil teeth and bones and petrified tree\nbranches.\n\nYet the tradition long survived Browne. His contemporary, the\nPortuguese Jesuit Lobo, said that in Abyssinia he had seen the unicorn,\nin shape like a beautiful bay horse with a black tail. He could give no\nminute account, for it ran with prodigious swiftness from wood to wood,\nand never fed save when surrounded by animals that protected it. \u201cThe\nunicorn really exists in Tibet,\u201d Huc affirmed after traveling there in\n1846. At Kordofan, in 1848, a man, whose custom was to provide Baron\nVon Mueller with animal specimens, offered to sell him an _a\u2019nasa_,\nwhich he described as of donkey size with a tail like a boar\u2019s, and a\nsingle pendulous horn which it erected when it saw an enemy. In 1876\nPrejevalski gave an account of the _orongo_, a stag-like creature with\ntwo vertical horns, which he said was common in Tibet; according to\nnatives there were a few single horned individuals among the herds.\n\nEvery feature in the unicorn legend of the west has its counterpart\nin the Chinese books. Six species of unicorns are mentioned; one\nfigures in the crest of the Mikado of Japan; another is sculptured in\nthe avenue of animals that leads to the Ming tombs north of Peking.\nAnother, and the best known, the _ki-lin_, appeared only in the reign\nof upright monarchs. It was called a spiritual beast, chief of the\n360 kinds of hairy creatures. Its pace was regular, it ambled only on\nselected grounds, and its voice was like a monastery bell. So softly it\ntrod that it left no footprints and crushed no living thing.\n\nAll a moon myth, says one ingenious writer. But Gould declares, \u201cI\nfind it impossible to believe that a creature whose existence has been\naffirmed by so many authors, at so many different dates, and from so\nmany countries, can be the symbol of a myth.\u201d He thinks it either a\nhybrid occasionally produced by the crossing of the equine and bovine\nfamilies, or else the generic name for extinct missing links between\nhorses, cattle, and deer.\n\nWhence the world\u2019s long belief in the unicorn? Was there such an\nanimal, now extinct? Cuvier returns an emphatic negative: \u201cThe nations\nof modern days have only been able to drive back the noxious animals\nin the deserts, but have never yet suceeded in exterminating a single\nspecies.\u201d He goes further: there could never have been a cloven-footed\nruminant with a single horn, because its frontal bone must have been\ndivided, and no horn could have been placed on the suture.\n\nCtesias may have woven some rhinoceros details into his picture of the\nso-called Indian ass. The Egyptian unicorn was called an oryx--a word\nperhaps related to the Sanscrit and Teutonic aurochs. There is a large\nAfrican antelope the modern name of which is oryx. It is probable that\nthe correct name has been retained, and that the oryx, or gemsbok, of\nto-day, is the unicorn of Herodotus, Strabo, Pliny, Lampridius, et al.\nBut the real oryx has two horns, while the fabled animal had but one\nbecause the Egyptians did not understand perspective in drawing.\n\n\n_The Griffin_\n\nGreek and Persepolitan griffins are curiously alike, and both may\nhave derived from the winged lion of the Assyrians, emblem of the\ngod Nergal. Griffin lore, however, is rich in details which have no\nreligious significance. Herodotus speaks of the animal as guarding the\ngold of the one-eyed Arimaspians in Asia north of the Altai Mountains.\nCtesias places it in the mountain barrier of India.\n\nAccording to \u00c6lian the griffin was a winged and feathered lion with\nan eagle\u2019s head and a color scheme that suggests the German imperial\nflag--the breast plumage red, the wings white, and the dorsal plumage\nblack; \u201ca mixed and dubious animal,\u201d Browne calls it. Ctesias says it\nhad also blue neck feathers and red eyes. He describes the species as\na race of four-footed birds the size of wolves, but Maundeville says\nthey were as large and strong as eight lions and could carry to their\nnests \u201ca great Horse, or two Oxen yoked together as they go to the\nPlough.\u201d Of their talons the Indians made drinking cups. The griffins\nbuilt their nests like the eagle, but laid therein agates instead of\neggs. The Bactrians said that these birds dug gold out of the mountains\nand made their nests therewith, and the Indians carried off so much of\nit as falls to the ground. The Indians denied that the griffins were\nwatchmen for the gold of their district or had any use for it; they\nsaid that when the birds see them coming to gather gold, they fear the\nintruders are after their young and assail them. Also they attack all\nother beasts and prevail over them, save only the lion and the elephant.\n\nFearful of their vengeance, the natives go not out to gather gold\nin the daytime, say the chroniclers, but under cover of night make\ntheir raids into a frightful desert where griffin and gold are found\ntogether. Companies of one thousand or even two thousand men set out,\nequipped with mattocks and sacks. The expeditions take from three to\nfour years, for this region lies afar. If successful, the members\nreturn wealthy; but should they be detected in the act of theft, says\n\u00c6lian, certain death would be their fate.\n\nThere are four explanations of this four-footed bird of classic\nlegend and Welsh heraldry--that the winged Assyrian lion was taken\nfor a portrait instead of a symbol; that the Samoyeds mistook mammoth\nbones in the gold-bearing district of the Ural Mountains for remains\nof monster fowls; that the griffins were merely Tibetan mastiffs of\nsingular ferocity and reputed tigrine decent, and that they are an\nearly form of the dragon. The so-called griffin\u2019s claws in the museums\nof Dresden and Vienna and in the churches elsewhere are horns of the\nCaffrarian buffalo. Drinking cups made of them were used in treating\nepilepsy.\n\n\n_The Hippogrif_\n\nIt would be vain to seek among animals the original of the hippogrif,\na creature related to the griffin, though of more involved lineage,\nand like it treated sometimes as a bird, sometimes as a beast. The\nhippogrif is a product of medi\u00e6val romance, and wings its way as the\ncourser of more than mortal knights over countries of fable, albeit\nthey bear such names as Brittany, Abyssinia, Circassia, and Cathay.\nAs the griffin was called a hybrid between the lion and the eagle, so\nthe hippogrif was supposed to be a hybrid between the griffin and the\nhorse. It had the head, wings, and fore claws of the griffin and the\nbody, hind hoofs and tail of the horse. Its habitat was the Riph\u00e6an\nMountains, source of the north wind. The hippogrif enters the Orlando\ncycle as the mount of an enchanter with a castle on the Pyrenees, but\nlater serves the far adventures of the paladins of Charlemagne.\n\n\n_The Monster Rat_\n\nThe Samoyeds and Chinese who found in the river banks of the north the\nfrozen bodies of mammoths, with skin and flesh intact as if they had\ndied but yesterday, reached the strange yet natural conclusion that\nthis was a kind of monstrous burrowing rat. It figures in Chinese books\nas _fen-shu_, the \u201cdigging rat,\u201d or _yen-men_, the \u201cburrowing ox.\u201d Why\nwas it always dead when men came upon it? Because air and sunshine were\nboth fatal to it; evidently in its wanderings underground it had broken\nthe crust above it and died in the daylight. Sometimes the Yakuts saw\nthe earth tremble and knew this great rat walked beneath. \u201cThere is got\nfrom it,\u201d says the _Chinese Encyclopedia_, \u201can ivory as white as that\nof the elephant, but easier to work, and not liable to split. Its flesh\nis very cold and excellent for refreshing the blood.\u201d\n\n\n_The Martikhora_\n\nIn the jungles of Ind roved the martikhora--a creature with unpleasant\naffinities to men, the great cats, and the serpents. Its face was\nlike a man\u2019s with pale blue eyes and human ears but with three rows\nof teeth. Its body was as big as the lion\u2019s and in color red like\ncinnabar. It had a tail like the scorpion\u2019s and more than a cubit long.\nThe martikhora, indeed, was a sort of anticipation of the machine gun,\nfor it had one sting at the end of its tail, two at the roots of this\nmember, and a fourth on the crown of its head; and these it projected\nto the distance of a hundred feet. The missiles, which were about a\nfoot long and no thicker than fine thread, were fatal to every animal\nsave the elephants. The natives, says Ctesias, hunted it from the backs\nof elephants. The name of the animal means man-eater, so-called because\nthe beast carried off men and women. Its size, also, and general\ndescription, and the manner of hunting it all suggest the tiger as\nfearful Indians might report it. To this day the Cambodians think the\nwhiskers of the tiger are a strong poison. The Malays call it a demon\nin beast form and speak of its Village where the houses are raftered\nwith men\u2019s bones and thatched with human hair.\n\nIn heraldry the martikhora is called the montegre, manticora, or\nman-tyger, and is pictured with the body of a lion, the head of an old\nman, the horns of an ox, and sometimes with dragon feet.\n\n\n_The Scythian Lamb_\n\nTo match the barnacle goose which came from a nut, the ages of faith\nhad the Scythian lamb which grew in a gourd. Maundeville has the best\naccount, for did he not make a meal of one? The creature is found in \u201ca\nkingdom that men call Caldilhe,\u201d one of \u201cthe Countries and Isles that\nbe beyond the Land of Cathay.\u201d In this country \u201cthere groweth a manner\nof Fruit, as though it were Gourds. And when they be ripe, men cut them\nin two, and Men find within a little Beast in Flesh and Bone and Blood,\nas though it were a little Lamb without Wool. And men eat both the\nFruit and the Beast. And that is a great Marvel.\u201d\n\nFriar Odoric makes a similar report. In other stories the Scythian\nlamb is a true animal attached to the earth by its umbilical cord. The\nScythian lamb of botany is a woolly fern (_Cibotium barometz_) with a\nprostrate stem turned upside down. It is also called vegetable lamb\nand Tartarian lamb. In his _Travels into Muscovy and Persia_ (1636)\nthe ambassador from the Duke of Holstein describes it as a gourd like\nunto a lamb in all its members and with the lamb\u2019s sacrificial relation\nto the wolf. It grows wild in the district of Samara, in Russia, and\nits growing is a kind of destructive browsing. \u201cIt changes places in\ngrowing, as far as the stalk will reach, and wherever it turns the\ngrass withers, which the Muscovites call feeding.\u201d When all available\ngrass fails, it dies. The rind of the gourd is covered with a sort of\nhair, which makes a good substitute for fur. The natives showed the\ntraveler certain skins, covered with a soft frizzled wool \u201cnot unlike\nthat of a lamb newly weaned\u201d--vegetable lamb, they affirmed. Scaliger\ndeclares that alone among animals the wolf feeds on this gourd and that\nwolf traps are baited with it.\n\n[Illustration: _In Caldilhe There Groweth a Manner of Fruit, and Men\nFind Within a Little Beast as Though It Were a Lamb Without Wool_]\n\nErasmus Darwin has these lines upon the Scythian lamb in his _Botanic\nGarden_:\n\n /*\n Rooted in earth each cloven hoof descends,\n And round and round her flexible neck she bends;\n Crops the gray coral moss and hoary thyme;\n Or laps with rosy tongue the melting rime,\n Eyes with mute tenderness her distant dam,\n And seems to bleat, a Vegetable Lamb.\n\nSo until 1915 stood the fable--seemingly just a tale of the credulous\nMiddle Age, rationalized by later science and gently derided in still\nlater rhyme. Then the scholarship of Berthold Laufer, basing itself\nmainly upon Chinese texts, gave it long backgrounds. The Scythian lamb\nhas been in turn a mollusk, a marine sheep, a bird, the cotton-plant, a\nstrange half-human creature and--this part is surmise--an allegory of\nthe early Christian Church, the Lamb of Revelation that \u201cstood on the\nmount Sion.\u201d\n\nUnto this day fabrics are made of the undyed fleece of the true\nScythian lamb. Byssus silk is the name it bears in commerce, and\nTaranto is the seat of its manufacture. The silk is derived from the\nfibrous foot by which mollusks of the species called the pinna, found\nin the waters about southern Italy, attach themselves to rocks. The\noriginal Scythian lamb was this mollusk and its umbilical cord was\nthe byssus, or foot, which anchored it. The genesis of the legend\nseems to be a statement of Aristotle that these creatures have within\nthem a parasite, a small crab, nicknamed the \u201cpinna-guard\u201d which in\ngathering its own food collects fishes also for its blind, stationary,\nand helpless host. Without the pinna-guard, says Aristotle, the mollusk\nsoon dies; and he cites the latter to illustrate his observation that\nin the sea \u201cthere are certain objects concerning which one would be\nat loss to determine whether they be animal or vegetable.\u201d After\nAristotle\u2019s time, and in the first centuries of the Christian era,\nbyssus fabrics, which may have been a by-product of pearl fisheries in\nthe Persian Gulf, appeared in the Mediterranean countries.\n\nHere, then, is an animal living within what passed for a vegetable\nthat was \u201crooted in earth,\u201d and that produced a substance later known\nas marine wool. But how did the Adriatic mollusk and its tenant crab\nbecome a lamb-tenanted gourd, or a veritable sheep attached to the soil\nby a fleshy stem, in the plains of Asiatic Scythia? And how did this\ntiny partnership of the sea floor become in turn a ph\u0153nix-like creature\nof the air and the grisly Yedua, man-monster of Talmudic legend?\nThe process illustrates the part that travel tale, the carrying of\nconfused reports from place to place, has in creating myth. Though the\nfable grew up in the Roman Orient and reached China only through such\nreports, the superior historical sense of the Chinese has made their\nannals the key to its meaning.\n\nThe first Chinese record in point, not later than A. D. 220, speaks\nof a fine cloth in the Roman Orient \u201csaid by some to originate from\nthe down of a water sheep.\u201d This may be inference from the almost\ncontemporary phrase of Alciphron, the Greek sophist, who calls byssus\ntextiles \u201cwoolen stuffs out of the sea.\u201d In the sixth century Procopius\nrecites that each of the five hereditary satraps of Armenia had from\nthe Roman emperor a golden-hued cloak made from \u201cwool gathered out of\nthe sea.\u201d In an account by the Arab Istakhri, written about A.D. 950,\nit is said that an animal runs out of the sea and rubs itself against\nthe rocks, \u201cwhereupon it deposes a kind of wool of silken texture and\ngolden color.\u201d Robes of this, worn by the Ommiad princes at Cordova,\nwere valued at a thousand gold pieces each.\n\nBy etymological error and a device of ancient trade, the mollusk, which\nhad already become a water sheep, got itself wings. Pinna, its name, is\nalso the classic Latin word for \u201cfeather,\u201d an ambiguity which may have\nconfused the Arabs; and the filaments of the shellfish are rather like\nthe plumage of fowls. Byssus weaves were held at so high a price that\nthey were counterfeited in feather fabrics, and to promote their sale\nthe discovery of a wonderful bird was at length announced. The Arab,\nKazwini, calls it _abu baraquish_ and pictures it as like the stork;\nbut \u201cevery hour its plumage glitters in another color, red, yellow,\ngreen and blue.\u201d The fabric from its plumage is named \u201cph\u0153nix-feather\ngold\u201d in a Chinese work of the Mongol period. Skilled artisans, it is\nrelated, weave a soft golden brocade from the neck feathers of the\nph\u0153nix, which in the spring drop to the foot of the mountains. These\nwere probably the feathered headskins of peacocks, which in China are\nstill made into jackets.\n\nWhen the _Annals_ of the T\u2019ang Dynasty (618-906) were compiled, the\nwater sheep had become a land animal of Syria, or Fu-lin as that\ncountry was called. Here is the Chinese account: \u201cThere are lambs\nengendered in the soil. The inhabitants wait till they are going to\nsprout, then build enclosures around as a preventive measure for wild\nbeasts that might rush in from outside and devour them. The umbilical\ncord of the lambs is attached to the soil, and when forcibly cut off\nthey will die. The people, donning cuirasses and mounted on horseback,\nbeat drums to frighten them. The lambs shriek from fear and thus their\numbilical cord is ruptured. Thereupon they set out in search of water\nand pasture.\u201d\n\nIt was part of the tradition of the marine sheep that it yielded its\nfleece of its own accord, and this was carried over into the later\nChinese story that the Scythian or Syrian lamb must itself rupture the\numbilical cord, which others could not sever without killing it. The\nappearance of men in armor to frighten it to this end is elucidated\nby a passage from the thirteenth-century Arab traveler, Abul Abbas.\nAfter the pinna comes ashore and lets its wool escape, he records, it\nis pounced upon by large crabs. In the Chinese story, these crabs have\nbecome men on horseback and their shells are the cuirasses worn by the\nhorsemen.\n\nA debased version of the same story appears in the Mongol period when\na thirteenth-century Chinese traveler describes the \u201csheep planted on\nhillocks\u201d in the countries of the western sea. The umbilical cord of a\nsheep is planted and watered. At the time of the first thunder peals it\nbegins to grow. When matured, the creature is frightened by the sound\nof wooden instruments and, breaking off the cord that attaches it to\nthe ground, roams about in search of herbage. This was the tale Odoric\nand Maundeville heard; that the lamb was inclosed in a gourd may have\nbeen their own invention, or the report of some early attempt to relate\nit to the cotton pod, which about a generation ago was conjectured to\nbe the basis of the fable.\n\n\u201cCreatures called Lords of the Field are regarded as beasts,\u201d says\nthe Talmud. The same creature is also called the Man of the Mountain.\n\u201cIt draws its food out of the soil by means of the umbilical cord; if\nits navel be cut, it cannot live,\u201d says Simeon a thirteenth-century\nrabbi. In the detailed portrait by Rabbi Meir the timid vegetable lamb\nundergoes a wolfish transformation: \u201cThere is an animal styled Yedua,\nwith the bones of which witchcraft is practiced. It issues from the\nearth like the stem of a plant, just as a gourd. In all respects the\nYedua has human form in face, body, hands, and feet. No creature can\napproach within the tether of the stem, for it seizes and kills all. As\nfar as the stem stretches, it devours the herbage all around. Whoever\nis intent on capturing this animal must not approach it, but tear at\nthe cord until it is ruptured, whereupon the animal soon dies.\u201d\n\nLaufer thinks that the Jewish legend is early Christian allegory\nmisunderstood; that the Man of the Mountain is \u201cthe lamb that stood on\nthe mount Sion,\u201d a symbol of the Church itself the followers of which\nare attached to the earth by sensual pleasures; and that the mounted\nhorsemen of the Chinese version, who cause the lambs to break their\nconnection with the earth, may be the two hundred thousand horsemen of\nRevelation that symbolize the Last Judgment.\n\n\n_Gold-guarding Ants_\n\nBits of turquoise, chips of obsidian arrow heads, and fragments of\nprehistoric jewelry are found in the little heaps of earth which ants\nbring up from underground on the sites of vanished cities in New\nMexico. On the Pajarito plateau ant-gold is not unknown. Ant-gold is\nthe theme of one of the most circumstantial and puzzling stories told\nby ancient travelers. Herodotus lays its scene somewhere near Cabul.\nThe Indians of that district send forth men in search of gold into a\nsandy desert \u201cwhere live great ants in size somewhat less than dogs,\nbut bigger than foxes.\u201d A number of these were caught by hunters and\nsent to the Persian king. The ants live underground and, \u201clike the\nGreek ants, which they very much resemble in shape, throw up sand-heaps\nas they burrow.\u201d\n\nThere is gold in the sand, but the ants are formidable enemies and\nfleet in pursuit. So the Indians harness a female camel between two\nmales, and the female is one that has lately dropped a foal. The inroad\nis timed so that the caravans arrive when the sun is hottest and the\nants are hiding from the heat. Herodotus continues:\n\n\u201cThe Indians fill their bags with the sand and ride away at full speed;\nthe ants, however, scenting them, as the Persians say, rush forth in\npursuit. Now these animals are so swift, they declare, that there\nis nothing in the world like them; if it were not, therefore, that\nthe Indians get a start while the ants are mustering, not a single\ngold-gatherer could escape. During the flight the male camels grow\ntired and begin to drag; but the females recollect the young which they\nhave left behind, and never flag. Thus, say the Persians, the Indians\nget most of their gold.\u201d\n\nIn substance the story is repeated in the letter which Prester John\nsent to the Pope in the twelfth century. The \u201cemmet valley\u201d also\nappears in the _Arabian Nights_. Megasthenes said that the plain\ntenanted by the monster ants is three thousand stadi\u00e6 in circumference\nand lies eastward in the mountains in the kingdom of the Dard\u00e6. In\nwinter the ants dig holes and pile the auriferous earth in heaps at the\npit mouths. Pliny declares the ants are of the color of cats and the\nsize of Egyptian wolves; that they work in winter and are despoiled\nin summer. \u201cThe horns of the Indian ant,\u201d he remarks, \u201cfixed up in\nthe temple of Hercules at Erythr\u00e6 were objects of great wonderment.\u201d\nNearchus, admiral of Alexander, reports having seen skins of these\nants as large as leopard skins. Ctesias speaks in his _Persica_ of a\nhorse-pismire which was fed by the magi and became of such monstrous\nsize that it took two pounds of meat a day to victual it. As late as\nthe sixteenth century there is a story by Busbequius that the Shah of\nPersia sent one of the Indian ants as a present to Sultan Soliman at\nConstantinople. Maundeville transfers the whole scene to Taprobane\n(Ceylon) and varies the incidents: Men do not enter ant-land but send\nthither mares to which empty vessels are suspended. \u201cIt is Pismire\nnature that they let nothing be empty among them, but anon they fill\nit, and so they fill those Vessels with Gold.\u201d When the foals neigh in\nthe distance their dams return to them with a golden burden.\n\nWhat were these ants, and whence the fable?\n\nIt will be noted that the griffins were cast in a similar r\u00f4le in\nanother Indian gold quest. It may be accepted that good-sized animals,\nor the skins of animals, were seen in menageries, museums, and temples,\nand identified with the ant custodians of the Scythian metal. It\nhas been suggested that these were some other burrowing animal--the\nanteater, or the marmot; but neither is fleet of foot. M. de Weltheim\nthought the Herodotoan ant might be the corsac, a small Asiatic fox.\n\nPhilology has a word to offer. The gold collected on the plains of\nLittle Tibet is popularly known as _pippilika_, or \u201cant gold,\u201d from\nthe belief that ants bring it up, or bare the veins which carry it.\nMcCrindle asserts that the gold-diggers were neither ants nor other\nanimals, but \u201cTibetan miners, who, like their descendants of the\npresent day, preferred working their mines in winter when the frozen\nground stands well and is not likely to trouble them by falling\nin.\u201d Thus the raid and retreat would be accomplished with the same\nexpedition with which any tribe would make a sudden foray on another\ntribe equipped with equal ordnance and cavalry. Metaphor still speaks\nof the miner as a mole or a human ant.\n\n\n_The Questing Beast_\n\nIn _Le Morte d\u2019Arthur_, Malory describes a singular animal with an\neconomy of phrase that whets curiosity. Arthur had had a heavy dream\nof griffins and serpents that devoured his land, and to put it out of\nhis mind he went a-hunting. And he followed a white hart until his\nhorse fell dead under him and his quarry was embushed. \u201cHe set him down\nby a fountain, and there he fell in great thoughts. And as he sat him\nso, him thought he heard a noise of hounds, to the sum of thirty. And\nwith that the king saw coming toward him the strangest beast that ever\nhe saw or heard of; so the beast went to the well and drank, and the\nnoise was in the beast\u2019s belly like unto the questyng of thirty couple\nhounds; but all the while the beast drank there was no noise in the\nbeast\u2019s belly; and therewith the beast departed with a great noise,\nwhereof the king had great marvel.\u201d\n\nFollowed a knight hight Pellinore, and sought to borrow the king\u2019s\nhorse to pursue this animal, and the king would have taken over his\nquest for a twelvemonth, but he would not. After Pellinore\u2019s death it\nis Palomides that rides across the pages of romance, well in the rear\nof the questing beast.\n\n\n_The Beasts of Revelation_\n\nThe beasts of Revelation were but symbols; yet they moved like\nrealities through the imagery of the Church, and, undergoing a sea\nchange, appeared alive in the distant Atlantic Islands of Irish epic.\nSt. John beheld the shapes of locusts like unto horses prepared for\nbattle; \u201cand their faces were as the faces of men, and they had hair as\nthe hair of women, and they had tails like unto scorpions.\u201d He saw also\na beast coming up out of the earth; \u201cand he had two horns like a lamb,\nand he spake as a dragon.\u201d Above all, John saw the beast that came up\nout of the sea, a leopard with the feet of a bear and the mouth of a\nlion, and with the dragon\u2019s authority; and the beast had seven heads\nand ten horns, \u201cand upon his heads the name of blasphemy.\u201d The Whore of\nBabylon rode this beast--composite of seven mountains and ten kings,\nthe text explains--to world power and to downfall; and rode on into\nliterature, and an unending controversy.\n\n\n_American Contributions_\n\nAnimal elders are America\u2019s main contribution to the collection\nof fabulous beasts. The Indian believed that every species had a\ngiant ancestor like itself in form, but with supernatural powers to\nprotect it. Hunters who killed more animals than they needed for food\nfelt the vengeance of the elder beasts. The latter gave a tribe its\nmedicine, and themselves became totems. They are sometimes represented\nas in human form and living in stately lodges. The Pacific coast of\nSouth America has also stories of a house-haunting ram, a repulsive\ntree-dweller, a water-monster resembling a distended cowskin, and a\ncreature with the head of a heifer and the body of a sheep.\n\nAccording to members of the Forest Service, American lumberjacks have\ntheir own mythology. Product of camp-fire chaff and a whimsical humor,\nthe creatures that people it are noted here only because, both in name\nand in nature, they illustrate the traditional instinct for composites\nthat elsewhere has wrought to more serious ends. They include the\ntote-road shagamaw, with the head of a lion, the forepaws of a bear\nand the hind legs of a moose; the splinter cat, which crushes hollow\ntrees in search of raccoons; the hugag, with buffalo body and jointless\nlegs, which sleeps leaning against a tree; the sausage-like wapaloosie,\nwhich lives on fungi; the billdad, which kills fish with its tail; the\ngumberoo, which explodes when it gets too near a fire; the snoligoster,\na spiked and legless crocodile, and the lachrymose squonk. A common\nhuman figure in these tales is the grotesque giant, Paul Bunyan.\n\n\n_The Prodigies of Heraldry_\n\nIn the later totemism, which is called heraldry, the following fabulous\ncreatures with human, animal, or bird attributes, or an admixture of\nall of these, were represented on crests and coats of arms: allerion,\nchimera, cockatrice, dragon, griffin, harpy, hydra, lyon-dragon,\nlyon-poisson, mermaid, montygre, martlet, opinicus, pegasus, sphinx,\nsagittary, satyr, tarask, tityrus, unicorn, wyvern, winged lyon, winged\nbull.\n\nSeveral of these are noted elsewhere in this study, and a word will\nserve for the rest. The allerion is an eagle without beak or claws. The\nchimera, says Bossewell, is \u201ca beast or monstre having thre heades,\none like a Lyon, an other like a Goate, the third like a Dragon.\u201d The\nhydra is a seven- or nine-headed water serpent. The lyon-dragon is\na composite of a lion and a dragon, and the lyon-poisson of a lion\nand a fish. The martlet is a swallow without feet. The opinicus is a\ncomposite of camel, dragon, and lion. The pegasus is a winged horse.\nThe sphinx is a figure with a woman\u2019s head and breasts, a lion\u2019s body,\nand usually eagle\u2019s wings. The sagittary is the centaur of antiquity\nwith the head, arms, and body of a man from the waist up, united to\nthe body and legs of a horse. The heraldic satyr has a human face, a\nleonine body, and the horns and tail of an antelope. The tarask is a\ndragon-basilisk on the shield of Tarascon. \u201cThe tityrus is ingendred\nbetween a sheep and a buck-goat,\u201d says Guillim. The wyvern is a\nserpentine dragon with a long tail and only two legs. The winged lyon\nis an achievement of Venice, the winged bull a memory of Assyria.\n\nOther heraldic creatures, not so well authenticated, are mentioned\nby Randle Holme in his _Academy of Armory_. These include the\nass-bittern, the cat-fish, the devil-fish, the dragon-tyger, the\ndragon-wolf, the falcon-fish with a hound\u2019s ear, the friar-fish, the\nlamya, compounded of a woman, a dragon, a lion, a goat, a dog, and a\nhorse; the lyon-wyvern, the minocane or homocane, half child and half\nspaniel dog; the ram-eagle, the winged satyr-fish, and the wonderful\npig of the ocean.\n\nThe menagerie of blazonry has been enlarged by representing nearly\nall of the animals at times with fish-tails, when they are said to be\nmarined. The zodiacal sign of the capricorn, shown as half goat and\nhalf fish, is a familiar example. Sometimes the sea-horse is drawn as\nan enlarged hippocampus, sometimes with the forequarters of a horse and\na fish tail. Griffins and unicorns are marined in German heraldry.\n\n\n\n\nChapter VI. Fable upon Wings\n\n\nFor the most part the winged creatures of fable are exiles from\nmythologies broken down or forgotten. They are imperfect and confused\nembodiments of the phenomena of the heavens. In them one sees, what the\nmen who repeated stories about them did not see, the diurnal journeys\nof the sun into the west, the shadowing storm-cloud, the lightning\nflash, the fury of evil winds, the hail, and the snow. But the poetry\nof the air, of which these creatures are the flying shreds, is weighted\nwith terrestrial prose. Extinct birds of colossal size, prehistoric\nwinged reptiles, and the bones of fossil mammals are reflected in\nthe shapes of cloudland. Few of the creatures that hover there can\nbe called fowls at all; their wings carry bodies that belong upon\nthe earth. Thus Pliny, in one of the most flagrant of his carelessly\ncredulous passages, makes the casual statement that Ethiopia produces\n\u201chorses with wings, and armed with horns, which are called pegasi.\u201d\nBecause of its human affinities the dragon must be considered by itself.\n\n\n_The Ph\u0153nix_\n\nOf the ph\u0153nix, a true fowl of legend and its most renowned, Maundeville\nhas a vivacious picture. This bird, he says, \u201cis not much more big than\nan Eagle, but he hath a Crest of Feathers upon his Head more great than\nthe Peacock hath; and his Neck is yellow after the Colour of an Oriel\nthat is a fine shining Stone; and his Beak is coloured blue as Azure;\nand his wings be of purple Colour, and the Tail is yellow and red, cast\nin streaks across his Tail. And he is a full fair Bird to look upon,\nagainst the Sun, for he shineth full gloriously and nobly.\u201d\n\nOther men were not so sure about the ph\u0153nix. Herodotus said he had\nnever seen it and Pliny declared he was \u201cnot quite certain that its\nexistence is not all a fable.\u201d Herodotus, however, had seen its\npicture, and the Maundeville account is copied from him.\n\nThe bird was Arabian, its legend Egyptian. It was said that there\nwas only one ph\u0153nix in the world, and that it appeared at very long\nintervals. The Roman Senator, Manlius, wrote that no person had seen\nit eat since its food was air, that in Arabia it was sacred to the\nsun, and that its lifetime was five hundred and forty years. When\nstricken with age it built a nest of cassia and sprigs of frankincense\nand lay down to die; from its bones and marrow issued a worm which in\ntime changed into a small bird. The first duty of the new bird was to\nperform the obsequies of its predecessor, and carry the nest containing\nits myrrh-swathed remains to the City of the Sun in Egypt, placing it\nupon the altar of that divinity.\n\nAccording to the more familiar account, when the ph\u0153nix is full of\nyears it flies to Heliopolis, sings its own dirge there, flaps its\nwings to fan the funeral pyre, and presently is utterly consumed; the\nnext day emerges the new bird, fully feathered; and on the third day,\nits wings well grown, it salutes the priest and returns to the East.\nStill another account has it that in its old age the bird casts itself\non the ground, receiving a mortal wound, and the new bird issues from\nthe ichor.\n\nIn the censorship of the Emperor Claudius what purported to be a ph\u0153nix\nwas brought to Rome and exhibited in the Comitium, but it was adjudged\nan imposture. Plutarch ventures the daring statement that \u201cthe brain of\nthe ph\u0153nix is a pleasant bit, but that it causeth the headache.\u201d He may\nhave meant the golden pheasant, or even wine from cocoanuts, but it is\nsaid that Heliogabalus made a fruitless attempt to secure this unique\ntidbit for his table.\n\nPopular art reflects the ph\u0153nix legend, metaphor still more. It is\nthe favorite symbol of self-regeneration. The burned city, the ruined\ncountry or cause, \u201crises like the ph\u0153nix from its own ashes.\u201d Jesus,\nwhose death coincided with one of the reported flights of the fowl to\nEgypt, was called the Ph\u0153nix by monastic writers, and St. Clement of\nAlexandria cites the fowl as proof that the dead will rise again. Its\neffigy was taken over from the pagan urn by the Christian sarcophagus.\nBrowne, however, thought that the notion of a solitary ph\u0153nix was\nrepugnant to Scripture, \u201cbecause it infringeth the benediction of\nGod concerning multiplication.\u201d At one time its image hung before\nchemists\u2019 shops because of its association with alchemy. Sometimes the\nArabs confused it with the salamander and pictured the latter as a bird.\n\nThe relation of the ph\u0153nix to astronomical reckoning gives a clue to\nthe legend. It reappeared, according to some authors, at intervals of\n250, 500, 654, 1,000, 1,461 or even of 7,006 years, but the accepted\nPh\u0153nix Period or Cycle was 540 years, and Egypt reports having seen the\nfowl five times, the first in the reign of Sesostris, and the last time\nin A.D. 334. This relates the appearances of the ph\u0153nix to the Great\nYear, which Hardouin says is 532 years.\n\nIt was an ancient belief that the same aspect of heaven and order\nof the stars that had prevailed when the world began recurred\nevery 532 years, and that at one of these periods, with all the\nplanets in conjunction or all the stars returned to the same point\nin the ecliptic, the world would be destroyed; or else that it\nwould perish and revive again to go through the same sequence of\ncelestial phenomena. The ph\u0153nix, self-regenerating, sun-dedicated,\nwestward-winging, arrayed in the gold and purple of dawn and twilight,\nseems to be an obscure form of the sun myth; and this inference is\nstrengthened by the fact that at Heliopolis a bird called the bennu\nwas a symbol of the Egyptians for the rising sun. It was a heron which\n\u201ccreated itself\u201d and rose in a \u201cfragrant flame\u201d over a sacred tree.\nBennu in Egyptian and ph\u0153nix in Greek are the same word, and signify\nthe palm tree.\n\n\n_The Fung-wang_\n\nThere was a Chinese ph\u0153nix called the fung-wang which at long intervals\nand only in the reigns of upright monarchs emerged from the deserts.\nSix feet high, with plumage reflecting the five colors that the Chinese\nrecognized--red, white, yellow, azure, and black--it was something\nlike an immense bird of paradise. It was called the chief of the three\nhundred and sixty kinds of birds, and classed with the dragon and the\nunicorn as a spiritual creature. On its poll appeared the Chinese\ncharacter for uprightness, on its back that for humanity, while its\nwings enfolded the character for integrity. Its low notes were bell\ntones, and its high like those of a drum. When you play the flute,\nin nine cases out of ten the fung-wang comes to hear, says the _Shu\nKing_. It frequented only groves and gardens and would not peck living\ngrass. The _Bamboo Books_ record its visits as far back as 2647 B.C.\nThe emperor in whose reign it first showed itself recast his cabinet so\nthat officers bore the names of birds, and the Minister of the Calendar\nwas called the Ph\u0153nix. \u201cAnother example of an interesting and beautiful\nspecies of bird which has become extinct within historic times,\u201d rashly\nconcludes Gould.\n\n\n_Flying Serpents of Araby_\n\nAnother winged creature besides the ph\u0153nix sought to go out of Arabia\ninto Egypt, but its passage was opposed. This was the flying serpent.\nHerodotus says he went to \u201ca certain place in Arabia\u201d to ask about\nit. He saw the backbones and ribs of these reptiles in inconceivable\nnumber, piled in a gorge, and learned why they got no further. They\nare met in this place by \u201cthe birds called ibises, who forbid their\nentrance and destroy them all.\u201d Hence the Egyptians hold the ibis in\nreverence.\n\nJosephus uses the incident as basis of a story about Moses that is not\nin the Pentateuch. The Ethiopians had successfully invaded the land of\nEgypt, and an oracle advised the defenders to choose for their general\nMoses the Hebrew. His choice pleased the scribes of both nations--the\nEgyptian because they apprehended that Moses would be slain, and the\nJewish because they expected that he would be the instrument of their\ndeliverance. The line of march lay through the country of winged\nserpents, powerful and mischievous creatures that came out of the\nground unseen or fell upon men from the air. But Moses \u201cmade baskets\nlike unto arks of sedges, and filled them with ibes, and carried them\nalong with him, which animals are the greatest enemies to serpents\nimaginable, for these fly from them when they come near them, and as\nthey fly they are caught and devoured.\u201d So Moses passed on unscathed,\nand into the heart of an Ethiopian princess through whose aid her\nfather\u2019s forces were routed.\n\nAfter centuries of discussion the sacred ibis of the Egyptians was\nfinally identified by the traveler Bruce with the bird the Abyssinians\ncall Father John; but the winged serpents have not been satisfactorily\nexplained. It has been suggested that what Herodotus saw in the Arabian\ngorge was the remains of a locust invasion--a difficult surmise,\nalthough Pliny reports that the legs and wings of grasshoppers three\nfeet long were dried in the sun and used by the Indians for saws.\n\n\n_The Roc_\n\nThe case for the roc--a creature unknown to either Greek or Roman\nlegend--rests mainly upon three beguiling names of travel tale. These\nare Aladdin and Sindbad of the _Arabian Nights_, and Marco Polo of the\n_Diversities_. By the magic of his lamp Aladdin, the wayward gamin of a\nChinese city, had won a princess and a palace; and he had poisoned the\nAfrican magician who sought to use him as a tool and then to take the\nlamp from him. Bent on vengeance, the magician\u2019s brother stabbed a holy\nwoman with the very un-Chinese name of Fatima, disguised himself in her\nhabiliments and won entrance into the palace of Aladdin and into the\nconfidence of his princess. The latter asked the false Fatima what she\nthought of her residence, and this was the reply.\n\n\u201cMy opinion is that if a roc\u2019s egg were hung up in the middle of the\ndome, this hall would have no parallel in the four quarters of the\nworld, and your palace would be the wonder of the universe.\u201d\n\n\u201cMy good mother,\u201d said the princess, \u201cwhat is a roc, and where may one\nget an egg?\u201d\n\n\u201cPrincess,\u201d replied the pretended Fatima, \u201cit is a bird of prodigious\nsize, which inhabits the summit of Mount Caucasus; the architect who\nbuilt your palace can get you one.\u201d\n\nThe princess consulted Aladdin, and, retiring to his apartment, he\nrubbed the lamp; when a genie appeared, he bade him procure the roc\u2019s\negg. Whereupon the hall shook as if about to fall, and the genie\nexclaimed in a loud and terrible voice, \u201cIs it not enough that I and\nthe other slaves of the lamp have done everything for you, but you, by\nan unheard-of ingratitude, must command me to bring my master and hang\nhim up in the midst of this dome? The attempt deserves that you, the\nprincess, and the palace should be immediately reduced to ashes; but\nyou are spared because this request does not come from yourself.\u201d Then\nhe told of the presence of a conspirator in the household. Aladdin\u2019s\nkilling of the latter is the final episode of the tale, the fortunate\nadventurer and his spouse soon mounting the throne of China.\n\nSindbad encountered the parent bird on his second voyage, after he\nhad been abandoned on an island; and first he saw its egg. He mistook\nthe egg for a white dome of prodigious height and extent and found it\nfifty paces around and too smooth to climb to the top. All of a sudden\nthe sky became dark as by a thick cloud and a huge bird came flying\ntoward him. It alighted on the egg, and Sindbad, creeping close to the\nshell, tied himself by his turban to one of its legs, which was as big\nas the trunk of a tree. The next morning he hoped the roc would carry\nhim away. Nor was his hope disappointed, and after an immense journey\nin the air--quite from Madagascar to India--the bird alighted in the\nValley of Diamonds. There Sindbad disengaged himself, only to fall into\nother adventures.\n\nMarco Polo was the first veracious traveler to bring to the west a\nreport of the roc, and he was careful to state that he did not see\nthe bird; he only heard of it. The roc, he said, comes to Madagascar\nfrom the south. It resembles the eagle, but is so much larger that\nit can carry away an elephant. \u201cPersons who have seen the bird,\u201d he\ncontinues, \u201cassert that when the wings are spread they measure sixteen\npaces [forty feet] from point to point, and that the feathers are eight\npaces [twenty feet] long and thick in proportion.\u201d Messer Marco guessed\nthat these creatures might be griffins, half birds and half lions, and\nparticularly questioned those who claimed to have seen them. No, was\nthe reply, they were fowls altogether. Kublai Khan sent messengers to\nMadagascar to confirm the story. They brought back, as Marco heard,\n\u201ca feather of the roc positively affirmed to have measured ninety\nspans, and the quill part to have been two palms in circumference.\u201d The\ndelighted khan sent valuable gifts.\n\nTwo centuries afterward the roc reappears in the narrative of Father\nJoano dos Santos, a Portuguese Dominican friar traveling in eastern\nEthiopia. He tells of a fellow Portuguese faring inland in Madagascar\nto purchase ivory, and leading a large monkey on a chain. This he\nfastened to the trunk of a tree and lay down to rest; a monstrous bird\nsnatched up both the monkey and the tree and flew away. The Shoshones\nhave a story of an owl which carries men away to its island larder.\nMewan legend speaks of the cannibal bird Yel-lo-kin with wings like\npine trees which snatched children by the top of the head and bore them\nthrough the hole in the middle of the sky to its nest on the other side.\n\nWhile the roc belongs to nature myth, matter-of-fact has a word to\nsay. The extinct dodo is recalled, which, however, could not fly. The\nfeather brought to Kublai, and the monstrous stump of a roc\u2019s quill\nwhich it is said was brought to Spain by a merchant from the China\nseas, may have been taken from a species of palm growing in Madagascar\nwhich has quill-like fronds. Southern Madagascar is frequented by very\nlarge birds--the albatross with a wing-spread of fifteen feet, and the\ncondor, which may measure more than ten from tip to tip.\n\nEverybody in the east believed that the roc, or more correctly the\nrukh, really existed. When the utmost depths of Arabic credulity\nare sounded, one reaches the probable basis of a legend into the\nsuperstructure of which exaggerated details of natural history have\nbeen built. One Arab writer says the length of the roc\u2019s wings is ten\nthousand fathoms, or nearly twelve miles, and these dimensions would\nmake a fair-sized storm cloud. A Chinese tale describes the bird as\na fowl which in its flight obscures the sun, and of whose quills\n\u201cwater-tuns\u201d are made. One of the riders of the roc in another tale\nfrom the _Thousand and One Nights_ is admonished to stop his ears from\nthe wind, \u201clest thou be dazed by the noise of the revolving sphere and\nthe roaring of the seas.\u201d It is shrewdly surmised that the roc is the\nstorm cloud and the egg it covers is the sun--true master of the slaves\nof Aladdin\u2019s lamp.\n\n\n_The Rhinoceros of the Air_\n\nAnother monstrous fowl, the rhinoceros of the air, was reported in\nmedi\u00e6val travel and still commands the faith of the Samoyeds. Purchas\nabstracts the description given by Andrea Corsali in his Abyssinian\ntravels. The bird is much bigger than an eagle and has a bow-fashioned\nbill or beak four feet long, with a horn between the eyes streaked\nwith black. \u201cIt is a cruel fowle and attends on battels and campes.\u201d\nThe Siberian myth gives this winged rhinoceros gigantic dimensions.\nThe tusks and bones of the great pachyderms, found in the tundras, are\nthought by native hunters to be the beaks and talons of monster birds.\nThe nearest approach of fact to the Abyssinian prodigy is perhaps the\nhorned screamer, or unicorn bird, whose cries \u201cresembling the bray of a\njackass, but shriller,\u201d unpleasantly disturbed for the naturalist Bates\nthe solitude of the Brazilian forest.\n\n\n_The Harpies_\n\nThose forbidding sister groups, the gorgons, the sirens, and the\nharpies, are perhaps different aspects of the storm clouds and the\nstorm wind--the baleful lightning, the shrieking sea gales, the violent\ngusts that snatch (_harpazo_) away soul and body. Of the three, the\ngorgons and sirens will be left within the domain of nature myths.\nThe harpies may be migrants from the religions of Egypt, in which\nNekhbet, the vulture-goddess, is sometimes represented as a woman with\na vulture\u2019s head, and the soul is depicted as a human-headed bird\nfluttering from the mouths of the dying. Yet they have that savor\nof the soil, that touch of the grotesque, that suggestion of coarse\nreality that belong rather to travel tale. Though with woman faces,\ntheir attributes are animal.\n\nHesiod describes them as maidens, winged and golden-haired, who\nharassed the blind King Phineus at his banquets. The myth is retold\nin grosser form in the story of the Argonauts, whence these sisters,\ndriven away by the comrades of Jason, make their flight to the \u00c6neid\nand find roost in an isle where the Trojans cast anchor. The picture\nVirgil drew of them superseded the more flattering accounts of poets\nbefore him, and the immense vogue of this poet in later ages led\nthe romancers of the Charlemagne cycle to adopt his report without\nabatement.\n\nThe harpies of Virgil are, as the poet Morris pictures them, \u201cdreadful\nsnatchers,\u201d like women down to the breast, with scanty, coarse black\nhair, dim eyes ringed with red, bestial mouths, gnarled necks, and\nbirds\u2019 claws. Their faces are pale with hunger. When the Trojans slay\nthe island cattle and prepare meat for a feast, the birds swoop down\nwith a horrible clamor, seize part of the meat, and defile the rest.\nNimbly they dodge the Trojan swords, and their feathers are like\nsteel mail. From a cliff they reproach the visitors for slaying their\ncattle and warring upon them, and as \u00c6neas departs they shriek direful\npredictions after him.\n\nIn the legends of Charlemagne the bird-sisters reappear when Astolpho,\ncousin of Orlando, reaches Abyssinia riding the hippogrif. Here is\nanother blind king, like Phineus, \u201cprey to a flock of obscene birds\ncalled harpies, which attacked him whenever he sat at meat, and with\ntheir claws snatched, tore, and scattered everything, overturning the\nvessels, devouring the food, and infecting what they left with their\nfilthy touch.\u201d They are put to flight with one blast of Astolpho\u2019s horn\nand driven by him and his hippogrif into a cavern, the entrance of\nwhich he blocked up so that they are seen no more.\n\nThat is, so far as the romancer of that time knew. They reappeared in\nthe New World on the Isthmus of Darien, where Balboa was pursuing,\namid the fens of a haunted land, the adventure of the mines of Dobayba\nand the elusive golden temple. The Indians told him there had been\na horrible tempest, and when they ventured forth again they found\nthat two monstrous creatures had come in with the storm. They were\napparently a mother and her daughter. They had woman faces and eagle\nclaws and wings; the branches of the trees where they perched broke\nwith their weight. Swooping down, they would seize a man and carry him\naway to the hilltops to devour him. At last the natives killed the\nolder bird by a stratagem, and, suspending her body from their spears,\nbore it from town to town to appease the alarm of their people. The\nyounger harpy disappeared.\n\nNatural history has given the name of harpy to a buzzard, an eagle,\na fly, and two species of bats. Neither of the last named, however,\nis the vampire bat of which Bates has left a portentous portrait.\nIts spread of wing is nearly two and a half feet. \u201cNothing in animal\nphysiognomy can be more hideous than the countenance of this creature\nwhen viewed from the front; the large, leathery ears standing out from\nthe sides and top of the head, the erect, spear-shaped appendage on the\ntop of the nose, the grin and the glistening black eye, all combining\nto make up a figure that reminds one of some mocking imp of fable.\u201d It\nseems to be fact that villages in Central America have been abandoned\nbecause of the nocturnal attacks of this animal. Dampier professes to\nhave seen on an island near Sebo bats \u201cwith bodies as big as ducks and\nwith a wing spread of eight feet.\u201d The custom of nailing up dead bats\nas witch-or-devil forms is common. \u201cAn animal,\u201d says Buffon, \u201cwhich,\nlike the bat, is half quadruped and half bird, and which, in fact, is\nneither the one nor the other, is a kind of monster.\u201d He suggests that\n\u201cthe wings, the teeth, the claws, the voracity; the nastiness, and all\nthe destructive qualities and noxious faculties of the harpies bear no\nsmall resemblance to those of the Ternat bat.\u201d\n\n\n_The Stymphalian Birds_\n\nThe Stymphalian birds, according to Greek legend, frequented a lake\nin the northeast of Arcadia, which lay on the main route from Argolis\nand Corinth westward. To disperse or destroy them was the sixth labor\nof Hercules. These birds were anthropophagous, used their feathers as\narrows, and were equipped with brazen claws, wings, and feet. Diodorus\nhas a milder account in which they figure merely as voracious poachers\nof the fruits of the neighborhood. With a brazen pan the hero made such\nan uproar that they flew away, appearing again, in the story of the\nArgonauts, as tenants of the island of Aretias.\n\nPausanias visited the township of Stymphalus in his tour of Greece.\nHe describes a temple to Artemis Stymphalia standing there, and the\nfigures of the birds Stymphalides under its roof; behind the temple\nwere marble statues of young women with the legs of fowls. The birds,\nhe says, are as large as cranes, but resemble the ibis save that they\nhave stronger beaks and less curved; so, indeed, they are represented\non coins of Stymphalus. Herodotus rationalizes the legend by intimating\nthat their feathery arrows were, in truth, hail or snow.\n\n\n_The Cockatrice_\n\n\u201cThe weaned child,\u201d said Isaiah, prophesying the good time coming,\n\u201cshall put his hand on the cockatrice\u2019 den.\u201d The cockatrice was a\nmonster with the head and plumage of a cock and a barbed serpent\u2019s\ntail, and so it is represented in heraldry. The word is an old French\ncorruption of the Latin for crocodile, but popular etymology attributed\nthe name to the fact that the prodigy was hatched from an aged cock\u2019s\negg by a serpent. Because of the crest crowning its head it is also\ncalled a basilisk, from the Greek _basilikos_, or \u201clittle king.\u201d\n\nIts habitat was Africa. It was horrid to look upon and its glance\nand breath were alike fatal, while its voice struck terror to other\nserpents. Its own image, reflected in a mirror, would kill it. The\nbasilisk of Cyrene, Pliny said, was not more than twelve fingers in\nlength, but it destroyed all shrubs save the rue, and consumed grasses\nand shattered stones merely by breathing upon them. \u201cHe infecteth the\nwater that he cometh neare,\u201d according to Leigh. It was believed that\nif a horseman killed a basilisk with a spear-thrust, its poison would\nascend the weapon and destroy not only the rider, but his mount. Even\nits dead body hung in a temple kept swallows from building and spiders\nfrom spinning there. However, if a man saw the basilisk first, he went\nscatheless and the creature itself might die, while women could seize\nit without suffering harm. The effluvium of the weasel and the crow\nof the cock were alike fatal to it. Travelers passing near its haunts\nsometimes took a cock along.\n\nWhile its deadly nature has persisted, the shape of the cockatrice has\nchanged. To the ancients it was merely a baleful lizard. Its confusion\nin the Middle Ages with the cock gave it feathers and a beak. As soon\nas hatched by a toad or snake from a cock\u2019s egg laid in a stable it\nhid itself in crevice, cistern, or rafter, for to be seen was to die.\nLater the heralds and painters represented it with the head of a hawk,\nsometimes even with the head of a man. Its ashes would turn base metals\ninto gold. People thought that cock\u2019s eggs were used in the devil\u2019s\nchrism whereby his anointed hags could assume beast form or ride the\nclouds. In Browne\u2019s time there was traffic in counterfeited cockatrices\nmade by joining the dead bodies of pheasants and serpents, or out of\nthe skins of thornbacks. The basilisk of natural history, which may\nhave been the original of the fable, is a harmless creature, although\nof frightful aspect.\n\n\n\n\nChapter VII. The Dragon\n\n\nThe dragon of pagan and early Christian legend was a winged crocodile\nwith a serpent\u2019s tail. As the word is used by travelers, often a\ncrocodile or a snake rather than a fabulous composite animal is\nintended. There are three animals listed in natural history which\nsomewhat resemble this creature. The dragon-fly is a frightful-looking\nbut entirely harmless insect; how the supersession of myth by science\nhas shifted values is illustrated by the fact that the ninth edition\nof the _Encyclop\u00e6dia Britannica_ gives nearly four pages to the insect\nand only a dozen lines to the fabulous monster, the destruction of\nwhich in another age was the crowning exploit of gods and men. There is\nalso a small flying lizard, native to the East Indies, which is called\na dragon and which in miniature is a fair copy of fable. The primeval\nworld knew a veritable dragon in the pterodactyl, a flying lizard with\na wing span of seventeen feet.\n\nIn the Far East the dragon was a four-legged serpent with rugged head\nand spiked ears, and, though without wings, it flew. There was more of\nthe crocodile in the dragon of the Near East. It had four short paws, a\nforked tongue, and bat wings, and fire came from its mouth. The dragon\nof heraldry had a squat, scaly body, a head with horny projections,\nlong clawed legs, a barbed tongue, and bat wings.\n\nThere were four noteworthy things about the dragon. It was watchful, it\nspat fire and smoke, it ejected poison, and it had control of water.\nThe dragon watched the golden apples in the garden of Hesperides where\nHercules found and slew it. It guarded the Valkyrie Brynhild in a\ncastle on the Glistening Heath. Although ecclesiastics of the Middle\nAges used the word to symbolize sin and particularly pagan worship,\nyet until very recent times the world accepted the dragon. The elder\nnaturalists, such as Gesner and Aldrovandi, picture it in their\nworks. A medi\u00e6val writer says that at the midsummer celebration lads\nburned bones and filth to generate a noxious smoke, and so to drive\naway dragons, which, excited by the summer heat, copulated in midair,\npoisoning the wells and springs by dropping their seed in them.\n\nFor what it is worth there is documentary evidence of dragons in the\nAlps, all of it attested by oath. The depositions were gathered early\nin the eighteenth century by Prof. Johann Jacob Scheuchzer and are\nthus summarized in Francis Gribble\u2019s _Early Mountaineers_: \u201cThere are\ndragons with and without wings, with and without legs, with and without\ncrests; dragons with cat faces, with human faces, and with nondescript\nfaces; dragons that breathe fire and dragons that do not breathe fire.\u201d\n\nScheuchzer was impelled to this inquiry when he found there were graven\nimages of dragons on Swiss public buildings and a \u201cdragon-stone\u201d in\na Lucerne museum. The latter item he says is a jewel cut out of a\ndragon\u2019s head in its sleep. If the monster awakes before the operation\nis complete, it will die and the stone will vanish. To forestall\nawakening, drowsy herbs are scattered about, and sometimes incantations\nare muttered. The dragon-stone is a remedy against plague, poison,\ndysentery, and nosebleed. Scheuchzer concludes that the Lucerne\ndragon-stone is no imposture because it does effect cures, because the\nAlps afford many caves for dragon haunts and because of the testimony\nof eye-witnesses as above.\n\nIn June, 1673, Joliet and Marquette saw two dragon forms carved\nand painted along a bluff that overlooks the Mississippi at Alton,\nIllinois. Says P\u00e8re Marquette: \u201cAs we coasted along rocks, frightful\nfor their height and length, we saw two monsters painted on one of\nthese rocks, which startled us at first, and on which the boldest\nIndian dare not gaze long. They are as large as a calf, with horns on\nthe head like a deer, a fearful look, red eyes, bearded like a tiger,\nthe face somewhat like a man\u2019s, the body covered with scales, and the\ntail so long that it twice makes a turn of the body, passing over the\nhead and down between the legs, and ending at last in a fish\u2019s tail.\nGreen, red, and a kind of black are the colors employed.\u201d\n\nThese outlines, which have been called the highest attainment of early\nIndian pictorial art, and which Marquette said the best painters of\nFrance could scarcely equal, became known as the Piasa petroglyph.\nQuarrymen destroyed them shortly before the Civil War, but drawings\nwere made of them by artists who followed descriptions. One surmise is\nthat they represented the Algonquin thunder bird.\n\nA copious and curious literature treats of the dragon as a veritable\ncreature of natural history. According to \u00c6lian, although the\nEthiopians call it the slayer of elephants, it conceals itself when it\nhears the noise of the eagle\u2019s wings. When it lies in wait for man or\nbeast, it consumes deadly roots and herbs. At Lanuvium naked virgins\npaid it the annual tribute of a barley cake to insure a fruitful year.\nPassing the cave of a sacred Indian dragon, the army of Alexander was\naffrighted by hissing and blowing and the apparition of a head with\neyes \u201cof the size of a Macedonian shield.\u201d Artemidorus adds the detail\nthat the Indian and African dragons have grass growing on their backs.\n\u201cYou burst asunder vast bulls\u201d is Lucan\u2019s apostrophe. Ignatius reports\nthat the library of Constantinople had the intestine of a dragon 120\nfeet long on which the Iliad and Odyssey were inscribed.\n\nChinese reports are very detailed. In the great Materia Medica of\nthe early seventeenth century it is said that the dragon has nine\nresemblances--its head like a camel\u2019s, its horns like a deer\u2019s, its\neyes like a hare\u2019s, its ears like a bull\u2019s, its neck like a snake\u2019s,\nits belly like an iguanodon\u2019s, its scales like a carp\u2019s, its claws\nlike an eagle\u2019s and its paws like a tiger\u2019s. It is whiskered and its\nvoice resembles the beating of a gong. The dragon, however, cannot hear\nitself, for it is deaf. It is fond of gems and jade and excessively\nfond of swallow\u2019s flesh; but it dreads iron, beeswax, the mong plant,\nthe centipede, the leaves of the Pride of India, and silk dyed in the\nfive colors. It passes the winter in muddy water contemned by the fish\nand turtle, and in summer the moles, crickets, and ants annoy it. At\nfive hundred years it grows horns. \u201cIf you do not ride on a dragon,\u201d\nsays one writer, \u201cyou cannot reach the weak waters of Kwan-lun hill.\u201d\nAnother suggests that if you eat dragon\u2019s flesh soaked in acid \u201cyou can\nwrite essays.\u201d\n\nIt was a belief among Chinese that dragons did not die, but merely\nsloughed off their bones as a snake its skin. These were used to cure\na variety of diseases and are still sold in apothecaries\u2019 shops. The\nrecords speak of a bone-covered dragon plain east of the hills of\nFang-chang, and of isles where the dragons shed their bodies; \u201cteeth,\nhorns, spines, feet, it seems as though they are everywhere.\u201d The\nidentification is perhaps with those deposits of dinosaur and other\npaleontological remains which modern exploration has uncovered.\n\nThe naturalistic side of Chinese dragon lore is not far removed\nfrom the position taken by Charles Gould, the stoutest defender of\nthe literal basis of wonder stories (_Mythical Monsters_, 1886). He\nfinds nothing impossible in the dragon of tradition and thinks it\nmore likely that it once lived than that fancy engendered it: \u201cIt\nwas a long, terrestrial lizard, hibernating and carnivorous, which\ndragged its ponderous coils and perhaps flew; which devastated herds\nand on occasions swallowed their shepherd; which, establishing its\nlair in some cavern overlooking the fertile plain, spread terror\nand destruction around, and, protected from assault by dread\nor superstitious feeling, may even have been subsidized by the\nterror-stricken peasantry, who, failing the power to destroy it, may\nhave preferred tethered offerings of cattle adjacent to its cavern, to\nhaving it come down to seek supplies.\u201d\n\nBut the dragon reached a place in the political and spiritual life of\nChina such as a mere saurian hardly could attain. The empire was called\n\u201cthe dragon empire\u201d; the imperial throne, \u201cthe dragon throne\u201d; the\nemperor\u2019s countenance, \u201cthe dragon\u2019s face\u201d; his beard, \u201cthe dragon\u2019s\nbeard.\u201d In pictured effigy, the dragon rears itself upon house fronts\nand draws its scaly folds over garments and utensils as well as across\nthe imperial flag; and there are annual processions of dragon images,\nregattas of dragon boats, and sacrificial ceremonies in dragon temples.\nTo a third of mankind, for five thousand years or more, the dragon has\nbeen the bestower of rain and the great giver of good, and the emperor\nits earthly representative.\n\nAs in other matters, China has merely preserved and exaggerated beliefs\nwhich were world-wide. Nearly all of the thrones of earth were once\ndragon thrones. On the shield of Agamemnon, king of kings, was \u201cthe\nunspeakable horror of a dragon glancing backward.\u201d Persians, Parthians\nand Scythians had dragon flags and Rome borrowed them for its cohorts.\nThe dragon flew on the battle standards of German, Celt, and Saxon,\nand breasted the foam of the seas as the figurehead of Norse longboats.\nIn the older Europe, as in the China of to-day, it was carved on house\ngables, bells, musical instruments, goblets, weapons, chairs, and\ntables.\n\nUnder these world-wide customs, was there only a giant reptile not long\nextinct, an inference from fossil remains, some frightful-seeming but\ndiminutive lizard contemporary with man and magnified a thousand times\nby the aberrations of fancy? All of these things there may have been,\nfor the myth is so complex that its development has been called the\nhistory of civilization. But inevitably speculation had to rise higher\nthan a saurian to account for phenomena of such consequence; it was\nconceived that the dragon was the storm-cloud and he who slew it the\nsun. So, it may be, ingenious minds surmised thousands of years before\nmodern conjecture first spoke of solar myths and found in forgotten\ntexts not the heart of the thing, but allegories in which ancient solar\nmythologists had wrapped it. Or, it was guessed, the dragon typified\nthe spirit of evil, a power to be placated by sacrifice and politic\ndevil-worship, but destroyed as opportunity offered. So the world long\nthought, and so far as it thinks at all of the dragon, that is what it\nthinks now.\n\nTo assume that the myth is an allegory of satanic forces is to explain\nmuch, but does it explain all? Powerful as is the motive of fear,\nit is negative. Was it potent enough to coil a dragon at the roots\nof all the world\u2019s religions; and when these arose, were men able\nto speculate on so abstract a thing as evil and symbolize it as a\ncomposite beast? The Bible narrative begins with the dragon of Genesis\nin the Garden of Eden and ends with the dragon of Revelation, \u201cthat\nold serpent which is the Devil and Satan,\u201d in the bottomless pit. The\nslaying of the dragon is the central point of Norse and Saxon epic,\nthe great deed of the heroes. The water monster of Navaho legend is a\ndragon; the elephant-headed thunder god of the Mayan inscriptions is\na dragon deity; the legendary founders of both Athens and Mexico were\ndragon-tailed. Snake worship is dragon worship and, like the Midgard\nserpent, it encircles the earth. Everywhere the myth is a thing of\nthrones and temples.\n\nPerhaps its secret is to be found, as later in this study it will be\nseen that the secret of the Amazon myth is to be found, in the time\nwhen thrones and temples were one. Clues that lead to it are: (1) the\nworld has still a dragon throne, or rather a recent memory of one; (2)\nalways in the lore of dragon or serpent, whether as victim, votary, or\nmate, appears the figure of a daughter of Eve; (3) the snake is the\nbadge of \u00c6sculapius and the symbol of healing; (4) the dragon, whether\nhaunting cloud or pool, is associated with water.\n\nWoman is the physical source of human life. Water is healing,\nfertilizing, and regenerating. Use the Scriptural figure, \u201cthe water\nof life,\u201d and it relates itself to woman and to the serpent symbol of\nthe art that lengthens life. When the throne and temple were one, the\ncreation and continuation of life was the function of the priest-king,\nthough only in China has his tradition come down to the modern time.\nThe Chinese emperor was himself the dragon. In the spring festivals of\nhis people he supplicated heaven for rains that would revive the land,\nand in the autumn festivals he rendered thanks for nature\u2019s bounty or\ntook upon himself the blame for dearth.\n\nThe dragon myth is not a myth of fear, nor was the dragon in the\nbeginning a personification of evil. It was an expression of the\ndeepest desire of man, the desire to defeat chance and change, to\nrepeal \u201cthe sad laws of time\u201d and to live forever. Of all myths, that\nof the dragon is the fundamental, for the forces with which it deals\nare the forces which have impelled man, in a long grapple with destiny,\nto construct societies, build religions, and create an art and a\nliterature. In China both the significance and the origin of the legend\nlie almost on the surface. In most other places and at most other times\nits meaning has been distorted, inverted, weighted down with fancies\nand guesses. As it stands, it is like the fabric of a vision in which\ntatters of experience are woven on the looms of sleep by the master\nweavers of hope and fear; and in this faded grotesque one may decipher\nthe eternal dream of mankind.\n\nThe theory which will be interpreted here is that of Grafton Elliot\nSmith (_The Evolution of the Dragon_: 1919). It is too sweeping in its\nimplications and too revolutionary yet to have received the general\nsanction of writers upon mythology; but among all dragon theories\nit must take precedence because alone it has the elemental breadth\ndemanded by the phenomena to be accounted for. A difficult thing about\nit is that the author rejects the doctrine accepted of the time, that\nthe same beliefs and practices can arise independently in two or more\nplaces. Unless there is in any case definite evidence to the contrary,\nhe assumes that \u201cno ethnologically significant innovation in customs or\nbeliefs has ever been made twice.\u201d It is his contention that the dragon\nmyth was born in Egypt, developed in Babylonia, and in a time remote\ncarried to China, India, and the Americas, and to all other parts of\nthe earth. Granting this, it becomes not merely the one world-epic, but\nthe proof that, before history began even as now, all races of men were\nin effectual contact.\n\nThe primitive custom at the basis of the myth is well established. The\npost of priest-king was enviable but dangerous. With each recurring\nspring he was expected to bring fertility to his land; but sometimes\nhe was killed and a successor appointed each year, in imitation of\nthe death of vegetation that preceded the resurrection of spring; and\nalways when age overtook him he was slain, for what vital magic over\nnature was there left in his aging frame? To avoid this fate a mock\nking was erected to suffer in his stead; or a virgin was sacrificed; or\nin elaborate mummery a ritual murder was merely simulated.\n\nHere in their simplest form appear all the elements of the dragon\nmyth--a king who was thought to control the sources of water and the\nfertility of which it was the symbol; a slaying to be accomplished, and\na woman who was at once a fertility symbol and a vicarious sacrifice.\nThe king himself was the dragon, in its original form just a serpent\nsymbol of his reputed control over water.\n\nThus stated the story is understandable, but it becomes confused and\ninfinitely complex when it is dramatized in the mythology of ancient\nEgypt. A king who through his beneficent irrigation works is identified\nwith the river Nile is translated by legend into the skies and becomes\nthe water god Osiris, a member of the earliest Trinity. The second\nmember of the Trinity, but the first in point of time, is Hathor,\nthe Great Mother,--at one time identified with the cowry shell, the\nearliest form of fertility emblem, and then identified with the moon\nand translated into the sky when primitive minds saw the lunar rhythm\nrepeated in the sex life of woman. The third member of the Trinity is\nHorus, the Warrior Sun God, a son of Osiris. How an aging king, not yet\na god, resolved that he would not be slain to make way for a younger\nman and called upon the Great Mother, already a goddess, to provide\nhim with an elixir of life, which was blood, and how, in compliance\nwith his entreaty, she nearly wiped out mankind before a substitute\nwas provided--in reality the red waters of the Nile inundation--is\nallegorically recited in the ancient Egyptian narrative called the\nDestruction of Mankind.\n\nIn this and its companion legends, the Story of the Winged Disk and\nthe Conflict between Horus and Set, are all the elements of the dragon\nsaga. It would be futile to recite them in detail, for the thing has\nbecome so confused that in the words of Doctor Smith it amounts to\nthis: \u201cThe early Trinity as the hero, armed with the Trinity as a\nweapon, slays the dragon, which is the same Trinity.\u201d But the confusion\nhas produced a concrete and comprehensible result, a composite\nwonder-beast in which are blended parts of real animals that symbolize\nboth regeneration and destruction and that are the attributes of the\nseveral members of the early Trinity, and of Set, enemy of Horus and\nlord of chaos.\n\nAn archaic conception this may seem now, but what is there of the human\nor the cosmic that does not lie in it? The desire for unfading youth\nand continuing life on one side of the grave or the other is in it, and\nthat is the heart history of humanity. The conflict between order and\nchaos is in it, and that is the story of nature. The theme of vicarious\nsacrifice is in it, and that is the deep mystery of religion. There is\nthat in the tale which impelled the story-tellers of five millenniums\nto repeat it, to enrich its incidents and to weave the tissues of new\nmeanings through it until it was at once a treatise on astronomy, a\ntheory of meteorology and a philosophy of destiny; a record of the\nstrife between winter and summer, night and day, justice and injustice,\nand good and evil fates, which is the world as men have found it.\n\nUnquestionably the dragon of classic story and medi\u00e6val blazonry is\nthe devil of Scripture; the biblical identification is complete,\nand the bird-like features, leathern wings, and forked tail of this\nelemental creature of fable all are reproduced in familiar portraits\nof the enemy of mankind. This and the inner meaning of the dragon myth\nmay be accepted, while its origin in Egypt and dissemination from one\nplace throughout the world is probable. Doctor Smith, whose contentions\nare all-embracing, makes other inferences which here will be outlined\nwithout comment:\n\nThe serpent in the Garden of Eden, the tree of life and Eve herself\nare all one. The deluge of Sumerian, Babylonian, and Hebrew legend\nis a disastrous Nile inundation dramatized. The ark is the moon-boat\nof Hathor. The pig owes its evil name to its identification with\nSet, who represents the evil side of the dragon\u2019s nature. The cowry\nshell, suspended from the girdle as a fertility emblem and not from\nany motives of modesty, became the origin of all clothing. Inland\ntribes which had no access to the shore copied the cowry in a plastic\nyellow metal, and this was the origin of the world-old quest for gold\nand the occasion of its use as money. The object of mummification\nwas the continuance of life beyond the grave, the purpose in burning\ngums and spices was to restore to the mummy the odor and warmth of\nlife; and these customs, related to each other and to the theme of the\ndragon saga, are also related to the development of architecture, sea\ntrade, and medicine. Jade reached its mystic estate in China and other\nlands, because the men who sought gold for cowry amulets in Turkestan\nsought jade at the same time for seals, and in popular thought the\ntwo substances became confused. Through a similar confusion, diamonds\nattained in India the value they have since had everywhere. Pearls\nranked beside both because they were thought to be particles of moon\nsubstances, emanations of the moon goddess herself. The precious metals\nand precious stones became so not because of their rarity or beauty,\nbut because of their magical power as symbols of the divine actors in\nthe dragon story. The griffin of legend is merely a tentative dragon.\nThe mandrake of legend is merely a stranded pearl shell, and the dog\nused to extract it from the earth is a terrestrial version of the\nMediterranean dogfish to which had been transferred the demoniac powers\nof the sharks that guarded the pearl treasures of the east. With the\ndragon began the unending search for the elixir of life.\n\nThese conclusions, some of which offer novel explanations for\nenigmatical things noted in this study, are at least a testimony that\nthe dragon myth has traveled far, and in its travels has become related\nto many things. It is the most vital of all growths that have found\nroot in the fecund soil of the imagination. It is a richly pictorial\nhistory of the groping sublimities of human thought. The dragon is one\nof two portraits which man has painted of himself.\n\n\n\n\nChapter VIII. Denizens of the Deep\n\n\nBelief that the sea was in every respect like the land, and that its\nvery waves were only a thicker atmosphere, was the main source of\nmarine fable. In Celtic story, for example, Manannan sings to Bran that\nwhat he is sailing across is not the sea but a flowery plain, and the\nspeckled salmon are lambs and calves. M\u00e6ldune, voyaging over the ocean,\ndescries beneath him a country with castles, people, and cattle. In\nthe _Pih T\u2019an_ it is said that in the midst of the waters off Shantung\nthere is sometimes the misty semblance of a palace, with towered walls\nabout it, and the appearance of men and carriages and horses busily\nengaged; and this is called the Market of the Sea.\n\nIt was long held that every land animal had its counterpart in the\nocean. So there had to be mermen to match the men of the land. Such\nnames as sea-mice, sea-spiders, sea-kites, sea-hares, sea-dragons,\nsea-lions, sea-oxen, and sea-horses, \u201cthe grisly wasserman\u201d and \u201cthe\nhorrible sea-satyr,\u201d are the records of old belief. Pliny tells of\na number of strange marine creatures, including elephants and rams,\nstranded on a Mediterranean beach, and of others with the heads of\nhorses, asses, and bulls, which despoiled grain fields beside the\nIndian Ocean. The Chinese believed that all domestic animals in the\nRoman Orient came out of the sea. Proclaiming that the atmosphere was\nonly diluted water, De Maillet, a French naturalist of the eighteenth\ncentury, contended that in the ocean was the original type of\neverything; that dogs descended from seals and men from tritons, while\nparroquets had their brilliant colors from gold, green, and violet\nfishes in the sea. There were fierce tribes of men in the north who\nseemed to him only lately emerged.\n\nIn classic legend, danger and marvel met mariners upon the strands\nalong which they sailed in coasting voyages, and there was no need to\ngo inland for adventure. The sirens sang their shrieking songs by\nthe water\u2019s edge, the Polyphemus-folk flung masses of rock into the\nbreakers, and from their island palaces enchantresses kept watch for\npassing ships. The voyages of fable were thus a sort of parade between\nshores thronged with perilous romance. A writing on the Catalan map of\n1375 is in this spirit. In the Spice Islands, it recites, are \u201cthree\nkinds of sirens--one is half woman, half fish; another is half woman,\nhalf bird; and the third is half woman, half horse.\u201d\n\nElder fancy peopled the deep itself with tritons riding sea-horses and\nstilling the waves with blasts from their shell trumpets, and with\ndivine nymphs of great beauty and often of engaging nature, as well as\nwith singular animals. The legate of Gaul wrote Augustus that a number\nof nereids had been found dead on its shore, and men from Olisipo\n(Lisbon) brought word to Tiberius that a triton had been heard blowing\na conch shell in a cavern retreat. Sea marvels multiply, but somehow\ntake on a coarser texture, in the medi\u00e6val time.\n\n\n_The Sailors\u2019 Favorite_\n\nAmong the marine populations the dolphin has always been a favorite\nwith sailors, as Greek and Roman bas-reliefs and the coins, medals, and\ncoats of arms of Mediterranean countries bear witness. It was supposed\nto be the swiftest of animals; it was fond of men and of music,\nparticularly that of the water organ; it had a turned-up nose, and\naccording to Pliny recognized in a surprising manner the name of Simo\n(flat-nose) and \u201cpreferred to be called by that name rather than any\nother.\u201d Ajasson thought it was attracted merely by the hissing sound of\nthe word. Pliny has a tale of its friendship with mankind which should\nhave a better ending:\n\n\u201cA dolphin at Hippo Diarrhytus on the coast of Africa used to receive\nhis food from the hands of various persons, present himself for their\ncaresses, sport about among the swimmers, and carry them on his back.\nProconsul Flavianus rubbed him with unguents whose odor rendered him as\nif dead, and he kept aloof for months afterward, as though affronted.\nBut he returned to familiar intercourse later. At last the vexations\nthat were caused them by having to entertain so many influential men\nwho came to see this sight, compelled the people of Hippo to put the\nanimal to death.\u201d\n\n\n_Monster Whales_\n\nThe ancients held the great cetaceans in terror. The Talmud declares\nthat it would take a ship three days to sail from the head to the\ntail of Leviathan. Pliny speaks of whales in the Indian Ocean nine\nhundred feet long, and of others which would cover two acres of\nground. The traditional fear of them is in the account by Nearchus of\nhis battle--his own word--with a school of whales when he was taking\nAlexander\u2019s fleet back from the mouth of the Indus to the Persian Gulf.\nThe sailors saw columns of foam shooting up from the sea and at first\nmistook them for waterspouts. When they learned that these came from\nwhales, \u201cthey were so terrified that the oars fell from their hands.\u201d\nBut Nearchus rallied them, drew up his ships in order of battle, and at\na given signal dashed toward the monsters. Oars splashed loudly, rowers\nshouted, trumpets sang defiance. The astonished whales plunged out of\nsight, and his men hailed Nearchus as savior of the fleet.\n\nSailors in the Indian Ocean of a later time told of the head of a fish\n\u201cthat might be compared to a hill; its eyes were like two doors, so\nthat people could go in at one eye and out at the other.\u201d In these\nwaters Sindbad\u2019s companions mistook a whale for a green meadow. The\nwhales of Norse lore carry witches, while the monster that bore\nGlooskap, the Algonquin culture hero, could hear the song of clams as\nthey lay under the sand.\n\nSt. Brendan and his seventeen monkish brethren repeated the Sindbad\nadventure when they sailed into the western seas in search of the Isle\nof the Blessed. Bearing a lamb without blemish, they landed on a low\nisland to celebrate the Easter festival. But when a fire was lighted\nand the pot set over it, the island began to move, and they fled to\ntheir osier ship. What they had taken for an islet was \u201cthe beast\nJasconius, greatest of things that swim, which laboureth night and day\nto put his tail in his mouth, but for greatness he may not.\u201d In stories\nof this kind in the _Physiologus_ the whale was supposed to represent\nthe devil, the sea the world, and the ship the human race.\n\n\n_The Kraken_\n\n\u201cOh, silly mariners,\u201d exclaimed Arngrim, \u201cthat in digging cannot\ndiscern whale\u2019s flesh from earth!\u201d Bishop Pontoppidan pondered these\naccounts and in his _Natural History of Norway_, published in 1752, he\nconcluded that the whale, large as it was--and science knows no extinct\nmonster of equal bulk--was not large enough to explain them. These are\nnot floating islands, but a vast sea-monster called kraken, kraxen, or\nkrabben. \u201cWhat the credulous Olaus Magnus writes,\u201d says he, \u201cof the\nwhale being so large that his back is looked upon as an island, and\nthat people might land, light fires, and do various kinds of work upon\nit, is a notoriously fabulous and ridiculous romance.\u201d No, this is the\nkraken, the back of which \u201cseems to be about an English mile and a half\nin circumference.\u201d\n\nPeople, thinks the bishop, had some imperfect idea of the kraken for\nages back. Pliny heard an obscure account of it in the Gaditanian sea;\nhe likens it both to a wheel with spokes and to a tree with such large\nbranches that it could not get through a ship channel. The Kors Trold\nor Soe-Drawl which sailors deemed an evil spirit, and which they said\ncould stop a ship under full sail, must be the kraken, concludes the\nNorwegian.\n\nPontoppidan draws a spirited picture of this prodigious creature\nshowing itself among a fleet of fishermen. They are several miles out\nat sea on a hot summer day. Their lines should show from eighty to one\nhundred fathoms of water under them, but show only twenty or thirty.\nFish are plentiful, above all cod and ling. As fast as the sailors cast\nin they draw out their finny prey. They are angling right over the\nmonster, and his back is the bottom the lines have sounded. Then they\nsee the water shallowing still further; the kraken is raising himself.\nSo they hasten out of danger and lie on their oars.\n\n\u201cIn a few minutes,\u201d says the historian, \u201cthey see this enormous\nmonster come up to the surface of the water; he there shows himself\nsufficiently, though his whole body does not appear, which in all\nlikelihood no human eye ever beheld. His back looks at first like a\nnumber of small islands, surrounded with something that floats and\nfluctuates like seaweeds; and several bright points or horns appear,\nwhich grow thicker and thicker the higher they rise above the\nwater. Sometimes they stand up as high and as large as the masts of\nmiddle-sized vessels. These are the creature\u2019s arms, and it is said if\nthey were to lay hold of the largest man-of-war, they would pull it\ndown to the bottom. After this monster has been on the surface a short\ntime, it begins slowly to sink again, causing a whirlpool that draws\ndown everything with it.\u201d\n\nPontoppidan believes the kraken is a polypus, one of the starfish kind.\nIt has a strong and peculiar scent by means of which it attracts other\nfish. Those islands, among the Faroes, that suddenly appear and as\nsuddenly disappear and that people deem inhabited by evil spirits are\nkrakens.\n\nAll of which is set down in the famous eighth chapter of the _Natural\nHistory_ which, as its author says, \u201ctreats of the Norwegian\nSea-Monsters, or those animals of enormous size and uncommon form\nwhich are sometimes seen in the ocean.\u201d In this chapter the Norse\ncleric seeks seemingly to outmatch in the colder seas of Scandinavia\nthe marvels of the Mediterranean. He makes himself chief sponsor for\nthe sea-serpent. He describes the trold-fish, or unlucky-fish, that\nsailors hasten to throw overboard. He has much to say of mermaids. He\ntells of the Maelstrom in the Lofoden district of Nordland--an abyss\nwhich penetrates the globe and issues in the Gulf of Bothnia; \u201cwithin\na Norway mile of it, boats, ships, and yachts have been carried away.\u201d\nWhales are sometimes swept into it, \u201cand then it is impossible to\ndescribe their howlings and bellowings.\u201d\n\n\n_The Sea Serpent_\n\nThe sea serpent of Pontoppidan has a venerable past and a present of\nconjecture and recurrent report. Insensibly a legend has been built up\nin the modern time as strange as any in the whole range of fable. Men\nsay, not \u201ca sea serpent,\u201d but \u201cthe sea serpent.\u201d It is assumed that\nthere is but one, and that for ages it has haunted the deep, appearing\nsometimes in the Atlantic, sometimes in the Indian Ocean, sometimes in\nthe South Pacific--a plesiosaurus, perhaps, wandering the seas, the\nlonely survivor of a vanished age.\n\nOlaus Magnus described the great marine snake--the Soe-Ormen of old\nlays--as two hundred feet long and twenty feet around, and as rising up\nlike a mast before ships and snapping men off their decks. Hans Egede,\nthe Greenland missionary, saw it in July, 1734. When it reared itself,\nits head was higher than the ship\u2019s maintop. When it flattened itself\nupon the water, its tail was a ship\u2019s length behind its head. \u201cThe\nfollowing evening,\u201d says Mr. Egede, \u201cwe had very bad weather.\u201d\n\nFrom all accounts, Pontoppidan concludes that this monster is of about\nthe length of a cable, or six hundred English feet. The body is as big\naround as two hogsheads. \u201cThe head has a high and broad forehead, but\nin some a pointed snout, though in others that is flat, like that of\na cow or horse; with large blue eyes like a couple of bright pewter\nplates, large nostrils, and several stiff hairs standing out on each\nside like whiskers.\u201d Its skin is smooth, except for a mane, like\nseaweed.\n\nThese great snakes, the Norse writer declares, haunt the floor of the\nNorth Sea, rising in July and August, their spawning time. The wind is\ndestructive to them, and they appear only in calms. They cannot face\nthe sun, and the fisherman may escape them by rowing toward it. Nor can\nthey endure the smell of castor or asaf\u0153tida, and anglers who go out\non Stor Eggen in the summer provide themselves with one or the other.\nSometimes, however, the monster rises under small boats and upsets\nthem, or throws its heavy folds across vessels even of some hundred\ntons burthen, and sinks them.\n\nThe appearances of the sea serpent are well enough documented. It was\nreported off the Norway coast in 1819, 1822 and 1837, off the New\nEngland coast in 1815, 1817, 1819, 1833, and 1869, and off the American\ncoast farther south in 1895. It was seen in the South Atlantic in 1841\nby the frigate _D\u0153dalus_, and in 1875 by the bark _Pauline_, when\nseemingly it was dragging under a large whale. A few years ago it was\nseen by the bark _Harvard_ near Borneo. In the nineteenth century it\nwas sighted so often near Boston that it became known as the American\nsea serpent. The accounts were circumstantial and so well vouched\nfor that there could be no reasonable doubt that a strange marine\nmonster was abroad. A committee of the Boston Linnaean Society, for\nexample, drew up a report signed by eye-witnesses in 1819. The serpent,\nthey said, was from eighty to ninety feet long, with buoy-like\nprotuberances on its back and was swimming at twenty miles or more an\nhour, and driving frightened mackerel before it.\n\nThese reports have been variously explained--that a low-ranging flight\nof sea fowl could produce the semblance of a snake upon the water; that\na mass of seaweed had created this effect; that a pair of gigantic\nbasking sharks, swimming in a line, had seemed to be one creature;\nthat twenty-foot ribbon fish were the basis of the legend, and that\na monster squid had been mistaken for a snake. The preponderance of\nscientific opinion inclines to the last named view. Cephalopods more\nthan sixty feet long have been seen off Newfoundland and the coasts of\nnorthern Europe, and it may be that what the _Pauline_ saw was not a\nserpent crushing a whale, but a whale killing a giant cuttle fish. But\nit is not at all certain that a monster of some species unknown, or\ntoo hastily assumed to be extinct, a stray from the Mesozoic or Eocene\nseas, does not haunt the ocean.\n\nCousins of this prodigy, of vaguer outline, rove the deeps of myth and\nromance. The sea serpent of Arab story is the waterspout. The spotted\nsnake of Navajo story caused the flood. The bunyip of Van Diemen\u2019s\nLand carried off women to his water abode. The yacu-mama, or mother\nof waters, of Brazilian story--fifty paces long and twelve yards in\ngirth--drew anything within a hundred yards into its jaws, but could\nbe placated by bugle music. The orc of the Charlemagne cycle, a\nhorrible mass of tossing and twisting body with nothing of the animal\nbut head, eyes, and tusked mouth, haunted an island off the Irish\ncoast and menaced the manacled and beauteous Angelica. Rogero with\nhis hippogrif and magic buckler released her, and Orlando slew the\nmonster afterward. The killing by a Moslem of a like creature that had\nbeen devouring beautiful virgins led to the conversion of the Maldive\nislanders, according to Ibn Batuta; at times it reappears in the offing\nin the seeming of a ship with lighted candles. The orc of science is\nno serpent, but a large dolphin, and when it pursues the whale, says\nan old writer, the latter makes \u201ca hideous bellowing, like a bull when\nbitten by a dog.\u201d\n\n\n_Tortoises_\n\nA quaint humor animates much of tortoise tradition. By stringing cords\nacross a tortoise shell the infant Hermes invented the lyre. According\nto the Sicilians a tortoise executed the decree of fate that \u00c6schylus\nshould die of a blow from heaven; an eagle mistook the tragic poet\u2019s\nbald head for a stone and dropped a tortoise upon it to break the\nshell. Pliny says that tortoises betray themselves to fishermen by\novereating at night on land and snoring loudly after they return to\nthe water. \u201cSome persons are of opinion,\u201d he reports, \u201cthat the female\nrefuses to have any intercourse with the male until he has placed a\nwisp of straw on her back, and that she hatches her eggs merely by\nlooking at them.\u201d From the tortoise the Romans obtained no less than\nsixty-six remedies for bodily ills.\n\nSea turtles may attain a weight of a thousand pounds, and legend has\nenlarged this figure. In their shells, says Diodorus, the Chelonophagi\n(turtle-eaters) of the East African islands, sailed to the mainland for\nfresh water. They used them also as roofs, nature\u2019s bounty providing\nthem \u201cby one gift food, vessels, shipping, and habitations.\u201d \u00c6lian\nspeaks of tortoise shell houses fifteen cubits long: \u201cnor does the rain\nbeating against them sound otherwise than if it were falling on tiles.\u201d\nOdoric overtops this. In Cochin-China he saw a tortoise \u201cbigger in\ncompass than the dome of St. Anthony\u2019s Church in Padua.\u201d\n\n\n_Eels_\n\nThe Romans thought that the mur\u00e6nas, or sea eels, had a language\nof their own, and that their voices were \u201clow and sweet, with an\nintimation so fascinating that few could resist its influence.\u201d The\nEmperor Augustus, it was believed, could understand the language. How\neels were generated was long a puzzle, their origin being imputed\nto May dew, horse hairs, rocks, mud, the carcasses of animals, and\neven to Jove and the goddess Anguilla; hence their scientific name of\n_Anguillina_. A cod of the German coast and a Sardinian water beetle\nhave each been called the \u201ceel-mother.\u201d It has lately been ascertained\nthat the eggs are spawned in Bermuda waters, and the young reach Europe\nafter a two years\u2019 journey.\n\n\n_Three Traditions_\n\nA German folk-tale has it that when Christ was crucified all the fishes\nwere terror-stricken and dived under water, save the pike, which thrust\nforth its head and witnessed the scene. Hence the pike\u2019s head shows\nsome of the parts of the crucifixion--the cross, three nails, and a\nsword. Another fish, the remora, decided the fate of the world by\nattaching itself to Antony\u2019s galley and keeping it out of the battle\nline at Actium; or so says Pliny. There are monstrous crabs on the\nbeaches of Japan, some of them seven feet across, which bear what seems\nto be a human mask on their backs. The natives say they appeared after\na pirate fleet had been destroyed and its leaders beheaded on the shore.\n\n\n_Water Horses_\n\nThe water gods of northern Europe usually had the horse form, and their\nmemory survives in Shetlandic tales of the njogel and tangi. The former\nappeared as a sleek pony or decrepit gray horse; its hair grew forward\ninstead of backward; its fetlocks pointed upward instead of downward;\nits hoofs were reversed. At dusk it would stand beside a trail, and\nseemed to invite the benighted traveler to mount it. Then it galloped\nover a waterfall, or dashed into a lake, leaving him to drown while it\nvanished on the other bank in a blue light. The tangi was like it, but\nhad its ranging ground on the seashore. People became insensible for\ndays when it ran around them.\n\n\n_Sharks_\n\nHuman attributes among the sea\u2019s inhabitants are divided between\nsharks and the merfolk. The latter are the graceful creatures of an\nimagination at play with itself. The former are always things of\nterror, not only because they attack man, but because they seem to have\nsome special and sinister relation to him. They have been thought to\nbe enchanted men. Savages tell of their taking human form and human\nmates. The West African sacrificed children to a shark god. In the\nshark temples of the Sandwich Islands priests rubbed their own bodies\nwith salt water so as to seem to have scaly skins. Offerings of coins\nwere made to the basking shark in northern Europe. In New Calabar it\nwas a capital offense to kill a shark. Sailors still think that this\nfish will follow vessels on which some one is to die, and in the days\nof the slave ships it was said to have a special fondness for the flesh\nof blacks. In former times its teeth, set in gold, were used as amulets\nand its powdered brains had a place in medicine; shark\u2019s oil is still\nin the pharmacop\u0153ias, shark fins are a Chinese dainty, and shark skins\nan article of commerce. The source of these beliefs and practices may\nbe in the world-wide dragon myth, wherein pearls were thought to be\nemanations of the moon goddess and were sought as givers of life. The\nsharks that harassed the pearl fisheries came to be looked upon as\ndemons guarding the treasure houses of the sea floor, and embodiments\nof evil like the dragon itself.\n\n\n_Merfolk_\n\nUnder mermaid legend is the old notion that because there are men and\nwomen on the land there must be men and women in the sea. The texture\nof the legend has become about as complex as human nature itself, and,\nlike it, shows the divine, the semi-divine and the coarsely animal\nsubsisting together. In turn the mermaid has been goddess, enchantress,\nand fresh meat at sea.\n\nThe oldest known form of the myth may be glimpsed on tavern signs,\nwhere the mermaid is depicted with a circular mirror in her hand and a\nfish tail. She is Chaldean and Ph\u0153nician. Derceto, the moon goddess,\nwas represented as half woman and half fish because it was conceived\nthat she divided her time between the earth and the waters under the\nearth, plunging into the sea with every moonset. Baring Gould thinks\nthat the mirror she holds may be the moon disk.\n\nOther shapes of poetry were merged in the legend before it entered the\nprose period of maritime discovery. Among them were the tritons and the\nnereids, \u201chalf-naked, natural, loving, and antique\u201d--lesser divinities\nof classic fable. At some time the sirens, who had been pictured as\nhalf human and half bird, were immersed, and thereafter were pictured\nas half human and half fish. Browne protests this representation, but\nthe mermaid myth does carry siren features, song included. The song of\nthe Rhine maidens is mermaid song, their prophecy mermaid prophecy. Of\nthe same family are the nixies who love music and foretell the future.\n\nThe legend has become further entangled--with tales of banshees whose\nwailing portends death, of gull-befriended seal people who could take\nhuman form, of swan maidens who wed mortals, of forward sea fairies\nwho leave their red caps on the shore of Ireland for young men to pick\nup, even of the female demon or nightmare. There are both foam and\ncloud-flock in mermaid story, and they meet in the gentle Ph\u00e6acian,\nNausicaa, whom Ulysses discovers bathing on the shore.\n\nIn Fouqu\u00e9\u2019s _Undine_ the legend achieves its purest poetry. It is the\nstory of a nymph who lives with her foster parents on the edge of an\nenchanted forest where a knight of the old German Empire finds and woos\nher. Riding thither through the wood, a bear mocks him with human voice\nfrom the branches of an oak, a troll shows him the goblins at play with\ntheir gold beneath the earth, and what seems at one moment a tall white\nman and at the next a foaming brook guides him to the cottage. These\nwere Undine\u2019s familiars, and when the knight meets the water maiden the\nbrook rises and for days roars about the cottage, secluding him there\nuntil he has won the nymph\u2019s heart, and she his hand and with it an\nimmortal soul. Through the remainder of the story until its inevitable\ndisaster in the unwitting breaking of a vow--the end of all unions\nbetween nymphs and mortals--water foams and flashes and strange shapes\ndissolve in spray.\n\nThis is the type of a hundred medi\u00e6val tales, of which the best known\nis that of Melusina, a fountain nymph wedded to the head of the house\nof Lusignan, but lost to him because he did not keep his pledge to\nrespect her Saturday privacy. He discovered her in the bath, a serpent\nfrom the waist downward. According to report her blood flowed in the\nveins of the Luxembourg and Rohan families and in Henry VII, sovereign\nof the Holy Roman Empire. Her spirit was seen whenever the death of a\nLusignan impended. The tale has an extensive bibliography.\n\nOther accounts of water maidens are of a wilder cast. The judy of\nSlavic folk tales lived in the lakes and rivers of the Rhodope\nMountains and danced in meadows, and him whom they coaxed to dance with\nthem they destroyed. When they saw a man in the water they entangled\nhim in their long hair and drowned him. The pariks of Armenian story\nare erotic female demons of the river banks. In a Celtic tale Rath saw\nmermaids as \u201cgrown-up girls, the fairest of shape and make above the\nwaters; but huger than one of the hills was the hairy-clawed, bestial\nlower part which they had beneath.\u201d They sang the hero to sleep and\ntore him to pieces. The ships of another Celtic adventurer, Ruad, were\nstopped, and when he went over the side he saw \u201cthree of the loveliest\nof the world\u2019s women\u201d holding to the keels; the rest of the story is\ndalliance. Pacific coast Indians have legends of beautiful, long-haired\nwomen who lived in a round house under the ocean and made trouble for\npeople above. An Arab traveler tells of joyous water maidens caught and\ncaressed by sailors in the bright straits of Greece, and then returned\nto the sea.\n\nThe prose of the legend was reached when men began to capture what\nthey conceived to be mermaids and mermen, and failed in most cases to\nfind kindred beings. There is a considerable list of these creatures\ncaptured or sighted on the beaches of the Old and the New World.\nOnly one of these talked, and Pontoppidan mentions the story but to\ndiscredit it. Two senators of Norway caught a merman, but let him go\non his threatening them in Danish to sink the ship with all its crew.\nOf the so-called bishop-fish or sea bishop, said to have been netted\nfor the King of Poland in the Baltic in 1453, a similar tale is told.\nIt wore a dalmatic and mitre and carried a crosier. With gestures of\nentreaty it besought the intercession of its brother prelates of the\ncourt. When it was released into the sea the grateful creature made\nthe sign of the cross and gave the episcopal benediction with its fin\nbefore it submerged. In one other instance there were points of human\ncontact. Milkmaids of Edam in West Friesland in 1430 found a mermaid\nwhich had been swept over the dykes by a storm. They brought it home,\nas the story goes, and dressed it in female attire; it learned how to\nspin, to eat with them, to adore the crucifix, but it never spoke.\n\nThrough many other accounts runs the belief that merfolk were\nweather-breeders. The _Speculum Regale_, an Icelandic work of the\ntwelfth century, describes a mermaid with a \u201cvery horrible face\u201d that\nhaunts the deep near Greenland and before heavy storms is seen with\nfish in its hands. If it casts the fish toward the ship, it is an omen\nof death in the coming storm; if it casts the fish away from the ship\nit is a good omen. Hakluyt\u2019s _Voyages_ tell of a monster, from the\nmiddle upward proportioned like a man and with a tawny skin, which was\ndiscovered near Bermuda in the sixteenth century. The clerks of the\nexpedition put the account in writing, to be certified to the English\nking. \u201cPresently after this,\u201d it is recited, \u201cfor the space of sixteen\ndays we had wonderful foule weather.\u201d Knud Leems in his account of\nDanish Lapland asserted that horrible tempests followed the appearance\nof a merman and merwoman in those seas. The male, or hav-manden, was\nlike a robust man with brown skin and long hair and beard; the female,\nor hav-fruen, had the human shape and hair and a ghastly visage.\n\nIt appears that a merman, captured in the Baltic in 1531, lived for\nthree days at the court of Sigismund, King of Poland, and there is a\nstory that to determine ownership of another the King of Portugal and\nthe Grand Master of the Order of St. James had a suit at law.\n\nMerolla tells of a ship\u2019s crew in a South African port who saw at a\ndistance \u201ca sort of sea monsters like unto men\u201d gathering herbs, with\nwhich they plunged into the sea. The sailors gathered herbs for them,\nand the grateful creatures \u201cforthwith drew from the bottom of the sea a\nquantity of coral\u201d and laid it in the place where the sailors had piled\nthe herbs. Human perfidy ends a pretty story. The sailors spread a net\nto catch the mermen, who lifted it and fled.\n\nThe purely animal quality predominates in other of the circumstantial\naccounts repeated of the mer people. A merman was captured off the\ncoast of Suffolk in 1187, but escaped. Hendryk Hudson reports that his\ncrew saw a mermaid near Nova Zembla, and \u201cfrom the navel upward her\nback and breasts were like a woman\u2019s,\u201d while the tail was like the tail\nof a porpoise. In 1560 fishermen netted seven mermen and mermaids in\nthe seas west of Ceylon; several Jesuit priests were witness thereto.\nCaptain Weddell, the Antarctic explorer, records the sworn testimony\nof one of his crew that he had seen a creature with human form and the\ntail of a seal, and with red face and green hair. In the sea of Angola,\nsays Pontoppidan, mermaids are heard to shriek and cry like women;\nnegroes net and eat them, and their flesh is considered much like pork.\nSigismundus ab Herbenstein had it from Muscovite sources that in the\nriver Tachnin there was \u201ca certain fish with head, eyes, nose, mouth,\nhands, feete and other members utterly of humane shape, and yet without\nany voyce, and pleasant to be eaten.\u201d In Pinkerton\u2019s _Voyages_ there\nis an account of the woman fish found \u201camong the islands Boccias,\u201d the\nflesh of which is \u201cof excellent savour when eaten boiled like other\nmeat, and which also serves to make highly savoury sausages.\u201d\n\nThe dugong, manatee, or sea cow has been called the Old Man of the\nSea as well as the mermaid. It has figured in legends with a biblical\nbackground; the people about the Red Sea took these creatures for\nsurvivors or descendants of the army of Pharaoh that was drowned in\npursuing the Israelitish host. The three mermaids that Columbus saw on\nhis first voyage to the New World are supposed to have been of this\nspecies. When white men first came to America the manatees thronged the\nwaters of Florida, but have since become nearly extinct there, although\nthere is a protected herd in the Miami River.\n\nReports of actual captures present the rationalization and degradation\nof the mermaid legend. The divine daughters of the deep with their\nlovely bodies and flowing hair become strange animals of the seal or\ncetacean species with ugly faces and bodies that may be converted into\npork--sea apes, as the credulous and yet cautious Pontoppidan calls\nthem. They grow so common that the _Aberdeen Almanac_ of 1688 predicts\nthe periods when mermaids may be expected near the mouth of the Dee.\n\nSir Humphrey Davy argued that if God had created the mermaid, her\ndeficient means of locomotion and of self-defense would have left her\na prey to the fish. Yet the seas would have been poorer of romance if\nthe logic and poetry of men had not led them to correct, in ages more\nna\u00efve, what seemed to them an oversight of their Maker.\n\n\n\n\nChapter IX. The Peoples of Prodigy\n\n\nIn his _True History_ Lucian relates what he is at pains to point out\nis a fictitious voyage to the moon and to various isles of the outer\nseas. Grotesque half-human beings people his narrative. There are grape\nvines, the upper parts of which have the shape of women, and these\nentwine themselves about his men. There are Hippogypi, or men carried\nupon vultures; Onoscileas, or ass-legged women, with long robes and a\nfree manner of harlotry; Bucephali, or men with bulls\u2019 heads and horns\nand lowing voices; Schorodomachi, or garlic-fighters; Psyllotoxot\u00e6, or\nflea-archers; Acroconopes, or gnat-riders; cloud-centaurs, nut-eaters,\npirates riding dolphins that neigh like horses, and a variety of other\nfantastic creatures. The Samosatan wrote, he says, \u201cabout such things\nas neither are nor ever can be.\u201d\n\nYet races of men very much like these were long supposed to live\nupon earth. Their descriptions are in the ancient histories, their\nhabitats are defined in the classic geographies, their effigies are\nupon medi\u00e6val maps. As late as the century after Columbus, travelers\nwere still coming upon them, and repeating the interrogatory of _The\nTempest_, \u201cWhat have we here, a man or a fish?\u201d Perhaps twoscore of\nthese imaginary tribes are better documented, and not so long ago were\nbetter known, than most of the tribes of real men and women upon the\nearth; the documents are on dusty shelves of the larger libraries.\n\nSome of the singular folk entered literature by the double gates of\nmistaken etymology and literal acceptance of figurative language.\nIn the lineaments of others one discerns races that are still upon\nearth, but divested of the masks of fable. In the rest one sees the\ncreative fancy of man following its natural bent--cartooning humanity\nby exaggerating a limb or feature or by eliminating it; borrowing\nsomething from the brute; making men taller or shorter, or longer-lived\nor shorter-lived, than reality; fashioning the moon calves, the\nCalibans; setting up a realm in which paradox is law. Thus mankind gave\nitself new and interesting neighbors.\n\n\n_Singular Speech_\n\nMen judge one another by the testimony of the ear as well as of the\neye; and the speech of all these peoples, no less than their anatomy,\nproclaimed the law of paradox. Sometimes the surprise was in hearing\nIndian or Greek or Arab words from lips that seemed bestial rather\nthan human. Often no words came at all, but only unintelligible animal\nsounds. This, indeed, was to be expected from races whose bodies varied\nfrom the normal; but the list of prodigious folk is lengthened by the\naddition of other men who, while looking like ordinary mortals, were\nnot quite human in their speech.\n\nThere were nations which used dumb-barter because they had no\nlanguage. There were tribes in Ethiopia which, as Pliny says, \u201chave\nto employ gesture by nodding the head and moving the limbs instead\nof speech.\u201d On the Atlantic seaboard were troglodytes that \u201chave no\narticulate voice, but only utter a kind of squeaking noise.\u201d \u201cLike the\nscreeching of bats,\u201d says Herodotus of the same people. Another tribe\nof troglodytes, according to John Lok, \u201chave no speech, but rather a\ngrinning and chattering.\u201d The Arabians dwell in caves and have shrill,\nboyish voices, declares Jordanus. In the eastern mountains of Ind, says\nTauron, are the Choromand\u00e6, a forest folk with hairy bodies, canine\nteeth, and sea-green eyes who \u201cscreech in a frightful manner.\u201d Kazwini\nspeaks of hairy little men in Ramni with a speech like the chirping\nof birds. Carpini names among the peoples of Ind the dog-faced men\nwho speak two words in human wise and bark for the third. There were\npeople with a small hole in place of the mouth, whose conversation was\na whistling. Among the isles of Maundeville is one \u201cclept Traconda,\nwhere the Folk be as Beasts and unreasonable, and dwell in Caves; and\nthey eat Flesh of Serpents, and they eat but little; and they speak\nNought, but they hiss as Serpents do.\u201d In a desert beyond paradise this\nauthority says there are wild men \u201cthat be hideous to look on, for they\nbe horned and they speak Nought, but they grunt as Pigs.\u201d However,\nthere was speech in that country, for \u201cPopinjays speak of their own\nNature and say \u2018Salve\u2019 to Men that go through the Deserts.\u201d\n\nNeither classical nor medi\u00e6val relators mention the device which has\ngiven a South African tribe its name, and rumors of which may have\nprovided a basis for fable. Merolla, who went to the Congo in 1682,\nheard that the Hottentots \u201chave not the gift of human voice, but\nunderstand each other by a sort of hissing tone and motion of the\nlips.\u201d This is the Hottentot \u201cclick\u201d which the Portuguese called a kind\nof stammering and the Dutch likened to the turkey\u2019s gobble. It is made\nby applying the tongue to the roof of the mouth, the teeth, or the\ngums, and suddenly drawing it back. There are four of these clicks--the\ndental, like the smack of a kiss; the palatal, like the tap of a\nwoodpecker; the cerebral, like the pop of a cork; and the lateral, like\nthe quack of a duck.\n\n\n_The Dog-headed People_\n\nThe Amazon and pygmy, and certain tribes of the satyrs, had speech\nentirely human. Because in them credulity has won unlooked-for triumphs\nover skepticism, these three peoples, best known of the races of\nlegend, are reserved for separate treatment later. The men of another\nrace vie with the Amazons as figures in plastic art, although only\nin its more grotesque manifestations. The Cynocephali, or dog-headed\npeople, writes Ctesias, are a swarthy and extremely just people living\nin the mountains of northern India at the sources of the Hyparkhos. The\ntribe numbers about one hundred and twenty thousand persons and pays\ntribute to the King of the Indians.\n\nThese people have the heads of dogs, but with larger teeth, and the\nbodies of men; and they have dog claws. They cannot use human speech,\nalthough they understand it. They converse with one another by barking,\nand with other people by barking and the sign language. They practice\nno arts but live by the chase, using the bow and spear; and they can\noutrun wild animals. Their staple food is raw flesh, which, however,\nthey roast in the sun. They rear numbers of sheep, goats, and asses\nand drink the milk and whey of the ewes. They are fond of the fruit of\nthe siptakhora, the tree that produces amber. The surplus fruit they\ndry and pack in hampers as the Greeks pack raisins. Every year they\nfreight rafts with the hampers and with two hundred and sixty talents\nweight of amber, and a like weight of a pigment which they make from\na purple flower. This they convey as tribute to the Indian king. They\nship other raft-loads of the same commodities to their neighbors,\nreceiving bread and flour in return and a cloth made from a stuff grown\non trees (cotton). They also sell arms to other peoples.\n\nThe dog-headed people are troglodytes, sleeping on a litter of straw\nor leaves spread in caves. The women bathe once a month, the men not\nat all, merely washing their hands; but thrice a month they anoint\nthemselves with butter. They are clad in skins and the richest have\ncotton raiment. Some of them live to be two hundred years old.\n\nThe inhabitants of the Andaman Islands, says Marco Polo, are a\nsavage race \u201chaving heads, eyes and teeth resembling those of the\ncanine species\u201d; and they kill and eat strangers. Odoric is equally\nuncomplimentary, but Ibn Batuta, always sensitive to female charm, says\ntheir naked wives are of exquisite beauty. Carpini speaks of India\u2019s\ndog-faced men. Even Greenland has a similar legend as to an older race\nof barbarians who had magic, but not the bow and arrow. These were men\nwith dog paws. They disappeared in battle with the Eskimos, or from\nnatural causes, since \u201cthe world was too small to hold both races.\u201d\nMyths of dog descent are found among the Aleuts, Dog-ribs, and Ojibwas\nin North America, as well as in Madagascar, Java, the Nicobars, New\nGuinea, Indo-China, and even Europe. In North America the wild dog\n(coyote) frequently figures as the creator of mankind.\n\nSunamukha is the Indian name of the Cynocephali, and a manuscript of\nthe Prabh\u00e2sakhanda recites that this people lives on the Indus. What\nCtesias has set down seems to be an account of an actual race, a tribe\nof black aborigines.\n\nWhen Hayton, the intrepid traveler-king of Armenia, paid a visit in\nthe thirteenth century to Batu, the Mongol prince, he brought back a\nrelated and still stranger story. Beyond Cathay, a journey of two years\nand two months from Nakin, was a country where the women had the human\nshape and speech, but the men were like hairy dogs and had no speech.\nThese dog-men repelled all strangers from their land, and supported\nthemselves and their wives by the chase, the men eating flesh raw, the\nwomen cooking it. When children were born, the males had the shape of\ndogs, the females that of women. The _Chinese Encyclopedia_ also has a\ntale of the Kingdom of Dogs, and it was a Chinese traveler who broke up\nthis curious commonwealth. The women wished to escape from it and gave\nhim little sticks, asking him, when he went back to his native land, to\ndrop one of these every ten li. They got away by the trail he marked.\n\n\n_The One-Eyed Arimaspians_\n\nLying between the gold-guarding griffins and the cannibal Issedones was\nthe country of the one-eyed Arimaspians. They first appear in a poem\nof Aristeas of Proconesus, a semi-mythical person who made a northward\njourney, as his verses declare, in a mood of \u201cbacchic fury.\u201d Herodotus\nbases his account on these, but cannot persuade himself that there is\na race of men born with one eye who in all else resemble the rest of\nmankind. Arimaspi, he says, is a word of Scythic origin, a compound of\n_arima_ (one) and _spou_ (eye).\n\nThere Herodotus drops the legend, and after it has thriven in the tales\nof the fabulists for some thousands of years, modern criticism takes\nit up again from the same angle. It is suggested that, after all,\nArimaspi never meant one-eyed, and that the race, the tradition of\nwhose deformed aspect arose from a mistaken translation of its name, is\nstill in existence in the Russian tribe known as the Tsheremis, which\noccupies the left bank of the Middle Volga. This is near enough to the\nUral gold districts to meet the general topography of the legend.\n\nStrabo also describes a one-eyed nation, the Monomatti, with the ears\nof dogs, bristling hair, and shaggy breasts.\n\n\n_Folk That Live on Odors_\n\nThe folk that live on odors dwell, says Megasthenes, near the sources\nof the Ganges. They have no mouths, hence their name of Astomi. Their\nbodies are rough and hairy and they clothe themselves with a down\nplucked from trees--silk or cotton. They use neither meat nor drink and\nsubsist only by breathing and by inhaling scents. When they start on a\nlong journey they lay in a supply of odoriferous roots, flowers, and\napples. But, says Pliny, \u201can odor which is a little more powerful than\nusual easily destroys them.\u201d Pope\u2019s \u201cdie of a rose in aromatic pain\u201d\nmay define such a fate.\n\nAccording to other ancient writers the Astomi also supported life by\nsniffing at raw meat, and their susceptibility to rank smells made it\nhard to keep them alive in camp. In Ethiopia Pliny places a people\nthat \u201chave the mouth grown together, and being destitute of nostrils,\nbreathe through one passage only, imbibing their drink through it by\nmeans of a hollow stalk of the oat, which there grows spontaneously and\nsupplies them with its grain for food.\u201d Maundeville removes the Astomi\nto an island and gives them the stature of pygmies and a hissing speech.\n\n\n_The Noseless Nations_\n\nThere were several noseless nations. The flexible-footed Scyritae, says\nMegasthenes, had only two breathing orifices above the mouth; and he\nsketches pygmies similarly made. Maundeville improves on the sketch:\n\u201cAnd in another Ile be Folk that have the Face all flat, all plain,\nwithout Nose and without Mouth.\u201d In contrast still another island had\n\u201cFolk of foul Fashion and Shape that have the lip above the Mouth so\ngreat that when they sleep in the Sun they cover all the Face with that\nlip.\u201d Megasthenes had named and described these seventeen centuries\nbefore. They were the Amycteres, with upper lips projecting far beyond\nthe lower--an omnivorous people, fond of raw meat, and short lived.\nTudela tells of desert-ranging, infidel Turks who worship the wind,\neschew bread and cooked meats, and, lacking noses, breathe through two\nsmall holes. The Noseless People of the Eskimo shore are evil spirits\nthat drag fishermen to gloomy abodes under the sea.\n\nTo men with the bold Roman profile, the Levantine contour, or the\nscimitar-shaped visage of the Sephardic Jew, Tartary\u2019s small-nosed,\nflat-faced peoples would indeed present a countenance very like a plane\nsurface. The scanty hair of the same peoples may be responsible for the\nancient notion of bald northern nations. The Eskimo legend suggests a\nskeleton tenanted by a demon.\n\n\n_Large-eared Races_\n\nAn Indian race called the Enotocoit\u00e6 had ears hanging down to their\nfeet--\u201cgreat Ears and long that hang down to their Knees\u201d is for once\nthe more restrained phrase of Maundeville. The philosophers who had\ntold Megasthenes of so many interesting folk told him also of these.\nThey could sleep upon their ears as upon a rug, or under them as under\na canopy, or inside them as in a sleeping bag. These appendages were\nlike winnowing fans, Tzetzes puts it. Their owners were so strong they\ncould pluck up trees. So could the elephant, which also has flapping\nears and a prolonged upper lip--the pattern, it would seem, for at\nleast two fables.\n\nCtesias describes a people who could blanket the upper parts of their\nbodies with their ears. These were the Pandore, a mountain race who\nlived to be two hundred years old, yet were destined evidently to\nbecome extinct, for they numbered only thirty thousand persons and the\nwomen bore children but once. The infants were hoary-headed at birth,\nbut at thirty the hair began to turn black, and at sixty no white hairs\nwere left. Five thousand bowmen and spearmen of the tribe followed the\nIndian king. There was even a Scandinavian tribe with all-enveloping\nears, if Pliny had it right.\n\n\n_Headless Peoples_\n\n The Anthropophagi, and men whose heads\n Do grow beneath their shoulders.\n --SHAKESPEARE: _Othello_.\n\nTo the west of the Troglodytes in distant mountains of Ind, says\nCtesias, live tribesmen who are without necks and have eyes in their\nshoulders. In the north of Africa, says Pliny, are the Blemmyes who\n\u201care said to have no heads, their mouths and eyes being seated in their\nbreasts.\u201d These were also called the Acephalites. Maundeville shifts\ntheir habitat. They occupy one of fifty-four great isles under the\njurisdiction of the king of Dondun. This island is somewhere toward the\nsouth of Asia. In it dwell \u201cFolk of foul Stature and of cursed Nature\nthat have no Heads. And their Eyes be in their Shoulders, and their\nMouths be round shapen, like an Horse-shoe amidst their Breasts.\u201d The\n_Arabian Nights_ locates these same people in the City of Brass. Abu\nMohammed, hight Lazybones, in quest of his wife, who has been carried\nthither by a Marid, \u201cheard a noise of cries and found himself in the\nmidst of a multitude of folk whose eyes were in their breasts.\u201d They\ngave him the news he sought and volunteered, \u201cNow we be brethren of the\nwhite serpent.\u201d The Eskimos speak of a headless people living in the\nmoon and in remote regions of the earth.\n\nHere is a story of a curious race domiciled by various writers in\nvarious parts of the Old World, and yet lacking details to give it\nverisimilitude. These are supplied by Sir Walter Raleigh in his report\non the wonders of Guiana. The headless people are Indians of the tribe\nof Ewaipanoma living in a district near the Orinoco. He has seen none\nof them, but \u201cevery childe in the provinces\u201d affirms the story. Their\neyes are in their shoulders, their mouths in the middle of their\nbreasts, \u201cand a long traine of haire groweth backward between their\nshoulders.\u201d A chief\u2019s son whom they had made a prisoner told Raleigh\nthey were \u201cthe most mighty men of all the land, and use bowes, arrowes,\nand clubbes thrice as big as any of Guiana.\u201d This confirms, concludes\nRaleigh, what was written of them by \u201cMandevile, whose reports were\nholden for fables many yeeres.\u201d\n\nIn the interior of Guiana Sir Walter had a trading transaction with\na nation of kindred appearance. He bartered jew\u2019s-harps for fowls at\na town of five hundred houses, where he found Indians plentifully\nprovisioned with venison, fowls, and wine. He asked their chief \u201cwhence\nhee had those Hennes.\u201d The answer was that they were brought from a\nmountain less than a mile away, \u201cwhere were many Indians, yea so many\nas grasse on the ground, and that these men had the points of their\nshoulders higher than the Crownes of their heads, and had so many\nHennes as was wonderful; and if wee would have any wee should send them\nJewes harpes, for they would give for every one two Hennes. Wee tooke\nan Indian, and gave him five hundred Harpes; the Hennes were so many\nthat hee brought us, as were not to be numbered.\u201d Raleigh wanted to\nvisit these mountain Acephali, but was warned that they were in their\ndrunken feasts and would kill him.\n\nOne may explain the headless peoples about as one will. The Tartar\ntribes north of India certainly have short necks. Thus Pliny on the\nAfrican Acephalites: \u201cOn the invasion of the Persians the Blemmyes were\nin the habit of falling on one knee and bowing the head to the breast,\nby which means, without injury to themselves, they afforded a passage\nto the horses of the enemy.\u201d Buffon accepts and interprets the Raleigh\ntale. \u201cThis monstrous deformity cannot be natural,\u201d he says. \u201cIt is\nprobable that savages, who are so pleased in disfiguring nature by\nflattening, rounding, and lengthening the head, might likewise contrive\nto sink it into the shoulders. These fantasies might arise from an idea\nthat, by rendering themselves deformed, they became more dreadful to\ntheir enemies.\u201d This passage would have interested Sir Walter.\n\n\n_Half-men_\n\nThere were people in the Philippines whose bodies suffered temporary\nsubtraction at the other extremity. These were the asuangs--men who had\nacquired powers of sorcery by eating human livers. When they willed\nit their persons divided at the waist line, the lower part remaining\nbehind and the upper growing wings and long nails and a horrible black\ntongue, and flying away on vampire errands. An orifice in the armpit\ncontained an oil which rendered this human bat invisible. If salt was\ncast on his abandoned half he could not assemble himself on his return.\nWak-wak was one of his names. The reality behind this grim fiction was\nthe learned counselor, called the asuang, whom each datto had at his\ncourt before the Spaniards came. His evil repute is a Spanish slander.\n\nIf there were men whose stature had been reduced as by a transverse\nsweep of the knife, there were others whose appearance was as if they\nhad been sliced. These were the half-men of Moslem legend called the\nShikh and the Nesnas, each with a single arm, leg, and eye, as though\none man had been split in twain. The Zulus had the same story, perhaps\nfrom Moslem sources. They tell of half-men discovering a Zulu girl in\na cave and thinking her two persons. When they discovered their error\nthey exclaimed: \u201cThe thing is pretty! But, oh, the two legs!\u201d The fable\nmay have sprung from figurative speech, in which men of backward\nculture are described as only half-men.\n\n\n_Diminutive Husbands_\n\nAmerican Eskimo legends tell of a tribe called Ardnainiq living far\nto the northwest, whereof the men, small as children and covered with\nhair, were carried around in the hoods of their wives, who were of\nnormal size. The detail oddly parallels Darwin\u2019s statement that he had\nfound a female crustacean of the common cirripedial character, \u201cand in\ntwo valves of her shell she had two little pockets, in each of which\nshe kept a little husband.\u201d\n\n\n_Eel-like Men_\n\nA race of eel-like men, says Julius Scaliger, dwell in Malabar. They\nhave the serpent\u2019s form, are eight feet long, and, while of horrible\naspect, are harmless unless provoked. They will \u201cstand bolt upright for\nhours together, gazing on the boyes at their sportes, never offring to\nhurte any of them.\u201d In the upright posture they lose the likeness of\nserpents and \u201cspread themselves into such a corpulent breadthe, that\nhad they feet they would seeme to be men.\u201d This is a tale brought to\nEurope by the Portuguese; and at a time when it was debated whether the\nserpent assumed a human form in tempting Eve, it was thought this might\nbe the creature whose body Satan borrowed.\n\nThe tale is based in part on the cobra\u2019s power to dilate its neck\ninto a broad hood. Back of it are Buddhist traditions of the Nagas, a\nrace of serpents that lived in dragon palaces under the earth. There\nwere naga-kings, and naga-maidens who assumed human form, had their\nmortal lovers, and became the founders of dynasties. The original\ninhabitants of the Andamans were reputed to have been of this race, and\naccording to a popular belief their descendants were oviparous. The\ninterpretation of this legend is complicated by the surmise that the\nNagas were actually an ancient, non-Aryan people whose emblem was the\ncobra.\n\n\n_Strangely Footed Folk_\n\nCertain races the ancients classified and named according to their\nmeans of getting over the ground. With his instinct for balanced\nstatement Pliny unearths a passage from Eudoxus which says that \u201cin\nthe southern parts of India\u201d the men have feet a cubit in length,\n\u201cwhile those of the women are so remarkably small that they are\ncalled Struthopodes.\u201d The word may mean either \u201csparrow-footed\u201d or\n\u201costrich-footed.\u201d In the context it probably means the former; the\ndames with diminutive feet hopped around as sparrows do. It may be they\nwere Chinese women.\n\nNear the Indian troglodytes, according to Ctesias, dwelt the Monocoli,\nwho had only one leg, but were able to leap with surprising agility.\nThese people were also called the Sciapodes, which means \u201cmaking a\nshadow with the foot.\u201d It was their custom in the time of extreme heat\nto lie on their backs and shield themselves from the sun, each under\nthe shade of his own foot. A later century knew the shadow-footed folk\nas the men with parasol feet. Maundeville places them in Ethiopia. In\nArmenia, or bordering upon it, the Mongols found another one-legged\nnation, but with different structure. Its citizens had only one arm\nalso, which was attached to the middle of the breast, but they had\ntwo gaits. Hopping, they covered ground with remarkable speed, and\nwhen tired of hopping the men and women whirled themselves around like\ncartwheels.\n\nWhen the Norsemen were exploring America, they encountered a Uniped,\nor one-legged man, who launched a lethal arrow at Thorwald Ericson, as\nhe sat at the boat helm. The dying leader drew it out and exclaimed,\n\u201cThere is fat around my paunch; we have hit upon a faithful country,\nand yet we are not like to get much profit by it.\u201d\n\nThe stiff-legged men, Carpini heard, lived south of the country of the\nKara-Khitai, upon a great desert. They had no speech and no joints in\ntheir limbs, and when they fell down somebody had to help them up. They\nwore felt of camel\u2019s hair and made wind shelters thereof. When wounded\nin battle they stanched the blood with grass and fled swiftly away.\n\nA related tale is told by Rubruquis, who had it from \u201ca certain priest\nof Cathaya who sat with me clothed in a red-coloured cloth.\u201d When the\nfriar asked him whence he had such a color, \u201che told me that in the\neast part of Cathaya there were high craggy rocks, wherein certain\ncreatures dwell, having in all parts the shape of men, but that they\nbow not the knees, but leap instead of walking; which are not above one\ncubit long, and their whole body is covered with hair, who have their\nabode in caves, which no man can come unto; and they who hunt them, go\nto them, and carry strong drink with them, and make pits in the rocks\nlike wells, which they fill with that strong drink. The hunters hide\nthemselves, and then these creatures come out of their holes and taste\nthe drink, and cry \u2018chin-chin\u2019 and drink till they are made drunk, so\nthat they sleep there. Then the hunters come and bind them hand and\nfoot, while they are sleeping, and afterwards open the veins in their\nneck and draw forth three or four drops of blood from every one, and\nlet them go free; and that blood, as he told me, is the most precious\npurple.\u201d\n\nMegasthenes describes a race of Indians living upon a mountain called\nNulo, who had their feet turned backward with the heel in front and\nwith eight toes on each foot. Pliny places this race \u201cbeyond the\nother Scythian Anthropophagi in a country called Abarimon situate in\na certain great valley of Mount Imaus\u201d (Himalayas). They had great\nrapidity of movement and wandered about indiscriminately with the wild\nbeasts. The fable may have originated in the Caucasus, where there is\nstill a tradition that d\u00e6mons take the shapes of armed men, and have\ntheir feet reverted. Farther north dwelt an ox-footed race.\n\nClassic note is made of two writhing nations. The Scyrit\u00e6 of India who\n\u201chave merely holes in their faces instead of nostrils\u201d have \u201cflexible\nfeet like the body of the serpent,\u201d says Megasthenes. There was also\nthe thong-footed people or Himantopodes, residents of northern Africa,\nwho moved with a serpentine, crawling gait. This may be a traveler\u2019s\nimpression of some sinuous dance of the desert.\n\nUnder the hand of Maundeville the centaurs pass out of mythology into\nhistory. The \u201cFolk that have Horses\u2019 Feet\u201d are in his collection of\nmarvelous islanders: \u201cAnd they be strong and mighty and swift Runners,\nfor they take wild Beasts with Running and eat them.\u201d These are the\nHippopodes of Pliny, tenants of a Baltic island. A related folk are\nthe islanders permanently mounted on ostriches, with which they seem\nto form one body. Kazwini, who records this Arab legend, says they\ndevour the bodies of drowned persons cast up by the sea. On another\nisle Sir John seems for the once to have invented a people rather than\nrevived a legend. Here be \u201cFolk that go always upon their Knees full\nmarvellously. And at every Pace that they go, it seemeth that they\nwould fall.\u201d\n\nIn Ethiopia, \u201con that side of the Nile which extends along the borders\nof the Southern Ocean,\u201d Pliny domiciles the Artabatit\u00e6, who have four\nfeet and wander about after the manner of wild beasts. Maundeville is\nmore detailed: \u201cAnd they be all skinned and feathered, and they would\nleap lightly from Tree to Tree.\u201d Farther south were the Aigamuxa, theme\nof a Hottentot story cycle, whose eyes were in the back of their feet.\nRegarding human beings as zebras, they hunted them down and tore them\nto pieces.\n\nChinese marvel tales describe a race of people living somewhere in the\nwest. They have a hole right through their bodies at the breast. When\ntheir mandarins would take the air, they thrust a stick through the\naperture, and two domestics carry them so. \u201cIf the bearers are strong\nenough,\u201d says Huc, \u201cthey often string on several gentlemen at once.\u201d\n\n\n_In the Russian East_\n\nThere was an east other than the sun-bathed lands whose fabulous\npeoples are in literature. It lay just beyond northern Europe, on the\nfarther flanks of the Urals and beside the Obi. To the Russians of the\nMiddle Ages it was a land of strange races and weird happenings. About\nthese a body of legends grew up which in a measure parallel the classic\nstories, but give them backgrounds of ice and snow and add new actors\nand enriching details. A Russian manuscript of the fifteenth century,\nfound at Novgorod a few years ago and entitled \u201cThe Unknown Peoples of\nthe East,\u201d pictures these forgotten folk. Nine different races, all\ncalled Samoyeds, are described, and six are races of marvel.\n\nThere were Samoyeds who shed their skins like snakes. For a month each\nyear they stayed in the water, avoiding dry land, lest their bodies\ncrack open. The Russian anthropologist, Professor Anutschin, whose\ninterpretation of the narrative is followed here, says that these\nare natives who fish and hunt in the watery domain of the tundras,\nwhere the summer attacks of mosquitoes and horse flies give their\nskins a rough and bloody aspect, as if cracking before sloughing off.\nThere were also Samoyeds like other people from the navel up, but all\nshaggy-haired from the navel down--in reality wearing trousers of\nreindeer skins with the hair outside. There were other and speechless\nSamoyeds with their mouths on the top of their heads. When they would\neat, says the Novgorod manuscript, \u201cthey crumble the meat or fish,\nstick it under their fur caps and then move their shoulders up and\ndown.\u201d This is the account of a people whose speech the Russians did\nnot understand, who wore the head skin of the reindeer, ears and all,\nfor a cap, and whose sack-like garments had collars so high as to\nconceal their mouths.\n\nThere were also headless Samoyeds with eyes in their breasts and the\nmouth between the shoulders, and their diet was raw reindeer heads and\nbones; in warfare and the chase their weapon was an iron tube through\nwhich they drove an iron arrow by hitting it with a hammer. This, it\nis thought, was an early race of ironworkers who wore peaked head-caps\nwhich concealed the shoulder line and made the face of the wearer seem\nto be in the breast. Another explanation is that several Siberian\ntribes had faces painted on the leathern fronts of their garments.\nThe descriptive phrase, \u201cwith the face upon the breast,\u201d might easily\nbecome \u201cheadless\u201d when translated into Russian.\n\nThen there was a strange Samoyed race--an independent creation of\nRussian fantasy--the members of which died every winter and revived\ntwo months afterward, if let alone. When the fatal hour had come, they\nsat down and a stream of water gushed from their nostrils and froze to\nthe ground. If a stranger came from another land and broke this icicle\nor removed it, the Samoyed never woke up. If he merely jarred it, the\nrefrigerated native would open his eyes and ask, \u201cWhy, little friend,\nhave you disfigured me?\u201d Others were brought to life by the warmth\nof the spring sun. According to a German writer the day of death was\nNovember twenty-seven and revival came on the twenty-third day of the\nfollowing April. It is supposed that the wooden idols scattered over\nthe Obi country, three hundred of them on a single river island, were\nthe basis of this curious story. Covered with ice and drifted snow,\nthey looked human enough, and there were native reports that these were\nancestral Samoyeds.\n\n[Illustration: _The First People Engaged in Such Cosmic Adventures as\nWarfare Against Stone Giants_]\n\nOne race of Samoyeds, says the Novgorod manuscript, travels day and\nnight with torches by underground ways and comes out upon a sea over\nwhich a strange light falls and beside which is a great fortress and\na deserted city. When the stranger approaches he hears a tumult in\nthe streets, but, entering, he sees no one and the clamor dies away.\nIn each house, however, there are things for him to eat and drink,\nand other commodities. He takes what he needs, lays down money in its\nstead, and goes his way. Should he fail to make payment, the wares\nhe takes with him vanish and return to the silent town. And when the\nstranger leaves, \u201cthen he hears again a tumult as in other inhabited\ncities.\u201d\n\nThis story has the Celtic magic and might be a chapter from Malory.\nIt is thought that the mysterious sea is Lake Koliwan in the western\nAltais. Granite rocks in the semblance of towers, terraces, and\ndismantled fortifications rise from its shores, and in the hills are\nthe pits and galleries of a copper camp long abandoned by the Tchudi.\nThese are the underground Samoyed ways of legend. Perhaps dumb barter\nwas once carried on here. The radiance across the lake, if not the\nnorthern lights, may have glanced from some Russian tale, like that in\nwhich Bishop Theodor saw the earthly paradise on a mountain side with\nan azure light upon it.\n\n\n_New World Prodigies_\n\nThe New World, it has been seen, had its own prodigious peoples. In\nSpanish America their legends are overlaid with imported material, but\nelsewhere there is little alien alloy. North America has traditions\nof stone giants, pygmies, one-eyed cannibals, hermaphrodites,\nflint-armored warriors, double-headed men, dog-headed tribes. There are\nalso storm-raising mermen, phantom boatmen, underwater folk, otter-men,\nseal-men, pug-nosed people, skeletons that resume human shape at night,\ntalking skulls. Many stories tell of the marriage of mortals with\nunearthly beings, of the living with the dead, and of the union of\nwomen with animals. The best known Indian myth has two versions, in\none of which the people of the First Age had human forms but an animal\nnature, and took the animal guise before the real men appeared; in the\nother, which is of the southwest, the first people had bestial forms\nbut a human nature, and presently laid aside their animal masks. In\nthe latter version there was an Amazonian phase in the ascent of the\nprimitive people. Their women seceded from society and lived with a\nwater monster. Hunger drove them back, but they brought into the world\na number of prodigious beings whom their lords had to destroy.\n\nIn the First People who had the human form but became animals the\nEastern Algonquins and the Pacific tribes have a myth which ranks\nbeside the Greek myth of the Titans that were before Zeus, and\nthe myths of the Golden Age. Its quality is at once haunting and\nchallenging, the more so because these dawn-folk are nowhere described.\n\u201cIn old times,\u201d a Micmac Indian told Leland, \u201cmen were as animals and\nanimals as men; how this was no one knows. But it is told that all were\nat first men, and as they gave themselves up to this and that desire,\nand to naught else, they became beasts. But before this came to pass,\nthey could change to one or the other form; yet even as men there was\nalways something which showed what they were.\u201d\n\nThe story cycle of the Mewan Indians of California pictured the First\nPeople as living in great ceremonial houses and engaging in such cosmic\nadventures as sun-capture, fire-theft, and warfare against stone\ngiants. How nearly human and how much animal they were the Western\nIndians left in doubt. When they became animals and went forth from\nthe ceremonial house, they carried to their future haunts not only\ntheir old names, but their distinctive traits, such as Grizzly Bear\u2019s\nappetite for acorns, Frog\u2019s aptitude at water jumps and the clamorous\nvoice of Sandhill Crane. After the transformation was effected--and\nonly casual reasons for it are suggested--man was created. Coyote made\nhim out of feathers, or sticks, or clay, and Lizard gave him five\nfingers because he had five himself and knew their value. In Popol\nVuh, the Guatemalan saga, the First People were manikins that the\ngods carved out of wood and endowed with life; but so frivolous and\nirreverent were these that a flood was invoked to destroy them; \u201cthe\nlittle monkeys that live in the woods\u201d are descended from survivors.\n\nAll over North America were stories of stone giants, and crudely\narchaic as are these stalking figures of legend, the myth has the\nelemental vigor of Norse epic. According to the Iroquois, a cannibal\nrace--\u201cstonish giants,\u201d Schoolcraft calls them--who made their bodies\nhard by rolling in sand, overran America seventeen centuries ago, and\nnearly exterminated the natives. The Holder of the Heavens took giant\nform in order to destroy them. These are the icy-hearted Chenoos of\nAlgonquin story who lived in northern Canada; in summer they rubbed\nthemselves with fir balsam and rolled on the ground so that moss,\nleaves, and twigs adhered to them. The California Indians have tales of\na cannibal rock-giant who went abroad with a rock basket on his back\ninto which he tossed people. There was another stony Titan, tall as a\npine tree but vulnerable under the heel. Only after the First People\nhad killed him by planting sharp sticks in his path did they elect to\nbecome animals. The theory that these clanking folk typify mountains is\nnot convincing.\n\nMaundeville has a tale of a bodiless head, but North America is the\ntrue home of this weird legend. Glooskap, culture hero of the Eastern\nAlgonquins, played at ball with a snapping skull. There were Indians\nwho went all to pieces leaving only the head, which ate the other\nmembers. Everywhere stories were told of heads that pursued people and\ndevoured them. The skull of a mother chased her children over hill and\nplain. In nightmare flight the heroes of Indian epic cast obstacles or\nattractive things behind them to delay or divert the rolling skull.\nReading a new meaning into the legend, the Arapahoes used it to explain\nthe railroad.\n\nA Sioux story describes a duel between the Monster and the Bladder,\ntwin sons of the Turtle. They kept striking off each other\u2019s heads,\nand these flew into the sky and, falling back, adhered again to their\nnecks. But at length Bladder pushed Monster\u2019s body aside, and the head\nrebounded, and to this day it rebounds, for it is the sun, and Bladder\nis the sky; but only to old men or wise is this part of the story told.\nIt may be that these tales derive from the conception of the sun and\nmoon as traveling heads, or from the use of a skull as tribal medicine,\nor from the war custom of decapitation later supplanted by scalping,\nor even from the appearance of the tumbleweed of the western prairies,\nwhich wanders like a ball before the autumn wind.\n\n\n\n\nChapter X. The Satyrs\n\n\nThe tail is a symbol of the animal nature. Stories of tailed humans are\nfound all over the world. They signify a belief that certain races of\nmen are descended from the apes, or that the apes are descended from\ncertain races of men. Both beliefs have been stressed in the modern\ndebate on evolution; yet neither is new. They are almost the oldest of\nthe philosophical myths. They trace back to primitive animism--to the\nnotion that animals are endowed with human intelligence, can understand\nthe speech of men, and may well be propitiated with worship. Early\nman accepted them as cousins. He could change natures with them, and\nsometimes it seemed to him he did. P\u00e8re Lafitau said of his American\nflock, \u201cThese men are living in Ovid\u2019s Metamorphoses.\u201d\n\nSometimes men were content enough with this kinship, erecting it into\ntotemism, wearing the tail of the buffalo or horse as an emblem of\npower. Sometimes they were ashamed of it. They plucked off all hair\nfrom their bodies, because animals were hairy, and resented it when\ntheir women bore them twins, because the young of animals came in\nlitters instead of singly. Constantly they confused brute and human\nnature, using identical terms of neighbor folk, whether these were\napes or men. The confusion was carried over into literature. One\nAfrican tribe was said to have an ape king. There are passages in which\ntravelers seem to themselves to be speaking of men while to their\nreaders it is evident they are speaking of monkeys. There are other\npassages in which they set out to describe monkeys, yet draw pictures\nof men like themselves, but of more primitive cast. The creatures\ncalled satyrs embody this confusion and the sense of kinship behind it.\n\nAccording to Isidore, the satyrs have done something to make their own\nnature clear. One of them, he says, appearing to St. Anthony in the\ndesert, explained, \u201cI am mortal, one of the inhabitants of the waste,\nwhom the heathen, misled by error, worship as the Fauns and Satyrs.\u201d\nHe pictures them as manikins with upturned noses, horns on their\nforeheads, and goat feet.\n\nThe heathen world, however, never was quite sure what it meant by\nthe satyrs. If it be true that the fable began with ritual mummers\nwho donned the nature of fertility d\u00e6mons when they put on the heads\nof asses, horses, or goats, and danced in them--as men still do--the\nmemory of this was forgotten. The satyrs were supposed to be spirits,\nhalf human, half bestial, that haunted woodland and mountain side\nand fellowshipped with Pan and Dionysus. They had bristly hair, flat\nnoses, and pointed ears, with two small horns, and a tail like that of\na horse or goat. Earlier Greek art represented them as ugly, withered,\nand ape-like. But Attic sculpture in the time of Praxiteles shows them\nwith the beast nature well-nigh submerged--graceful figures instinct\nwith poetry. They took over the attributes of the kindred sileni, and\nas Roman influence grew they were confounded with the fauns and were\ndepicted as half men and half goats. In Scripture they are the \u201chairy\nones\u201d of Hebrew folklore, a sort of demon of waste places. So is the\nword intended in the prophecy of Isaiah as to Babylon: \u201cWild beasts of\nthe desert shall lie there; and their houses shall be full of doleful\ncreatures; and owls shall dwell there, and satyrs shall dance there.\u201d\n\nSatyrs, as the ancients conceived them, were a wanton, music-loving,\nmerry-hearted and yet timid folk, their symbol the hare. They roved\nabout, drinking, dancing to the pipe and cymbal, pursuing the nymphs,\nkilling the cattle of men and making love to their women. Men feared\nthem, as embodying the loneliness of waste places, feared them with the\nsudden panic fear, which the apparition of their leader, the leering\ngoat-god, always excited. Equally, the shy creatures feared men, but\nnot women. Gradually these timid spirits moved out of mythology into\ngeography. There were satyr isles, and there were satyr tribes in\ndistant mountains and deserts, alike in Africa, India, and the spaces\nof the sea. Always they were described as avoiding contact with men,\nscreening themselves in the thickets and seen only from afar. The\nsatyrs of western Africa, says Pliny, \u201cbeyond their figure have\nnothing in common with the manners of the human race.\u201d \u00c6lian speaks of\nIndian satyrs that have human features, that go sometimes on four feet\nand sometimes on two and are too swift to be caught.\n\n[Illustration: A SATYR _By_ Jacob Jordaens]\n\nThus the classic conception of this creature passes from spirits of\nthe waste to tailed men, to apes, retracing the path which Greek art\nfollowed from simian beings to spirits of the waste. These were the\nwild men and wild women whom Herodotus locates in western Africa.\nHanno, the Carthaginian explorer, had been before him. His narrative\ntells of finding an island full of wild people on the west coast of\nAfrica: \u201cFor the greater proportion were women, whose bodies were\ncovered with hair, and whom our interpreters called Gorill\u00e6. Though we\npursued the men, we could not catch any of them, since all fled from\nus, escaping over the precipices and defending themselves with stones.\nHowever, we took three women, but they attacked their conductors with\ntheir hands and teeth, and could not be prevailed on to accompany us.\nWe therefore killed and flayed them and brought their skins with us to\nCarthage,\u201d where they were hung up in the temple of Juno.\n\nThis narrative betrays the ancient confusion as to the satyrs\u2019 real\nnature. They are described as wild men and women, and it would even\nseem that the Carthaginians undertook to reason with their captives;\nbut their captors killed and skinned them, as they certainly would not\nhave done to creatures they deemed to be of their species. The terms\ngorilla and orang-utan both mean men-of-the-woods. They are borne by\nlarge apes, but when the Malays speak of the orang-utan they mean a\nsavage and not a simian.\n\nThe Hindu term for man-of-the-woods is bunmanus, and here is a Hindu\nsketch of him. \u201cThe bunmanus is an animal of the monkey kind. His face\nhas a near resemblance to the human; he has no tail and walks erect.\nThe skin of his body is black, and slightly covered with hair.\u201d Then\nthe account proceeds to enumerate the dialects of the peninsula and\nincludes among them \u201cthe jargon of the bunmanus.\u201d These animals of the\nmonkey kind are really the dark-skinned, non-Aryan aborigines.\n\nA Portuguese manuscript cited by Tylor tells of an Indian tribe in\nBrazil called the Cuatas. \u201cThis populous nation,\u201d it says, \u201cdwells\neast of the Juruena, in the neighborhood of the rivers San Joao and\nSan Thome. It is a very remarkable fact that the Indians composing it\nwalk naturally like the quadrupeds, with their hands on the ground;\nthey have the belly, breast, arms, and legs covered with hair, and are\nof small stature; they are fierce, and use their teeth as weapons;\nthey sleep on the ground, or among the branches of trees; they have no\nindustry, nor agriculture, and live only on fruits, wild roots, and\nfish.\u201d The author of this account seemed not to know that the coata he\nwas describing was an ape and not a man.\n\nCustoms of speech and sometimes motives of self-interest have shaded\nthe differences between the two species. The belief is widely held,\nboth in Africa and in South America, that apes know how to talk, but\nhold their peace lest they be put to work, as it seems they were put\nto work in gathering the fig harvest in ancient Egypt and perhaps in\nceremonial processions as torch-bearers. On the other hand, sailors,\npioneer colonists, and slave dealers betray a tendency to rate the\nsavages among whom they are thrown, and whom they may wish to exploit,\nas little, if any, above the brutes.\n\nIt has become almost a principle of ethnology, wherever a story of\na neighboring race of tailed men is current, to look for a tribe of\naborigines who have been dispossessed by men of a higher culture. Thus\nthe conqueror asserts his contempt, and justifies his treatment, of the\nconquered. The latter may accept it in good part and admit a monkey\ndescent. The Marawars of South India trace their lineage back to Rama\u2019s\nmonkeys, and the Kathkuri avow an ape ancestry. Even the Jaitwas of\nRajputana, although classed as Rajputs, derive, they say, from the\nmonkey-god, Hanuman, and allege that their princes have still a vestige\nof tails. There are tribes in Tibet and in the mountains of the Malay\npeninsula whose traditions tell of ape progenitors.\n\nBy a sort of poetic justice, savages sometimes tell a like story about\ncivilized men. Why should these wear so much clothing if there were\nnot something they wanted to conceal? In the Land of Lamary, says\nMaundeville, men and women go all naked, \u201cand they scorn when they see\nany strange Folk going clothed,\u201d hinting that these are not formed\nas are other men. Captain Cook was not the only explorer to tell of\nnatives demanding that the white men strip so that it might be seen if\nthey were everywhere of the human kind. Buchanan gives this account in\nhis Indian travels:\n\n\u201cWhen I passed through among the gardens near houses, I have observed\nthe women squatting down behind the mud walls, in order to satisfy\ntheir curiosity by viewing a stranger. When they thought that I\nobserved them, they ran away in a fright. This does not arise from the\nrules of caste in Malabar requiring the Hindu women to be confined,\nfor that is by no means the case; but in the interior parts of North\nMalabar the Nairs, being at enmity with Europeans, have persuaded the\nwomen that we are a kind of hobgoblins who have long tails, in order to\nconceal which we wear breeches. The women and children are therefore\nafraid of Europeans.\u201d\n\nStories of man\u2019s descent to the ape match stories of the ape\u2019s ascent\ninto man. One of these is recited in the Metamorphoses of Ovid, where\nfor their treachery Jove degrades the Cercopes. A Moslem legend tells\nof Solomon passing through the Valley of Apes, between Jerusalem and\nMareb, and finding monkeys dwelling in the houses, wearing the clothes,\nand using the speech of men. The river which flowed by their city\nhad been full of fish, they said, and these showed themselves freely\non the Sabbath day, trusting to the Jewish fishermen to keep the\nCommandments. The temptation proved too strong, and for their offense\nof Sabbath-breaking Jehovah turned all the citizens into apes.\n\nThere is a Zulu story of a lazy tribe of negroes who would not dig the\nsoil. Their chief led them into the wilderness, where the pick handles\nwhich had hung useless at their backs became tails, and they themselves\nbaboons.\n\nIn both hemispheres there are legends of cross-breeding between the\nhuman and the simian species. The Quoyas Morrov, or wood-man of Angola,\nwhich was sent to Frederick Henry, Prince of Orange, was supposed by\nhis age to have an ape father or an ape mother. The First People of\nCentral American myth were manikins who became monkeys, and Count\nCastelnau repeats a story by Father Ribeiro, a Carmelite missionary,\nof a tribe of tailed Indians in the Amazonian region, whose descent\nwas from both apes and men. In British Central Africa, says Sir Harry\nH. Johnston, the negro women profess to go in terror of the large male\nbaboons, and it is a fact that these animals will descend upon parties\nof unarmed women, but only if they are carrying well-filled market\nbaskets.\n\nThe forests of South America are haunted by two legendary creatures of\nrelated natures, in whom the myths of tailed men return to their Greek\noriginals. One of these is the salvaje, or hairy man-of-the-woods,\nof whom Humboldt first heard among the cataracts of the Amazon. This\ncreature, the natives, planters, and missionaries were agreed, carried\noff women, constructed huts, and sometimes ate human flesh. For five\nyears, everywhere the explorer traveled in the Americas, the story\nfollowed him, and he was censured for doubting it. He surmises that the\nlegend is decked out with features taken from African ape-lore, but\nadds that it may be that the man-of-the-woods, if not some rare ape, is\none of the large bears, the footsteps of which resemble a man\u2019s, and\nwhich are believed in every country to attack women.\n\n\u201cFather Gili,\u201d says Humboldt, \u201cgravely relates the history of a lady\nin the Llanos of Venezuela, who so much praised the gentle character\nand attentions of the man-of-the-woods. She is stated to have lived\nseveral years with one in great domestic harmony, and only requested\nsome hunters to take her back because she and her children (a little\nhairy, also) were weary of living far from the church and sacraments.\u201d\nA Spanish author wonders, however, if the fable of the man-of-the-woods\nhas not sprung from the artifice of Indian women who pretended to have\nbeen carried off in default of a better excuse for long absences from\ntheir husbands.\n\nThe other legendary creature is the Curupira, or Diable Boiteux. Among\nthe noises of the Brazilian forest that used to startle Bates was \u201ca\nsound like the clang of an iron bar against a hard, hollow tree, or a\npiercing cry.\u201d This was never repeated, and the silence that followed\ntended to deepen the unpleasant impression. With the natives it was\nalways the Curupira, the wild man or spirit of the forest, that made\nthese inexplicable sounds. \u201cSometimes,\u201d says Bates, \u201che is described as\na kind of orang-otang, covered with long, shaggy hair, and living in\ntrees. At others he is said to have cloven feet and a bright red face.\nHe has a wife and children, and sometimes comes down to the rocas to\nsteal the mandioca.\u201d\n\nAll accounts agree that the Curupira is not footed like normal men. He\nis lame, with one foot larger than the other, or his feet turn backward\nso that his trail deceives. He is bald and dwarfish, with hairy person,\nhuge ears, and blue-green teeth, and he rides a deer, a rabbit, or a\npig. The spirit of the wood, the guardian of all wild things, he is\nbeneficent or mischievous, as occasion or mood offers. He insists that\ngame shall be killed, not maimed, merely, and for a gift of tobacco he\nwill return lost cattle. Where the forest is darkest, sometimes he will\nappear in friendly but treacherous human guise, luring hunters from the\npath and at last vanishing in mocking laughter. When the hunter sees\nfootprints of unequal size on the woodland trail ahead, if he is well\nadvised he will hasten back, and avoid the forest for weeks afterward.\n\nFarther north one finds again the tracks of this strange old man,\nor of beings like him. The Maidu Indians of California tell of the\nChamlakhu, a bearded ancient with clawlike hands and feet who lived\nin trees; running on the ground, his gait was shambling and his arms\nfanned the air like wings. The Indians of Costa Rica tell of a king of\nthe tapirs, a man of stately bearing, who rebukes hunters that kill\nout of wantonness. Among the Indians of Guatemala there are stories\nof a forest sovereign and protector of game whom the ladinos call the\nSombreron, from the enormous hat which he wears. Short and sturdy of\nfigure, he rides his domain astride a deer. He has a rustic stronghold,\nand a hunter following a wounded deer once came upon it. The Sombreron\nwas swinging in a hammock in the courtyard. He led the hunter to an\ninclosure in which were many deer. Pointing out the wounded animal, he\nsaid, \u201cKill it, but another time shoot better and do not torture my\nsubjects.\u201d\n\nThis creature is Arcadian Pan, master of the satyrs, generative d\u00e6mon\nof the flocks and herds, somehow an emigrant to the New World. The\nFilipinos call him the Tig-balang, picture him with long ears, legs of\ngrasshopper slenderness, and goat hoofs, and know him for a treacherous\njungle guide. The Russians call him the Lesiy. He guards their forests,\nmisleads wanderers, removes boundary stones and sign-posts. It is he\nthat makes the echo. Shouting and whistling in his domain he cannot\nabide. A bearded, shaggy, green-eyed old man, he yet entices girls into\nhis thickets, whence after a long time they may escape, but with honor\nforfeited; and he substitutes his stupid changelings for the children\nof men. The same or a like figure is Tapio, \u201cthe golden king of the\nforest\u201d in Finnish magic songs. Wild animals are his flocks and herds,\nhis queen is the charcoal wife, the bear is his bastard son, and he\nlives in Brushwood Town.\n\nSatyr geography covers a good many countries and centuries and\nspecifically includes at least one civilized race. It was long the\nvulgar belief upon the Continent that Englishmen had tails. This was\nfirst the story that the people of one shire told about another, and\nits birthplace was Kent. Kentishmen, according to their neighbors,\nwere tailed, as a punishment for one or the other of two acts of\nsacrilege. Their first offense was committed, says Bailey, when they\nwere still pagans. They abused \u201cAustin the monk and his associates, by\nbeating them and opprobriously tying fish tails to their backsides; in\nrevenge of which such appendants grew to the hind parts of all that\ngeneration.\u201d The second offense was against Thomas \u00c0 Becket when it was\nnoised abroad that he was out of favor with Henry II. The inhabitants\nof Strood cut off the tail of his horse, and by the will of God, says\nPolydore Vergil, \u201call their offspring were born with tails like brute\nanimals\u201d; not until their race was extinct did tailed men pass from\nKent.\n\nPliny numbers among the nations of India \u201cmen born with long hairy\ntails, and of remarkable swiftness of foot. In Indo-China, southwest\nof Yunnan, were the Tailed Pu mentioned in the _Sung Geography_. Ma\nTuan-Lin allows them tails from three to four inches long and classes\nthem among anthropophagi who eat their aged relatives. The Yao, a\nsubtribe of the Miaotze, have tails like monkeys, their neighbors say.\nThey live in leaf lodges or caves in the Lipo district south of the\nNanling range, and access to their habitations is by bamboo ladders.\nYet they are skillful weavers and musicians.\n\n[Illustration: _Men Feared Them, as Embodying the Loneliness of Waste\nPlaces_]\n\nThere are numerous reports of tailed tribes in the large islands of\nthe East. Marco Polo speaks of \u201ca kind of wild men\u201d in Sumatra, in\nthe kingdom of Lambri, with hairless tails a palm in length. The\n_Merveilles de L\u2019Inde_ tells of tailed cannibals on the west coast\nof Sumatra, and Galvano has an account of Sumatrans with tails like a\nsheep\u2019s. The fifteenth century _History of the Ming Dynasty_ pictures\nthe Borneo village of Wu-lung-li-tan and its tailed citizens. When\nthey see other men approaching they flee with their hands over their\nfaces. The resemblance of the name to orang-utan, or \u201cwild men,\u201d will\nnot escape notice. Colonel Yule tells of a trader who had examined the\ntails of a tribe on the northeast coast of Borneo. These appendages\nwere long and so stiff that the natives had to use perforated seats;\nArab, Malay, and native travelers report having seen them squatting\non these little stools. John Struys, a Dutch traveler in Formosa, saw\nthere in 1677 a man with a tail \u201cmore than a foot long, covered with\nred hair, and very like a cow\u2019s.\u201d The man said the tail was the effect\nof climate and all the natives on the southern side of the island had\nthem.\n\nThere were two archipelagoes known as the Satyr Islands. Ptolemy\nmentions one of them, and Gerini identifies it with the Northern\nAnambas lying off the Indo-Chinese mainland. Hsi-tung, supposed to\nbe a transcript of Syatan, was their name of old; the resemblance of\nSyatan to the Greek Satyron may have led Levantine sailors to make this\njest at the expense of ill-favored little people living then in the\nAnamba group. To reach the other archipelago one must steer through\nthe Pillars of Hercules in company with a Carian sailor of the second\ncentury. Him Pausanias asked what he knew about the satyrs. The Carian\nreplied that in a voyage to Italy he was driven from his course to\na distant sea whither people no longer sail. Here were many islands\nwhich the crew did not care to touch, and these they called the Satyr\nIslands. Their inhabitants were red-haired and had tails not much\nsmaller than a horse\u2019s.\n\nMany African tribes wore animal tails for ornament, and explorers were\nsometimes misled by the custom. The Duir of the northeast attached two\nantelope tails to their girdles. The Wa-Kavorondo, east of the Nyanza,\ngo naked or wear only a waist-cloth, and the women attach to it a tail\nof bark. In the same quarter of Africa the Bongo women, with their\nlarge hips and lubricious gait, have had a share in propagating fable,\nfor they, too, ornament themselves with tails; and as they stride along\nthey swing these about in conscious emulation of the flocks and herds.\nSchweinfurth likens them to \u201cdancing baboons.\u201d\n\nOther African satyr stories do not yield their secret so easily.\nThe Ba-Kwambas of the northwest, report said, had tails which they\ninserted in holes in the ground when they sat down. In his _Travels and\nAdventures_ (1861) Doctor Wolf asserted that in Abyssinia were men and\nwomen \u201cwith tails like dogs and horses,\u201d some of these so large that\nthey were able to knock down a horse with them. About the Niam-Niams, a\ncannibal people with filed teeth that live in French Equatorial Africa,\nlegends have multiplied, and these Baring Gould has assembled.\n\nHorneman was the first to describe them as tailed anthropophagi. In\n1849 M. Descouret reported that this was the common belief among the\nArabs. In 1851 M. de Castelnau told of a Houssa expedition in which\na band of Niam-Niams was slaughtered to a man. All, including the\nwomen, had hairless tails about fifteen inches long. These people were\notherwise a handsome race, of a deep black, using clubs and javelins\nin war, and in peace cultivating rice, maize, and other grains. An\nAbyssinian priest, seemingly speaking of the same tribe, told M.\nd\u2019Abbadie in 1852 that only the men had tails, and these were covered\nwith hair and the length of a palm. Doctor Hubsch, physician to the\nhospitals of Constantinople, examined in 1852 a tailed negress of the\nNiam-Niams who was offered for sale in the slave market. She was black\nas ebony, with frizzled hair, bloodshot eyes, large white teeth, and a\nsmooth, hairless, pointed tail two inches long. Her clothes fidgeted\nher, she ate meat raw, and was an avowed cannibal. The slave dealer\nsaid all her tribe was as herself.\n\nIn Cuba Columbus heard of a province called Mangou, lying farther west,\nand it sounded like Mangi, the rich maritime province of the Grand\nKhan. Its inhabitants had tails, and wore garments to conceal them.\nColumbus recalled the Maundeville story, related above, of the scorn of\ncertain naked Asiatics for clothing, and their belief that garments hid\nbodily defects. So he pressed onward in the thought that Mangi and the\nrobed peoples of Tartary lay just below the horizon.\n\nDespite witness from Asia, Africa, and the eastern and western\nIndies, there are no tailed races of men. But there have been tailed\nindividuals. Hottentot women come nearest meeting the requirements of\nlegend. Without a tail, they yet have a development of the posteriors\nthat amounts to a natural shelf, on which, as on a pillion, their\ninfants may ride. The mandril and certain other monkeys living in the\nsame latitudes show a like enlargement.\n\n\n\n\nChapter XI. The Pygmies\n\n\nIt was left to the pygmy to revenge all of the creatures of fable upon\nincredulous mankind. He was doubted, yet he is. Not until some fifty\nyears ago would the learned doubters admit that Homer and Herodotus\nwere right, and themselves wrong. Now it is in the books that half a\nhundred groups of pygmies are living on the earth, to say nothing of\nothers that have become extinct. Every race has had such groups, and\nevery continent has known their tread.\n\nThere is palliation for ancient and modern doubts as to these dwarfish\nnations. The pygmies of reality are not so small as the pygmies of\ntradition. Their name is from the Greek word for fist, or the distance\nbetween the elbow joint and the knuckles of the average man--a little\nmore than thirteen inches. The ancient geographers, however, allowed\nthe smallest pygmies at least double that stature. There were two\nspecies of little men--the one averaging three spans, or two feet three\ninches high, the other averaging five spans, or three feet nine inches.\nThese measurements recur again and again for fifteen centuries in the\nwritings of the east and west.\n\nNo race has a mean stature as short even as the pygmies of five spans,\nbut among the dwarf tribes there are many women who do not greatly\nexceed it; and there are women, not so small according to the standards\nof their brothers as to be accounted deformed, who do not equal it.\nStanley saw among the Akkas of the West African Rain Forest a grown\ngirl of seventeen who was half an inch short of three feet.\n\nPoetic license of the old time took liberties with the estimates of\ngeographers, but these liberties were understood as such. The dwarf\nnation on the Upper Nile that was reputed to war with the cranes used\nthe ax, it was said, to cut down ears of wheat. When Hercules passed\nthrough their country they set up ladders to climb to the rim of his\ngoblet for a drink. In his slumber two armies swooped down upon his\nright hand and two on his left; but, awaking, the hero laughingly\ngathered them all in his lion skin.\n\nThe myth of their warfare with the cranes became a theme of literature\nand art, but cast doubt over the whole pygmy tradition. It first\nappears in Homer. The _Iliad_ likens the shouts of the onrushing\nTrojans to the cries of cranes as they fly southward \u201cwith noise and\norder through the sky,\u201d bringing \u201cwounds and death to pygmy nations.\u201d\nMegasthenes elaborates the theme. It is the three-span pygmies, he\nsays, that war upon the cranes, as well as on the partridges, which are\nas large as geese. The small folk collect and destroy the eggs of the\ncranes, which breed in India and nowhere else. Pliny adds that every\nspring the little men go in a body to the seashore, astride of rams and\ngoats, and there destroy the eggs and young of the birds; \u201cotherwise,\nit would be impossible for them to withstand the increasing multitude\nof the cranes.\u201d The shore booths which they occupy they build of mud\nmixed with feathers and egg shells.\n\nSo the story moves from Africa to India, and towards modern times.\nMaundeville declares that in the Land of Pygmies, which he seems to\nplace to the west of, and tributary to, China, the inhabitants \u201chave\noftentimes war with the Birds of that Country that they take and eat.\u201d\nThere is even a reference to this warfare in the writing (1563) of a\ntraveler in Greenland. There Dithmar Blefkens of Hamburg met a blind\nmonk who said that the pygmies represented the most perfect shape of\nman, but were \u201chairy to the uttermost Joynts of the Fingers,\u201d had no\nproper speech, and were \u201cunreasonable Creatures that live in Perpetual\nDarkness.\u201d\n\nIndia appears to be the home of the tradition that the dwarfish peoples\nwarred with the cranes. Just a hint of its origin is afforded by\nCtesias. The \u201cswarthy men called Pygmies,\u201d he said, \u201chunt hares and\nfoxes not with dogs, but with ravens and kites and crows and vultures.\u201d\nFalconry is known to have been practiced in India as early as B.C. 600\nand may be a thousand years older there. From a people\u2019s using birds of\nprey in hunting to themselves fighting against birds of prey is a step\nof inference easy to take.\n\nThere is, however, a more direct explanation. According to a tradition\nof the Indians, the Garuda, the bird of Vishnu, was hostile to the\npeople of the Kirata, and the name of this people means \u201cdwarfish.\u201d\nWhile the sacred bird as pictured by the poets does not look like the\ncrane, or any other known species, it may be near enough to account for\nthe legend.\n\nHerodotus was the first to give the pygmy tradition a historical\nquality. He heard of the little people while he was collecting\nmaterials for his books in Africa. His informants were natives of\nCyrene who had been to the shrine of Ammon and talked with Etearchus\nthe Ammonian king. The latter tells the story of the adventure of\nthe five Nasamonian youths, which he had received from their Libyan\ncountrymen and which Herodotus, therefore transcribes at third hand:\n\n\u201cThe Nasamonians said there had grown up among them some wild young\nmen, the sons of certain chiefs, who, when they came to man\u2019s estate,\nindulged in all manner of extravagances, and among other things drew\nlots for five of their number to go and explore the desert parts of\nLibya, and try if they could not penetrate further than any had done\npreviously. The young men, therefore, dispatched on this errand by\ntheir comrades with a plentiful supply of water and provision, traveled\nat first through the inhabited region, passing which they came to the\nwild beast tract, whence they finally entered upon the desert, which\nthey proceeded to cross from east to west. After journeying for many\ndays over a wide extent of sand, they came at last to a plain where\nthey observed trees growing; approaching them, and seeing fruit on\nthem, they proceeded to gather it.\n\n\u201cWhile they were thus engaged there came upon them some dwarfish men,\nunder the middle height, who seized them and carried them off. The\nNasamonians could not understand a word of their language, nor had they\nany acquaintance with the language of the Nasamonians. They were led\nacross extensive marshes, and finally came to a town where all the men\nwere of the height of their conductors, and black complexioned. A great\nriver flowed by the town, running from west to east, and containing\ncrocodiles.\n\n\u201cHere let me dismiss Etearchus, the Ammonian, and his story, only\nadding that he declared that the Nasamonians got safely back to their\ncountry and that the men whose city they had reached were a nation of\nsorcerers. With respect to the river which ran by their town, Etearchus\nconjectured it to be the Nile, and reason favors that view.\u201d\n\nThus ends one of the most valuable records which have come down from\nancient times. The river referred to is now believed to be the Niger,\nor perhaps an affluent of Lake Tchad. Herodotus has another story of\na dwarfish people found in the west when Sataspes, the Carthaginian,\nundertook to sail around Libya.\n\nAlthough Strabo doubted the existence of pygmy races, yet his keen mind\nbrought him within reach of the truth. He finds in the wretched mode\nof life of the people he called the Ethiopians, an explanation of the\nreports of their dwarfish stature. They were naked and wandered from\nplace to place, and their sheep, goats, oxen, and dogs were undersized\nlike themselves. \u201cIt was perhaps from the diminutive size of these\npeople,\u201d he concludes, \u201cthat the story of the pygmies originated,\nwhom no person worthy of credit has asserted that he himself has\nseen.\u201d The Greek geographer seems to have had reliable information as\nto a fact that on its face is as hard to believe as the legends he\ndiscredits--that there was dwarfish live stock as well as a dwarfish\npeople. Sir Samuel Baker found that the cows and ewes of the Bari,\na tribe living in the same district with the forest pygmies, \u201chave\ndimensions truly liliputian.\u201d\n\nAristotle speaks with authority of the pygmies of Africa. \u201cThe storks,\u201d\nhe said, \u201cpass from the plains of Scythia to the marsh of upper Egypt,\ntoward the sources of the Nile. This is the district which the pygmies\ninhabit, whose existence is not a fable. There is really, as men say,\na species of men of little stature, and their horses are little also.\nThey pass their life in caverns.\u201d Pliny speaks of the pygmies as\ndwelling in Thrace near the Black Sea, in the Carian district of Asia\nMinor, in India under the shadow of the Himalayas, and at the sources\nof the Nile. There is a valuable fact behind this apparently confused\ngeography: the Roman was right in assuming there were several such\nraces.\n\nThe pygmy races of Asia and Indonesia are cited in classic, Arabic, and\nChinese geography, and in medi\u00e6val travel. \u201cIn the middle of India,\u201d\nCtesias says, \u201care found the swarthy men called pygmies, who speak the\nsame language as the other Indians. They are very diminutive, the\ntallest but two cubits high, the majority only one and one-half. They\nlet their hair grow very long--down to their knees and even lower.\nThey have the largest beards anywhere to be seen, and when these have\ngrown sufficiently long and copious, they no longer wear clothing, but\nlet the hair of the head fall down their backs far below the knee,\nwhile in front are their beards trailing down to their very feet. When\ntheir hair has thus thickly enveloped their whole body they bind it\nround them with a zone and so make it serve for a garment. They are\nsnub-nosed and otherwise ill-favored. Their sheep are of the size of\nour lambs, and their oxen and asses rather smaller than our rams. Three\nthousand men attend the king of the Indians on account of their great\nskill in archery. They are eminently just and have the same laws as the\nother Indians.\u201d\n\nThis may be a description of the Kiratas, whose district is east of\nBengal in the Himalaya foothills.\n\nThere were vague reports in the classic world of other pygmy peoples\nfar to the southeast in Asia. The Chinese records make these more\ndefinite. The _Hill and Sea Classic_ describes the Chiau Yau, a tribe\nof cap-wearing pygmies three cubits (3 feet 3 inches) high whose\ncountry was east of the country of the Three-headed Men. This is\nperhaps the country now inhabited by the Yau tribes, who are short\nof stature and may be this long-sought-for pygmy race. Individuals\nof the Chiau Yau tribe, \u201cdiminutive black slaves,\u201d were sent to the\nChinese court from the coasts of Indo-China in the reign of Ming Tu\n(A.D. 58-76). There was also a pygmy people whom the Annamese called\nthe Phong. They were only two cubits, or twenty-six inches, high,\nand although they were cave dwellers a fragrant perfume emanated\nfrom their skins. As hunters they paid their dues to the state in\ncamphor, rhinoceros horns, and elephant tusks. Both of these races\nGerini locates in \u201cthe mysterious country of the pygmies\u201d in French\nIndo-China, between the Mekong and the Black rivers, under the\ntwenty-first parallel of north latitude. North of this district on the\nRed River dwell the dark, dwarfish Pu-lu tribes which seem to be the\nremnants of a once widely spread pygmy race. The Santom aborigines of\nYun-nan and Laos are also of inferior stature, with flat faces and\nblack skins. In China itself ancient writings speak of the black dwarfs\nof Shantung province as early as the twenty-third century B.C.\n\nPerhaps the first record of the Aetas, or Philippine negritos, appears\nin Chao Fu-Kua, a Chinese author of the early thirteenth century, who\ntold of a tribe of small black men with frizzly hair, round yellow\neyes, and teeth that showed through their lips, who lived in remote\nvalleys of the archipelago. A Chinese work on novelties, published\nin 1636, has several passages on the black dwarfs of Cochin-China.\nAnywhere from Annam to Siam, it says, \u201cthere are pygmies whose stature\nis not over three feet seven inches, who are regarded as of animal\norigin, who sell themselves for longer or shorter periods to dealers in\naloes. When engaged they are provisioned, supplied with hatchets and\nsaws, and sent into the mountains. These dwarfs are very submissive and\nservile.\u201d\n\nIbn Khordadbeh and Idrisi tell of the Rami, a pygmy race of Sumatra,\nwho go naked, find shelter in thickets, avoid intercourse with other\npeople, and use a hissing speech. They are swift runners and adept tree\nclimbers. They have red frizzly hair and a stature of but three feet.\nCurled hair of this color had been ascribed from the seventh century\nA.D. to the clawed negrito savages on the east coast of the Malay\nPeninsula, and a traveler of the last generation reports hairy dwarfs\non the southwest coast of Sumatra. Dunashki (about A.D. 1300) has this\nnote: \u201cWhen ships approach Volcano Island at the beginning of a squall,\ntiny black dwarfs, five spans (nearly four feet) or less in stature,\nresembling negroes, appear and climb aboard, without harming anyone.\u201d\nAll three of these travel notes may be reflected in the incident in the\nthird voyage of Sindbad, when his ship, driven by a storm amid strange\nislands, is boarded by \u201can innumerable multitude of frightful savages\nabout two feet high, covered all over with red hair,\u201d who compel the\ncrew to follow them to the palace of a giant cannibal.\n\nAccounts of several other travelers bring the pygmy tradition down\nto the era of modern disbelief. Odoric, the fourteenth-century\nmissionary monk, reports that the Yangste Kiang waters the Country of\nthe Pygmies, whom he describes as an innumerable folk, three spans\nhigh, and foremost of all cotton workers. Their city of Chatan is one\nof the fairest of places. \u00c6thicus of Istria declares that he sailed\nnorthwest from Ceylon and passed, among other islands in the Northern\nSea, Bridinno, the land of dwarfs. Marco Polo tells how pygmies were\nfabricated from monkeys in Sumatra and sold to curio collectors.\n\nMaundeville makes the pygmies subject to \u201cthe great Chan.\u201d \u201cThe River\nDalay,\u201d he says, \u201cgoeth through the land of Pygmies, where that the\nFolk be of little Stature, and be but three Span long, and they be\nright fair and gentle. And they marry them when they be half a Year of\nAge and get Children. And they live not but six Year or seven at the\nmost; and he that liveth eight Year, Men hold him there right passing\nold. These Men be workers of Gold, Silver, Cotton, Silk and of all such\nThings, the best of any other that be in the World.\u201d Men of larger size\nwork their lands and mines for them.\n\nIn another passage Sir John populates an isle with \u201cLittle Folk,\u201d who\nhave no mouths and only an adder speech. Pigafetta, who went with the\nMagellan expedition around the world and wrote its story, reports two\nraces of dwarfs in the Philippines, one with gigantic ears. The latter\nwere shaven, naked, shrill-voiced troglodytes, whose food was the sago\ntree.\n\nLudovico Varthema, an Italian Mohammedan, a contemporary of Columbus\nand a wide-ranging traveler, tells an incident of his pilgrimage to\nMecca, which may or may not shed light on the moot question of the\nMiddle Ages and since, as to what became of the lost Ten Tribes. There\nwas a mountain in the Hedjaz, he said, inhabited by pygmy Jews, color\nblack, who skipped from crag to crag like goats--he watched them from a\ndistance--and when they caught a Moslem skinned him alive.\n\nIn Madagascar in 1770 the French naturalist Commerson, who accompanied\nBougainville in his voyage around the world, found evidences of a\npygmy tribe with an average stature of three and a half feet, all\ntraces of which vanished in the following century. His report was\ncorroborated by Count de Modave, governor of Fort Dauphin. The men of\nthis tribe wore long beards and were workers in iron and steel, of\nwhich they made lances and assagais. They were brave pacifists. When\nfrom their mountain homes they saw a formidable force approaching on\nthe plains below, they drove down such cattle as they could spare to\nthe entrances of their defiles to purchase immunity from invasion. If,\nhowever, the enemy entered these defiles, the little folk savagely\nattacked them.\n\nNear to the country of the warrior women in South America, said the\nSpaniards, was pygmy land. Peru has traditions of a race not over two\ncubits high. California Indians tell of a witch-like little people in\nthe redwood forest. The Arapahoes tell of dark-skinned, pot-bellied,\ncannibal dwarfs who were only three feet high but strongly made, and\nskillful trackers. They could carry buffaloes on their backs, so the\nCrows said of the small folk that once roved Montana. In the Gila\nCanyon in New Mexico there have been exhumed the mummies of a true\npygmy people, some of them scarcely three feet long, with cerements\nof woven cloth, sandals of yucca fiber and ornaments of hummingbird\nfeathers; legend speaks of thievish dwarfs who lived in underground\nhouses and sometimes came to the cities for supplies. D\u2019Orbigny\ndescribed, in 1831, the so-called Chiquitos, or Little Folk, who\ninhabit the heights on the divide between the Mamore and Paraguay\nrivers. The men he measured averaged only four feet ten inches, which\nbrings them within strict pygmy requirements--not over four feet eleven\ninches. They are a broad-shouldered, robust Indian people, hospitable,\nsociable, musical. D\u2019Orbigny estimated their number at about twenty\nthousand. No recent traces have been found of the Ayamanes whom\nFriedemann met in the northern Andes regions and who, he said, were no\nmore than \u201cfive empans,\u201d or three feet four inches, high.\n\nThere is a Chinese legend that in the remote northern mountains of the\nold empire there has lived for seventeen centuries a race of hairy\ndwarfs. Inscriptions on the Great Wall are said to recite that whenever\none of the millions of laborers who were building it was found to have\nmade a mistake in his work, he was imbedded alive in the wall at the\nplace of his error. About A.D. 210, the story continues, a body of\nworkmen rebelled at the custom, and with their families fled to distant\nforests where their descendants still live. The hardships of their\njourney and their rude surroundings brought these people down to the\npygmy level.\n\nIt is asserted that there is a race of dwarfs in Morocco in the Atlas\nMountains whose existence the Moors have kept secret for three thousand\nyears because they are regarded as holy men, and great saints who bring\ngood luck to towns. \u201cOur Blessed Lord,\u201d the people call a dwarf. \u201cIt\nis a sin to speak about them to you,\u201d one Moor said to a traveler. The\nMoorish silence is declared to be the remnant of a superstition older\nthan the Mohammedan religion.\n\nThese pygmy stories, of perhaps twenty-seven centuries so far as the\nrecord goes, of at least double that period if unwritten tradition\nbe included, have been brought together here in order to assess the\nscientific reaction to them. Some of them on their face are completely\nfabulous, some have an admixture of truth, some are good enough\nhistory. To all except the very latest of them the scientific reaction\nwas unfavorable until a deluge of facts made this attitude impossible.\n\nStrabo among the ancients was in his rights when he complained that\nnobody had seen any pygmies, but his facts were incomplete, for long\nbefore his day civilized peoples had seen them. Browne summarizes\nin his stiff but elegant English the unbelief of the scholars of\nthe Renaissance: \u201cJulius Scaliger, a diligent enquirer, accounts\nthereof, but as a poetical fiction. Ulysses Aldrovandus, a most exact\ngeographer, in an express discourse hereon, concludes the story\nfabulous and a poetical account of Homer. Albertus Magnus, a man\nofttimes too credulous, herein was more than dubious; for he affirmeth\nif any such dwarfs were ever extant, they were surely some kind of\napes; which is a conceit allowed by Cardan and not esteemed improbable\nby many others.\u201d \u201cThere is as much reality,\u201d concludes Browne, \u201cin the\npygmies of Paracelsus, that is, his non-adamical men, or middle natures\nbetwixt men and spirits.\u201d\n\nTwo towering names in natural history, Buffon and Cuvier, are ranged\nagainst the pygmy tradition. Here is Buffon\u2019s conclusion: \u201cDeceived by\nsome optical illusion, the ancient historians gravely mention whole\nnations of pygmies as existing in remote quarters of the world. The\nmore accurate observation of the moderns, however, convinces us that\nthese accounts are entirely fabulous. The existence, therefore, of\na pygmy race of mankind, being founded in error or in fable, we can\nexpect to find men of diminutive stature only by accident, among men\nof the ordinary size.\u201d\n\nBuffon\u2019s explanation of the fable that the pygmies war with the cranes\nis so plausible that men would accept it, as his own generation did,\nif they did not know that these little folk are human and not simian.\nEven so, there may be truth in the theory advanced. \u201cOne knows,\u201d says\nBuffon, \u201cthat the monkeys, which go in large bands in Africa and India,\ncarry on continual warfare against birds; they seek to surprise their\nnests, and without ceasing prepare ambushes for them. The storks defend\nthemselves vigorously. But the monkeys, anxious to carry off the eggs\nand the young birds, return constantly, and in bands, to the combat;\nand as by their tricks, their feints and movements they seem to imitate\nhuman actions, they would appear to ignorant people to be a band of\nlittle men. Behold the origin and the history of these fables!\u201d\n\nRoulin was equally ingenious in his explanation of the pygmy\npopulations and their campaigns against the birds. He noted the squat\nframes of the Lapps and Eskimos who dwell within, or not far from, the\nArctic Circle. The pygmies, he decided, were a circumpolar population.\nHomer placed their home and their battles at the southern end of the\ncrane path; Roulin placed them at the northern terminus, in that\nScythia of misty boundaries one of which was supposed to be the boreal\nocean. Pliny had told that every year the pygmies rode down to the\nseashore to destroy the eggs and young of the cranes. Very well, here\nwas the story explained, for every year the Lapps and Eskimos come down\nto the sea and return to the interior, and these people partly subsist\non the eggs of aquatic birds.\n\nCuvier is reproachful of Pliny. \u201cI am not surprised,\u201d he says, \u201cat\nfinding the pygmies in the works of Homer; but to find them in Pliny\nI am surprised indeed.\u201d The great French naturalist has contributed\nmore, perhaps, than any other man to find the basis of truth or the\nsource of error in classic fables. His explanation of the pygmy legend,\nlike that of Buffon, is more convincing almost than truth itself, but\nits teaching is error. He finds the source of a fable in a flattering\nconvention of ancient sculpture: \u201cThe custom of exhibiting in the same\nsculpture, in bas-relief, men of very different heights--of making\nkings and conquerors gigantic while their subjects and vassals are\nrepresented as only one-fourth or one-fifth of their size--must have\ngiven rise to the fable of the pygmies.\u201d\n\nCuvier died in 1832. Chambers\u2019 _Journal_ in 1844 voiced with less\nreserve the unbelief of that period. In a scoffing article it declares\nthat \u201cthe world has long been haunted with the idea that somewhere in\nAfrica there is a nation of Tom Thumbs\u201d; but \u201cthe grand difficulty\nabout the African nation of dwarfs is the fact that not a single\nspecimen has been seen either in Abyssinia or Egypt.\u201d \u201cThe pygmy dream,\none of the last lingering superstitions of travel, has been puffed\naway,\u201d confidently asserts this periodical. These so-called pygmies\nwere monkeys, not men.\n\nIn 1863 Paul du Chaillu explored the coast lands of West Africa and\nin 1871 published the results in _The Country of the Dwarfs_. The\nscientific skepticism of the ages delivered its last stroke in the\nattacks that met this book, for already, although the world did not\nknow it, Schweinfurth, farther east in the equatorial region, had\nreviewed an entire pygmy army. The _London Graphic_ wonders whether\nor not \u201cMr. du Chaillu means us to accept the book as a bona-fide\nnarrative of what he has himself seen.\u201d Thus cautiously this periodical\nregisters its doubts: \u201cThe first part of the book reads very much\nlike other descriptions of African exploration; but further on Mr. du\nChaillu represents himself as having arrived at the country of the\ndwarfs, whom he considers to be identical with the supposed fabulous\npygmies. This strange race, who average only from four feet to four\nfeet seven inches high, live a perfectly wild life in the forests of\nequatorial Africa, feeding on snakes, rats, mice, and berries. They go\nentirely naked, and inhabit huts made by bending branches of trees in\nthe shape of a bow. The height of the huts is just enough to keep the\nhead of a man from touching the roof when he is seated. These dwarfs\nare very shy of being seen and hold no communion with the negro tribes\nabout them, by whom they are called Obongos. Truly we have here a\nstrange tale.\u201d\n\nTruly, there are not only lost arts, but lost records, forgotten\nhistories. Forty-four centuries before du Chaillu was scoffed at for\na true tale, an authentic pygmy testimony was set down in a letter\nwhich a king of Egypt wrote to a vassal chief, and which is still in\nexistence. The world believed in pygmies then because sometimes it saw\nthem; and their descendants still hunt the elephant in the forests of\nequatorial Africa.\n\n[Illustration: \u201cTHE SWARTHY MEN CALLED PYGMIES\u201d]\n\nTo the Egyptians of that time the country beyond the Second Cataract\nof the Nile was the Land of Ghosts, whence the negroes brought to the\nmarkets of Assuan strange stories of shadowy folk who dwelt there. Into\nthis land a prince of Elephantine named Herkhuf marched with a little\nforce. An account of his journey has been written by Arthur E. P.\nWeigall, of the Department of Antiquities of Egypt.\n\nIn the country which Herkhuf penetrated he found pygmies dwelling, and\none he secured. He sent word back to the boy Pharaoh, Pepy II, and had\nfrom him a letter believed to be the earliest example of a private\ncommunication. Yet life still throbs through its lines and the colors\nglow in the picture of an excited royal lad awaiting the coming of this\nwonder of the south, directing that his meals shall be ample, that his\nslumbers shall be guarded, and that on taking ship at Memphis there\nshall be men to see he does not fall into the water. The Pharaoh\u2019s\nletter follows:\n\n\u201cYou say in your letter that you have brought a dancing pygmy of the\ngod from the Land of Ghosts, like the pygmy which the Treasurer Baurded\nbrought from the Land of Pount in the time of Asesa. You say to my\nmajesty, \u2018Never before has one like him been brought by anyone who has\nvisited Aam.\u2019 Come northward, therefore, to the court immediately, and\nbring this pygmy with you, which you must bring living, prosperous, and\nhealthy, from the Land of Ghosts, to dance for the King and to rejoice\nand gladden the heart of the King. When he goes down with you into the\nvessel, appoint trustworthy people to be beside him at either side of\nthe vessel: take care that he does not fall into the water. When he\nsleeps at night, appoint trustworthy people who shall sleep beside him\nin his cabin; and make an inspection ten times each night. My majesty\ndesires to see this pygmy more than the gifts of Sinai and of Pount. If\nyou arrive at court, the pygmy being with you, alive, prosperous, and\nhealthy, my majesty will do for you a greater thing than that which was\ndone for the Treasurer Baurded in the time of Asesa, according to the\nheart\u2019s desire of my majesty to see this pygmy. Orders have been sent\nto the chief of the New Towns to arrange that food shall be taken from\nevery store-city and every temple (on the road) without stinting.\u201d\n\nA Nubian Highway, so Weigall calls the ancient road down which the\ndancing pygmy came to civilization about B.C. 2500. In A. D. 1878 a\nlittle farther south, Stanley followed what he calls a Pygmy Highway,\n\u201calong which quite a tribe must have passed. It was lined with amoma\nfruit skins, and shells of nuts, and the crimson rinds of phrynia\nberries. Our elephant and game track had brought us across another\ntrack leading easterly from Andari, and both joined presently,\ndeveloping to a highway much patronized by the pygmy tribes. We could\ntell where they had stopped to light their pipes, and to crack nuts,\nand trap game, and halted to gossip. The twigs were broken three feet\nfrom the ground, showing that they were snapped by dwarfs. Where it was\na little muddy the path showed high, delicate insteps, proving their\nancient ancestry and aristocratic descent, and small feet not larger\nthan those of young English misses of eight years old.\u201d Later Stanley\nmet individuals of this tribe.\n\nThese were the Akkas, or Mambuti, the same pygmy tribe, it would\nappear, whose sculptured reliefs on monuments of Egypt going back as\nfar as B.C. 3366 were dwarfed, so Cuvier had thought, merely to make a\nconqueror seem larger than life and indicate their own inferior estate.\nWhen a regiment of several hundred of these little warriors marched\nbehind Moummeri in 1870 to do homage to Munza, the East African negro\nmonarch, the pygmy tradition marched with them out of the mists of\nfable across the border of geographical knowledge. For Schweinfurth, a\nEuropean explorer, was there to behold these \u201cgrasshopper warriors,\u201d as\nhe called them.\n\nThe revolution in scientific opinion since that day appears in the\nstatement that the ninth edition of the _Encyclop\u00e6dia Britannica_\nprints one paragraph about the pygmies, nearly all of which is an\nexposition of myths and a statement of doubts, while the eleventh\nedition prints two full pages of ascertained facts.\n\nAlthough science always balked at the name of pygmy and refused as long\nas it could to admit that the African forests concealed a race of tiny\nmen, yet the world had long known something of the little peoples.\nThe Spaniards rightly reported that pygmy Indians had lived in Peru,\nand they found negritos in the Philippines. Although Arab traders gave\nthe Andamans a wide berth because, as they believed, these islands\ncontained cannibals and no cocoanuts, yet they knew even before the\nMiddle Ages that a dwarfish people dwelt there. The Dutch found the\nBushmen when they settled South Africa, and hunted them for sport as\nif they were jackals; they found also the still smaller Vaalpens, or\n\u201cdusty-bellies.\u201d The Lapps of Russia and Scandinavia were known to\nmedi\u00e6val travelers, who were terrified by their diminutive stature\nand witch repute. These mongoloid people, whose mean stature is only\nfive feet, and their kinsmen, the Eskimos, who are a little taller,\nare, however, not classified among the true pygmies, a term which an\narbitrary convention restricts to Little Black Men.\n\nThe pygmies of Asia and Oceania are called negritos, the pygmies of\nequatorial Africa negrillos. They vary by tribes in average height from\nfour feet eight inches to five feet two inches, with the women smaller\nand many individuals only a little above four feet. A full-grown\nAkka adult, says Stanley, may weigh ninety pounds. Another explorer\nestimated the average weight of six of these adults at seventy-seven\npounds and found that two of them weighed but fifty-three pounds apiece.\n\nWherever seen, the tribes of little people have certain things in\ncommon beside their stature. One of these is their discontinuous\ndistribution. They do not adjoin each other in a continuous zone of\npopulation as the taller races do, but are dotted here and there\nacross the earth like islands in a sea of alien populations. Always\nthey occupy the less desirable districts. The Spaniards called the\nPhilippine pygmies Negritos del Monte, for they had retired before the\nMalays to the mountain gorges. The Lapps rove the tundras of northern\nEurope. The Bushmen dwell in the deserts of South Africa. The Akkas\ninhabit the steaming forests of equatorial Africa, in parallels of\nlatitude deadly to the white man. The Batwas live on volcanic uplands\nin the Tanganyika country. In the Malay Peninsula and New Guinea, one\nseeks in vain for littoral-dwelling negritos; they have been driven\ninland and to the mountain recesses.\n\nAlmost everywhere the little people somewhat resemble in feature\nthe races that surround them. This is due to unions, temporary or\notherwise, between the pygmy women and the men of the neighbor\ntribes, by which various streams of strange blood have poured into\nthe veins of the lesser stock. Among the Lapps of earlier generations\nit almost seemed as if it were conscious tribal policy to promote\na taller stature by encouraging women and girls to form irregular\nconnections with men of other European races. There is Bushman blood\nin the Hottentots, or Hottentot blood in the Bushmen. In the so-called\nBastards of the Kalahari Desert--a term whereof the wearers are\nproud because it concedes to them a Caucasian strain--the blood of\nthe Bushmen meets the blood of the Boers in the halfway house of the\nHottentot.\n\nHerbert Long, who spent six years in Central Africa with an expedition\nfrom the American Museum of Natural History, notes in its _Journal_ for\n1919 the fact that the pygmy men he saw were often much taller than\ntheir mates, and gives a reason, that may explain the same phenomenon\nin related tribes. Comely pygmy girls enter the harems of the chiefs of\nthe tall negro tribes. Their half-breed sons are sent back to their own\npeople. Since women are valuable chattels, the daughters are retained\nby the father\u2019s tribe. The custom increases pygmy prestige; but the\nlittle men must not wed the women of their tall friends.\n\nThe small black folk of the forest have thus won a right to the marked\nregional resemblance they bear to the larger black folk of the yam and\nbreadfruit clearings, whom they serve as scouts against the approach of\nan enemy and as allies in forest warfare. \u201cIn western Africa, as in the\nPhilippines and in the two Gangetic peninsulas,\u201d asserts Quatrefages,\n\u201cthe pygmies have played an ethnological r\u00f4le, at times important,\nin crossing with superior races and in giving birth to half-breed\npopulations.\u201d The Pandavas, or heroes of the oldest Indian times, set\nthe example of these unions with lower races.\n\nThe Dravidians of southern India, Quatrefages declares, occupy the\nterritory formerly populated by the negritos--and carry their blood.\nHe also thinks that the blood of these little blacks shows itself in\nthe skin and stature of natives in parts of Japan. Relics of a pygmy\nrace are supposed to exist in Sicily and Sardinia, \u201calong the highroad\nbetween Pleistocene Africa and Europe\u201d; fifteen per cent of the men\nof South Italy and Sardinia are rejected for military service because\nless than sixty-one and one half inches high. South of Salamanca in\nwestern Spain, the valley called Las Jurdes is peopled by men and women\nsaid to be little more than three feet high, whose shrunken stature is\nattributed to unwholesome surroundings.\n\nNo true pygmy race has developed a pronounced nose bridge, and only\nthe lozenge-faced Bushmen have salient chins. Among nearly all of the\ntribes there is a deficiency in the fatty tissues which affect the\nskin, so that, even before old age comes, they present a wrinkled\nappearance as if the skin fitted too loosely. This is true even of the\nLapps. The countenances of these northern dwarfs are mongoloid, but\nwithout the slanting eyes of the Chinese and Tartars, and their heads\nare the roundest of any race of men. The negrito and negrillo tribes\nhave rounder heads than the tall negroes. The bodies of many of the\nlittle people in Central Africa and New Guinea are covered with a downy\ngrowth. Pygmy complexions show olive in the Lapps, light yellow in the\nBushmen, yellow brown in the Indonesians, dark brown in the negritos of\nthe Andamans and Philippines, and among the Akkas, as Schweinfurth puts\nit, the color of coffee slightly roasted.\n\nSmall hands and in some cases small feet characterize these tribes, and\ngrown girls of the Bushmen show, under measurement, feet but little\nmore than four inches long. Their bodies are long in proportion to\ntheir legs, and the legs are slim. The mid-point of the body is above\nthe navel instead of below, as it is in the tall races. The pygmies\nof Africa are pot-bellied; this is due to diet, and is corrected by\nregular and wholesome food.\n\nIn other respects the pygmies differ from the rest of mankind chiefly\nin what they lack. Save in the case of the Semangs of the Malay\nPeninsula they may have no separate language; and they use always the\nspeech of their taller neighbors. There is no pygmy state, or king,\nand often no tribal organization; even among the Lapps there was a\nnomad tribe called the \u201ctwice and thrice tributary Lapps,\u201d because\nits members paid tribute to two, sometimes to three states--Russia,\nDenmark, and Sweden. The Andaman negritos and the Akkas of the West\nAfrican Rain Forest are the only races that never devised a means of\nmaking fire, though both know its use. The Andamanese are also the only\npeople that never made a musical instrument and the only people that\nnever domesticated a food animal or cultivated a plant.\n\nOne or two things, however, may be said for the culture of the little\nfolk. There are no pygmy cannibals. Although the Bushman houses, mere\nmats suspended on stakes, are the most primitive known, yet these are\nthe most skilled artists in South Africa, and some of their figures\nsuggest that they may have known hieroglyphic writing. All the little\npeoples treat their women kindly, and reverence gray hairs. The\nAndamanese are monogamous and believe in an omniscient deity. On the\nother hand, the highest religious concept among the polygamous Akkas\nis of a pygmy devil. The Bushmen live in a state approaching sexual\npromiscuity; it used to be the custom, when a man wished a temporary\nmate, to kidnap a small child, and the mother would follow the child\ninto his home. The Andamanese have the peculiar custom of manifesting\njoy by weeping, and it is said the Veddahs never laugh.\n\nNo certain statements may be made as to the aggregate numbers of the\ndwarf nations. There are about 50,000 Bushmen, 27,000 Lapps, 20,000\nAetas, 2,000 Mincoupies, 2,000 Veddahs. It may be that the equatorial\npygmies are half as numerous as the Aetas. Everywhere the number of\nthese people is diminishing.\n\nAs to their origin and the cause of their shrunken stature, there is\nno agreement among ethnologists. The small blacks may have come into\nexistence in South India and spread thence east and west, peopling\nMelanesia and Africa. Once they formed a belt of population clear\nacross equatorial Africa. On the evidences of crania which he examined,\nProfessor Kollman believes that, about b.c. 5000, they dwelt as far\ndown the Nile Valley as the Thebaid. The Oriental branch of the race,\npure or mixed, extends, says Quatrefages, from the extreme southeast\nof New Guinea to the archipelago of the Andamans and from the Sunda\nIslands to Japan, and on the Asiatic continent from Annam and the\npeninsula of Malacca to the western Ghauts, and from Cape Comorin\nto the Himalayas. This grandiose geography is challenged by later\nscholarship.\n\nYet over all these wide spaces, and over the Dark Continent, pygmies\nmay have been the first settlers. Once it was surmised that the tall\nnegritoes sprang from them; but this is a moot point. To accept\nit would be to assert that short stature is a primitive trait,\nand that all the tall races are in this respect abnormal. British\nanthropologists hold that the Bushmen are a distinct people, but\nthat the Congo pygmies, though of livelier intelligence than the\ntall blacks, are yet special groups of the Nilotic or Bantu negroes,\narrested or degenerated by the inhospitable forest. Their diminished\nstature, Stanley urges, is the result of \u201cthree thousand years of\nisolation, intermarriage, and a precarious diet of fungi, wild fruit,\nlean fibrous meat of animals, and dried insects; in a word, of the\nutter absence of sunshine and the lack of gluten and saccharine bodies\nin their food.\u201d\n\nHandicapping conditions may have produced the Lapps of the Arctic\nCircle, the vanished Indian dwarfs of the Andes, the enigmatic Bushmen,\nand the little black men of Africa, the Malay Peninsula, and various\nisles of the eastern sea. But in old fables pygmyland is hard by the\ncountry of the giants. It happens that the diminutive Lapp is neighbor\nto the tall Karelian, the Bushman and Akka to the stalwart Bantu.\nThere are little people of the frigid zone, the tropics, and the south\ntemperate. There were dwarfs of rich ocean littorals as well as of the\ntundra, the mountain glen, the desert, and the equatorial forest.\n\n\u201cI believe mankind was originally a dwarf,\u201d says Leland. Churchward, in\nhis _Signs and Symbols of Primordial Man_, holds that paleolithic man\nwas a pygmy, \u201cthe first little earth man or red man,\u201d and that he was\nevolved near the Nile springs, and thence overspread the earth. Sign\nlanguage and articulate sounds, the Masonic writer thinks, were worked\nout by these little folk. After talking with representatives of their\nrace, he concludes that they have a monosyllabic speech, and words\nwith the same sounds as the Egyptian hieroglyphs. The resemblance of\nliving pygmies to the long-armed, short-legged, paunchy dwarf-gods of\nEgypt and Ph\u0153nicia, and notably to Bes, has been remarked. These squat\ndivinities may have owed their being to ancient fear of small men, the\nelder brothers of historic man. Sir Harry Johnston thinks it possible\nthat the little blacks once overspread Europe and, by their prankish\ngood nature and curious power of becoming invisible in herbage and\nbehind rocks, gave rise to folk-tales of gnomes, kobolds, and fairies.\nKollman, the Basle anatomist, contends that the pygmies were the child\nrace of mankind, and that each tall race was preceded by a small one.\nThe common opinion, that healthy dwarf tribes have been produced by\ndegeneration from men of larger mold, is not fully satisfying. Yet the\noldest human skeletons found thus far are of men of normal size.\n\nThere are pygmies, but why? The one riddle succeeds the other.\n\n\n\n\nChapter XII. The Amazons of Legend\n\n\nMen gave up with regret, and not so long ago, and not until they had\nransacked all the horizons of geography, the belief that somewhere in\nthe world there is a state of warrior women. They are reluctant to\nadmit, nor have they quite admitted, that there never was such a state;\nand still they ransack the horizons of history and folk-lore for proof\nthat at one time Amazons were.\n\nMyth has mapped the woman\u2019s commonwealth in western Africa, in Armenia\non the Black Sea, in the Caucasus, in Russia along the lower Don, in\nislands of the Baltic, the Indian Ocean, and the Caribbean, and upon\nthe River of the Amazons. There is report of it in Greek, Turanian,\nArab, Negro, and American legend. It figures in the poetry of Arctinus,\nthe history of Herodotus, the mendacities of Maundeville, the narrative\nof Marco Milioni, the visions of Columbus, the journal of Orellana and\nthe Guiana prospectus of Raleigh.\n\nUnlike other ancient tales, the Amazon story, instead of slowly fading,\nhas grown in definiteness of outline as it approached to-day. The men\nwho discarded utterly the belief that there is a woman state lived not\nlong after the men who thought the state had at last been found.\n\nThe Amazons--so runs tradition everywhere substantially the same--were\na tribe of women ruled by a queen and subsisting by the chase and by\nwars of pillage. They fought both on foot and on horseback, using the\nbow, the spear, the javelin, and the double-headed ax. Their garb\nconsisted of a short tunic clearing the knee and fastened over the left\nshoulder, leaving the right breast bare. Their outlines were powerful\nand beautiful. There was a dispute, never composed, between art and\netymology, as to their bosoms. The word Amazon, though of barbarian\norigin, was thought to derive from _alpha_, privative, and _mazos_,\nthe Greek for breast. On this derivation the grammarians built up\nthe legend that the right breast of the women militant was either\namputated, or seared, or compressed in youth, so as not to interfere\nwith the recoil of the bow string. But the sculptors would not accept\nthis deformation, and statues and bas-reliefs represent the women\nwith bosoms entirely womanly. There are recent etymologies wherein\n\u201cAmazon\u201d is supposed to mean \u201cfull busted,\u201d \u201cmoon daughter,\u201d \u201cvestal,\u201d\n\u201cgirdle-bearer,\u201d or \u201cgame-eater.\u201d\n\nOne feature of the myth shows the working of inference. The woman\nstate must sustain its numbers. There must be children even if there\nwere no men, or the tribe would become extinct. In place of husbands,\ntherefore, there were what Sir Walter Raleigh called \u201cValentines.\u201d Once\na year the women paid a visit to the men of neighbor tribes, or once\na year these men called on them. The women retained the girl children\nborn of these excursions. As to the boy children, customs differed.\nIn some cases the mothers nurtured them until they were weaned, and\nreturned them to their fathers when these came back the following year,\nas always they did. In other cases the mothers put the male infants to\ndeath, or maimed them and raised them as slaves of the state.\n\nThe Greek treatment of the myth had a certain other-worldliness. The\nAmazons figured in epic events; their struggles were with demigods.\nThey came to the relief of Troy, and their subjugation was one of the\ndozen labors of Hercules. With him they fought, and with Achilles,\nand with Theseus, slayer of the Minotaur, and with Bellerophon, rider\nof the winged Pegasus, and with the griffins which guarded Scythia\u2019s\nfabled gold; and they invaded Attica to attempt another _Iliad_ in\nrevenge for the capture of a queen. Greek sculptures and decorative\npottery show the national feeling that these were a people far removed\nin time and space. The figures are beautiful, but something of\nbarbarian wildness animates the features. Earlier art had represented\nthem as bloodthirsty m\u00e6nads, raiders of the borders, but the Greek\nhumanizing spirit wrought itself upon the legend until the story the\nsculptors tell is of men\u2019s regret that they need smite these beautiful\nsavages.\n\nThis spirit is in the _\u00c6thiopis_ of Arctinus of Miletus, wherein\nAmazons appear on the side of beleaguered Troy. Their queen,\nPenthesilea, spreads death among the large-limbed Argives and\noverwhelms Achilles with abusive words. The angered hero slays her, but\nwhen he removes her helmet the charm of her strikes him to the heart\nand he grieves over his victim.\n\nThe story, with its fine human touch, recedes into the mists in a tale\nwhich in effect is its epilogue. After his own death and the ruin of\nTroy, Achilles reigns over the isle of Leuke, an Avalon of the East\nin the Black Sea at the Danube\u2019s mouth. Thither, even to the land of\nshades, the rage of the Amazons for the death of their queen follows\nhim. At their capital on the river Thermodon in Pontus they seize on\nships and compel the sailors to steer them to the enchanted isle. But\nas they approach a temple in the grove their horses take fright and\nbolt over a cliff into the sea. A terrible storm shatters the fleet and\nfew of the vengeful women escape.\n\nIn classic legend, there were three woman states--the countries of\nthe Gorgons and Amazons in the west of Libya, and an Amazon state in\nthe northeast of Asia Minor near the modern Trebizond; the capital\nof the latter was the mythical Themiscyra on the banks of the river\nThermodon, now called the Termeh. The African Amazons subjugated the\nGorgons, and under their queen, Myrina, marched in triumph through\nEgypt, Arabia, and Asia Minor into Thrace, where they were defeated and\nturned back by Mopsus. Ephesus, Smyrna, Cyme, and Myrina claimed them\nas their founders. This horde was wiped out by Hercules at the time\nwhen he erected the pillar in Africa, for, says Diodorus Siculus, \u201cit\nwas a thing intolerable to him, who made it his business to be renowned\nall the world over, to suffer any nation to be governed any longer by\nwomen.\u201d\n\nIt was the Black Sea Amazons whom the Greeks mainly limned in art\nand legend. These women, whose earlier home had been the Caucasus,\nraided the coasts of Asia Minor and came to the relief of Troy. The\nninth labor of Hercules was to bring back the girdle of their queen,\nHippolyte, a task equivalent to the subjugation of the state. Theseus\ncarried off another queen, Antiope, and this led to the Amazonian\ninvasion of Attica; the fierce women were not halted until they had\npenetrated Athens.\n\nThis expedition and that of their African sisters were interpreted by\nthe Greeks as allegories of barbarian menace. In the tread of Amazonian\nhorse they may have had a presage of the hoofs of Hunnish, Turkish,\nand Tartar cavalry that in after ages was to ride across their world.\nLiterally taken, the tales seemed to Strabo incredible. \u201cFor who can\nbelieve,\u201d he asks, \u201cthat an army of women, or a city, or a nation,\ncould ever subsist without men, and even dispatch an expedition across\nthe sea to Attica? This is as much as to say that the men of those days\nwere women, and the women men.\u201d\n\nTwice, however, in the field of legend over which Strabo cast an\nunbelieving backward glance, the note of reality, or perhaps of\nrealism, had been sounded. When Alexander the Great was in Parthia,\nThalestris, the Amazon queen, paid him a Sheba-like visit at the head\nof a hundred women carrying double-headed axes and the traditional\nhalf-moon shield. He was the bravest of men, said the lady, and she the\nbravest of women. They owed a duty to posterity to raise offspring in\nwhom the two strains should conjoin. The appeal flattered the vanity\nof the Macedonian, nor was he averse to meeting its conditions. So\nruns a Greek story like unto others with which the Alexander legend\nwas embroidered. But Arrian explains that the so-called queen and\nher followers had been sent as a present by the governor of the next\nprovince--a time-honored Asiatic gift.\n\nThere was a battalion of death perhaps three thousand years before\nthe young women of Russia took the field in the World War, and those\nof Poland in the war that followed it. The story is told by Herodotus\nin a chapter which begins in myth and seems to pass into history. In\nthe opening scene three shiploads of Amazons, captured in the Attic\ncampaign already noted, overpower the Greek sailors and slay them all.\nThey let the ships drift across the Black Sea and beach on the shores\nof the Palus M\u00e6otis (Sea of Azov), where the women seize a herd of\nhorses. Mounting them, they fall to plundering the land of the free\nScythians. Herodotus continues:\n\n\u201cThe Scyths could not tell what to make of the attack upon them--the\ndress, the language, the nation itself were alike unknown; whence\nthe enemy had come, even, was a marvel. Imagining, however, that\nthey were all men of about the same age, they went out against them\nand fought a battle. Some of the bodies of the slain fell into their\nhands, whereby they discovered the truth. Hereupon they deliberated,\nand made a resolve to kill no more of them, but to send against them a\ndetachment of their youngest men, as near as they could guess equal to\nthe women in number, with orders to encamp in their neighbourhood and\ndo as they saw them do. When the Amazons advanced against them, they\nwere to retire and avoid a fight. When they halted, the young men were\nto approach and pitch their camp near the camp of the enemy. All this\nthey did on account of their strong desire to obtain children from so\nnotable a race.\u201d\n\nThe Scythian youths were sent out. The Amazons saw that no harm was\nmeditated against them and desisted from further attack; and slowly\nthe romance unfolded. Day after day the camps were pitched nearer each\nother, and both parties, having naught but arms and horses, supported\nthemselves by the chase. \u201cAt last,\u201d says Herodotus, \u201can incident\nbrought two of them together. The man easily gained the good graces\nof the woman, who bade him by signs to bring a friend the next day,\npromising on her part to bring with her another woman. He did so, and\nthe woman kept her word. When the rest of the youths heard what had\ntaken place they also sought and gained the favor of the other Amazons.\n\n\u201cThe two camps were then joined in one, the Amazons living with the\nScythians as their wives; and the men were unable to learn the tongue\nof the women, but the women soon caught the tongue of the men. Then the\nScyths said: \u2018We have parents and properties; let us therefore give up\nthis mode of life, and return to our nation, and live with them; you\nshall be our wives there no less than here, and we promise you to have\nno others.\u2019\u201d\n\nBut the young women would not go home with their husbands to live with\ntheir mothers-in-law. \u201cOf womanly employments we know nothing,\u201d they\nsaid. \u201cTo draw the bow, to hurl the javelin, to bestride the horse,\nthese are our arts. Your women stay at home in their wagons engaged in\nwomanish tasks and never go out to hunt or to do anything. We should\nnever agree.\u201d So they bade the bridegrooms go back to their parents,\nask for their inheritances, and return. This the youths did, and\nthen the Amazons told them they could no more get along with their\nfathers than with their mothers. They had stolen horses and wasted the\nancestral lands. \u201cAs you like us for wives,\u201d they pleaded, \u201cgrant the\nrequest that we leave the country together, and go and dwell beyond the\nTanais\u201d (the river Don).\n\nAgain the Scythian youths consented, and all fared to a region three\ndays\u2019 journey east and three north of the Sea of Azov. Thus was founded\nthe race of Sarmatians. From that day to this, concludes Herodotus, the\nSarmatian women ride with their husbands in the chase, and in war take\nthe field with them. Nor does a girl marry until she has killed a man\nin battle, so that among them are women of advanced years, celibates\nbecause they have never struck down a foe. Also, the Sarmatians do not\nspeak the tongue of Scythia correctly, because the Amazons learned it\nincorrectly at the first.\n\nAt least the topography of the tale has been confirmed. Sarmatia is the\nancient name of Poland and Niebuhr has traced the westward drift of\nthe tribes from the Don steppes to the great Hungarian plain, whence\nthey overspread Poland and Russia. One could wish to believe that Maria\nBotchkareva, commander of the Battalion of Death that took the field\nagainst Germany when the manhood of Soviet Russia faltered and grounded\narms, is of the high Amazonian strain.\n\nThe Indian epic of the _Mahabharata_ has a similar tale, although in\nless realistic vein. There was a religious rite known as the Aswamedha,\nin which a leader would loose a horse, and follow it for a twelvemonth\ninto whatever adventures and countries it might go--a quest entailing\nwanderings and warrings. Rajah Arjuna of the Gangetic city of Hatusapur\ntook the pledge, and in the fifth stage of his adventure followed the\nranging horse into the Country of Women. He entered it with heavy\nheart, knowing its danger.\n\nThese were not like other women, but rakshasis, or goblin women. Their\nqueen, the Rani Paranunta, was a beautiful young creature, and so were\nall her women. But their customs were worse than Circean. When men\nentered the land they were kindly entreated and beguiled into remaining\nfor a month or more; and, indeed, there were guards to prevent their\nescape. After thirty days they were killed, and such of the women as\nhad entertained them, but were not expectant mothers, took their own\nlives--the suttee. Thus was it assured that the Country of Women should\nalways be also the Country of Young Women.\n\nThe roving rajah and his train were gloomily pondering these customs\nwhen they saw a troop of Amazons appear, and lead away the Aswamedha\nhorse to the stables of their queen. These were young girls, all\nbetween the ages of fifteen and sixteen, arrayed in pearls and rich\nstuffs, with bows in their hands and quivers at their waists and proud\nhorses under them. Among them rode their queen on an elephant. And she\nbade Arjuna to cease his quest. \u201cBecome my slave, drink with me, and\npass your time in pleasure,\u201d said the young Rani.\n\nArjuna reminded her that this was an invitation to die thirty days\nlater. To which the Rani replied that really it should make little\ndifference to him: \u201cIf you resist me you fall by my arrows; if you\nremain you have to face the light of my eyes.\u201d Already her beauty had\novercome his heart, but his mind made a last appeal. Let her permit him\nto fulfill his vow and he would come back to wed her and would find\nnoble husbands for all her women. The young queen liked the speech and\nsped him on his way to other adventures, and the tale itself to its\nultimate happy ending.\n\nIn a fortified palace in an iron city of Ceylon--Hiouen Thsang tells\nthe story--dwelt other goblin women to the number of five hundred.\nOn their towers flags flew to attract passing ships. When merchants\nwere sighted, the rakshasis took the form of beautiful maidens holding\nflowers and strewing scents, and with music welcomed them to the iron\ncity. There was a prelude of wanton pleasure and then the strangers\nwere shut up in an iron prison and devoured at leisure.\n\nHither came Simhala, prince of the merchants, and five hundred of the\ntrader-folk, while the lucky signals waved on the towers of the siren\nhost. Simhala mated with their queen, and each of the men found a\ncompanion, and of each union a son was born. But an evil dream came to\nthe prince, and he went in the night to the iron stronghold, whence a\ncaptive\u2019s voice told him who the women were and what he might expect.\nIf he would escape, there was a divine horse on the seaboard that would\ncarry him away.\n\nThe next scene shows the goblin women, each with her child, questing\nthe air in search of their fugitive husbands and by blandishments\npersuading them to return. Simhala alone stands out. But his deserted\nqueen, hastening before him to his father\u2019s house, wins the elder man\nfor her husband, and then brings on the demon women for a carnival of\ndeath. In the morning the royal ministers find in the palace hall no\nliving thing, but only gnawed bones. The remainder of the story tells\nof the vengeance of the son in a second expedition to the Isle of Gems.\n\n\u201cThen,\u201d says the narrative, \u201cthe rakshasis were driven back, and fled\nprecipitately to rocky isles of the sea.\u201d There for a while we must\nseek the warrior women.\n\nMarco Polo found them \u201cabout five hundred miles toward the south in the\nocean\u201d from Sind. Here were two islands thirty miles apart, supposed\nby modern geographers to be the Two Sisters lying near Socotra. One,\ninhabited solely by men, was called the Island of Males; the other,\ninhabited solely by women, was called the Island of Females. In March,\nApril, and May the men lived with the women, and at the same time sowed\ngrain in the fields. The rest of the year, because of the climate, the\nmen lived in their own island, knowing that if they stayed with the\nwomen it would be \u201cat the risk of falling a sacrifice.\u201d\n\nIn Siamese folk-lore the Amazon island is farther to the east, in\nthe Mergui archipelago, where lies the Country of Widows, or See-Saw\nCountry of Widows--a vanishing city where are women only, and nothing\ncan float on water. Still farther east, legend--Arabic, medi\u00e6val,\nand modern--tells of women commonwealths in Engano; in the \u201cSea of\nMalatu,\u201d identified as a bay of North Borneo; and in an island not far\nfrom Samar in the eastern Philippines. Even in the Ladrones and the\nCarolines the Jesuits heard of female islands. Pigafetta was told by a\npilot of an island called Acoloro, which lies below Java Major, where\nare found no persons but women, and these become pregnant from the\nwind. They kill their male offspring and any men who visit their island.\n\nThe name of California, borne by an American state, was given by\nmedi\u00e6val legend to an Amazon island \u201con the right hand of the Indies\nvery near to the terrestrial paradise.\u201d Although troglodytes, the\npirate women who inhabited it lived luxuriously. Their arms and armor\nwere of gold and their caves were richly tapestried and adorned with\ngems and feather-work, won by plunder of passing ships.\n\nIn the _Arabian Nights_ the Amazon legend becomes entangled in other\nmyths. Hassan el Bassorah loves and weds a strange and beautiful woman,\nbut she flies away to the farthest of an archipelago of seven islands\nruled by her father. He has an army of twenty-five thousand women,\n\u201csmiters with swords and lungers with lances.\u201d The daughter queens it\nover the island of Wak-wak. Here there is a forest the trees of which\nbear fruit with the faces of the sons of Adam. When the sun arises,\nthese exclaim, \u201cWak-wak, Glory to the Creating King,\u201d and when it sets,\n\u201cWak-wak, Glory to God.\u201d\n\nLane, translator of the _Thousand and One Nights_, adds a note that\nthe island of Wak-wak, familiar to Arab legend, lay near Borneo. A\nqueen swayed it and her warriors were beautiful women. Even the trees\nbore women who hung by their hair from the branches and syllabled,\n\u201cWak-wak\u201d; if their hair was severed, they died. Another editor,\nBurton, holds that there were two Wak-waks. One was the peninsula of\nGuardafui where the pagan Gallas cried \u201cWak\u201d as the Moslems cried\n\u201cAllah\u201d; the vocal fruit tree was the calabash tree, \u201ca vegetable\nelephant,\u201d the gourds of which hang by slender filaments. The other\nWak-wak was an island identified as Madagascar, as Malacca, and as\nSumatra. Sometimes the Cantonese speak of Japan as Wo-kwok, and in\nNew Guinea birds of paradise, settling on trees, are supposed to cry\nout \u201cWak-wak.\u201d This is also the name of the Falcon-man among the\nFirst People of American myth, and of Philippine sorcerers who could\ndisconnect their legs and fly about like bats.\n\nThe narrative of Maundeville brings legend west again. Beside the Land\nof Chaldea is the Land of Amazonia. The woman state emerged when the\nking and all his nobles were slain in war. The high-born relicts slew\nall the men left, \u201cfor they would that all the Women were Widows as\nthey were.\u201d Thereafter, \u201cthey never would suffer Man to dwell amongst\nthem longer than seven Days and seven Nights,\u201d and when they met their\nlovers in neighboring realms they lived with them only \u201can eight Days\nor ten.\u201d These \u201cwise noble and worthy Women\u201d fought valiantly as\nmercenary soldiers for neighbor states.\n\nThere was an island of women in the Baltic, according to Adam of\nBremen, but he perhaps confused Gwenland, or Fenland, with the land of\ngwens--that is to say, the land of women.\n\nThat there was an Amazon nation in America the Chinese were first to\nreport. Buddhist travelers of the sixth century told of a Land of\nWomen beyond the Pacific in what may have been Mexico. Of this report\nthe Spaniards knew nothing when they gave the legend a home in the\nCaribbean Sea, in islands that were halfway houses in time and space to\nits wild but splendid domicile on the mainland of South America.\n\nThe maps which Columbus knew had drawn into their contours of the\nOrient the outlines of various islands of women. In the Catalan map of\n1375 the _regio feminarum_ was placed in Ceylon. The fifteenth-century\nCatalan map placed the _insula de bene faminill_ in the west of the\nIndian Ocean and off the African coast. A map of 1489 now in the\nBritish Museum had the _insula mulierum_ and the _insula virorum_\nnot far from Zanzibar. These were islands of the east, and Columbus\nthought he was sailing into the east, and he had with him the _Travels_\nof Marco Polo with their account of the isles of men and women. It\nwas confirmation of his hopes that shortly after his landfall in the\nBahamas the natives spoke, or seemed to speak, of the island of women.\n\nThrough January and February of 1493 the journal of Columbus has much\nto say of the _Isla de Mugeres_, of which many Indians had told him.\nIts name was Madanino, the modern island of Montserrat. There was a\ncompanion island of men called Carib, a dozen leagues away. Columbus\nwanted to visit both, although the men were cannibals, and to carry\naway a few of the Amazons as a present to his sovereigns. But somehow\nhe never made this expedition.\n\nOn the second voyage Columbus unwittingly touched at another island of\nwomen. It was Guadeloupe, where \u201cabundance of women [his son Ferdinand\nis the narrator] came out of a wood, with bows and arrows and feathers,\nas if they would defend their island.\u201d They were naked, with long hair\nfalling over their shoulders. The admiral sent two Haytian women\nswimming ashore to barter for food. The armed women bade them go to the\nnorth side of the island \u201cwhere their husbands were.\u201d But a landing\nparty of Spaniards brought back ten women and three boys--and report of\nan adventure. One of the captives, wife of a cacique, had been pursued\nby a swift-footed Canaryman, and him she threw down and had nearly\nthrottled before his companions pulled her off. Although nimble, the\nwomen were excessively fat, \u201cand there were some thicker than a man\ncould grasp.\u201d\n\nThe cacique\u2019s wife told the Spaniards that the island was inhabited\nonly by women, and that four men they had seen were there by chance\nfrom another island; \u201cfor at a certain time in the year they come to\nsport with them.\u201d There was another Amazon island called \u201cMatrimonio.\u201d\nHaving seen the prowess of these women, the admiral readily believed\ntheir stories. He dismissed them with presents, but the Amazonian\nwrestler had conceived a passion for a Haytian prince whom he held\ncaptive, and remained with the Spaniards.\n\nOther explorers after Columbus mistook for Amazons various island women\nwho fought them when their husbands were away. The conquistadors even\nimagined that the convents of Mexican virgins, who followed the austere\nrule of Quetzalcoatl, were Amazon barracks in which, at seasons, men\nwere made welcome. Thus by a succession of reports the stage was\nprepared for the revelation made by Orellana, when in 1542 he slipped\naway with a party of men from the spice-hunter, Gonzalo Pizarro, who\nwas encamped near the headwaters of the great river--from that time\nforth called the River of the Amazons--and descended its broadening\nbosom to the sea.\n\nAt the mouth of its affluent, the Rio Negro, Orellana had a spirited\nfight with a band led by a number of women. An Indian captured farther\ndownstream told him that this was a district of women. Their five\nHouses of the Sun were plated with gold, their dwellings were of\ngold, and strong walls encompassed their cities; and their country\nwas neighbor to El Dorado. This story, brought back to Europe with\nmuch corroborative detail, inflamed it, and Spain gave its author a\ncommission to conquer and colonize the lands he had skirted afloat. But\nhe died on his outward passage, and these lands, falling within the\nterritories of Portugal, Spain had no profit of them.\n\nThenceforth the legend of the American Amazons followed its curious\ncourse for three centuries, while the credulity and cupidity of men\nwove for it a background bizarre in its colors and stiff with fabled\ngold.\n\nRaleigh\u2019s is the best account--such a recital as must interest his\nsovereign, the Virgin Queen. The nations of these warlike women, he\nsaid, were on the south side of a northern affluent of the Amazon in\nthe province of Topago, \u201cand their chiefest strengths and retracts are\nin the Islands situated on the South side of the entrance some sixty\nleagues within the mouth of the sayd river. They accompany with men\nbut once in a yere, and for the time of one moneth, which I gather by\ntheir relation to be in April; and that time all kings of the borders\nassemble, and queenes of the Amazones; and after the queenes have\nchosen, the rest cast lots for their Valentines. This one moneth, they\nfeed, dance, and drinke of their wines in abundance; and the Moone\nbeing done, they all depart to their owne provinces.\n\n\u201cIt was farther tolde me, that if in the warres they took any\nprisoners, that they used to accompany with those also at what time\nsoever, but in the end for certeine they put them to death; for they\nare sayd to be very cruell and bloodthirsty, especially to such as\noffer to invade their territories. These Amazones have likewise great\nstore of these plates of golde, which they recover by exchange chiefly\nfor a kinde of greene stones which the Spaniards call Piedras hijades,\nand we use for spleene stones.\u201d\n\nEven without the imported wealth of Old World legend--the tales of\npygmies and vampires and headless folk with which adventurers decorated\ntheir narrative--it was a singular backdrop of tradition before which\nthe female warriors of America were paraded. Through its colors ran the\nprimitive lusts of men--for gold and women. The English sought gold,\nthe Indians sought women, and the Spaniards, so Raleigh said, sought\nboth gold and women. The natives were fighting over women a succession\nof Trojan wars, in which copper-hued Helens passed back and forth as\nthe booty of the victors. Indian nobles with a dozen wives envied the\npolity of other tribes where the caciques had half a hundred apiece.\nWhen Raleigh asked Topiawara\u2019s people what he should wrest from the\nEpuremi, they replied \u201ctheir women for us, and their gold for you.\u201d\n\nOf such a world anything might be true, and Amazon proof kept coming.\nThe soldiers of de Agira, as Lopez Vaz records, \u201cdid finde that to be\ntrue which Orellana had reported, that there were Amazons, but these\nwomen fight to aide their husbands.\u201d Father de Acunha, who went with\nTeixera on his great journey of exploration, asserted (1698) that\nthe large ladies of fable had \u201ctreasures enough to enrich the entire\nworld.\u201d Their realm was the summits of the Cordilleras of Guiana. The\nmales of the neighboring Guacaris were \u201cthe happy tribe which enjoys\nthe favor of the valiant Amazons,\u201d and these dwelt well up the sides\nof the mountains where the women throned it. When the men made their\nyearly call, their hostesses met them on the frontier with arms in\ntheir hands, which, however, they soon put aside. Each Amazon chose a\nhammock at random from the canoes of the men, and its owner followed\nher to her lodge.\n\nBrazilian folk-lore fitted into the legend. The devil-mask of the\nJurupary is supposed to represent the mythical hero who came from the\nAntilles and overthrew the Amazons. All along their great river bands\nof women attacked him, but, like another Hercules, he destroyed them\nutterly. The cuirass of the conqueror became a sacred mask, and it was\nsaid that Indian women would hide in the forests rather than look upon\nit, so poignant was its reminder of their overthrow.\n\nIn another story, found upon the middle Amazon, the Indian women\nabandoned their lords and retired to the hills, taking one old man with\nthem. The oldster became the father of all children born to them, and\nonly girl babies were reared. One mother, however, had a crippled son,\nand in pity she secreted and reared him, and cured his deformity. When\nhis retreat was discovered there began, says Rothery, a long and tender\npersecution from the women, though the boy remained unmoved. To escape\nthis he agreed that his mother should throw him into a lake, where he\nbecame a fish. Whenever the mother called him he swam ashore, changed\nto his beautiful human form and took food from her hands. This secret,\nalso, was discovered, and the other women would imitate the call and\ninveigle the deceived youth into their arms. The old man, sole tribal\nhusband of record, noted the neglect of the women, divined the reason,\nand went fishing. Other nets failed to hold his prey, but a net of\nwoman\u2019s hair caught the boy-fish, and youth was no longer served; the\nold man killed him.\n\nNavaho myth tells a related story of the secession of the women, their\ncohabitation with a water-monster, and their return to their natural\nmates. Fragmentary tales of the woman state come also from Colombia,\nNicaragua, Sinaloa, and the two Californias.\n\nThe Amazon exodus is related in a third story of Brazil, told by\nBarboza Rodriguez. When the women abandoned their husbands, flood and\nfell barred the way of the pursuers and the very monkeys pelted them\nfrom the trees. After a while the female republic relented so far as\nto admit the men once a year. At length it disappeared into the land\nof shadows, the women going down into a hole in the earth, led by an\narmadillo.\n\nLa Condamine, the French geographer and mathematician, went to Peru\nin 1735 to determine the length of a degree of the meridian at the\nequator, and on his homeward journey made the first scientific\nexploration of the river Amazon. He returned with one certainty and\ntwo doubts. He was sure there had been a woman state, but he did not\nknow whether there still was, nor where it could then be found, for the\nAmazons were nomads who shifted their camps.\n\nThe distinguished scientist arrays his evidence: testimony of an Indian\nwhose grandfather had seen an Amazon band pass by at the entrance of\nthe Cuchura River and spoken with four of them; like testimony from\nother natives; statement of the Topayos that the green stones called\nAmazon stones which they wore were inherited from forefathers who had\nthem from a tribe of women; statement of an old soldier that he had\nseen necklaces of Amazon stones among a tribe of long-eared Indians\nand learned they had procured them from the women without husbands,\nwhose territories were seven marches west; native name of these women,\nCougnantainsecouima, meaning \u201cthe independent women who receive men\ninto their society only in the month of April\u201d; offer of a native of\nMortigua to guide La Condamine up the river Irijo which flows hard by\nthe woman state; passages in the Jesuit _Relations_ of 1726 and reports\nof two Spanish governors of Venezuela, Don Diego Portales and Don\nFrancisco Torralva.\n\nWhere are the Amazons now? asks La Condamine. He notes that while\ndifferent accounts designate the point of their retreat, some toward\nthe east, others the north, and others again the west, these several\nroutes converge in one common center, the mountains in the midst of\nGuiana. But without further proof he will not credit the existence of\nthe woman state there in his time. The tribe may have moved again. \u201cOr,\nwhat to me appears a more probable event than any other, it will have\nforsaken its ancient habits, either in consequence of being overpowered\nby some other nation, or of the maidens\u2019 having at length lost the\naversion of their mothers to the company of men. Thus, though no\nremaining vestige should be found of this feminine republic, this would\nnot yet prove that none such had ever existed.\u201d\n\nThe majority of the natives of South America, La Condamine declares,\nare liars, credulous, and prone to the marvelous. But none of them, he\nurges, could have heard of the Amazons of Diodorus Siculus, and Justin\nprevious to the arrival of the Spaniards; yet even then Amazons were\nspoken of as existing in the center of the country, and later reports\ncome from tribes that never had held commerce with Europeans.\n\nIf ever there was such a nation, concludes La Condamine, it must have\nbeen in America. The Indians were constantly wandering. Their wives\noften went with them to war. They had plenty of chances to get away\nfrom the men, and provocation enough in the hard estate of slavery in\nwhich they were held. Why could not these aboriginal women do what\neven imported slaves had done? Negroes in Latin America had fled from\ntheir taskmasters into the tropical forests, and there had reared a\ndozen Cimarron republics. Thus, weighing evidence, common report and\nprobabilities, La Condamine casts the weight of his name in favor of\nthe Amazons.\n\nTwo generations later the woman state received the allegiance of\nAlexander von Humboldt, founder of the science of physical geography\nand largest name among the savants of the nineteenth century. He had\nspent five years in tropical America at the opening of the century,\nand in his _Personal Narrative_ of travel there he records affirmative\nanswer to the question: Did he accept the conclusions of La Condamine?\nThere was exaggeration, he thinks, in the stories of Raleigh and\nOviedo; but nevertheless he cannot entirely reject \u201ca tradition which\nis spread among various nations having no communication with each\nother.\u201d\n\nRibeiro, the Portuguese astronomer who had traversed the Amazon basin,\nentering it a disbeliever of the story, had found the same traditions\nof the woman state among the Indians, and confirmed all that La\nCondamine reported a generation before, Humboldt notes. He is impressed\nwith the contemporary testimony of Father Gili. The friar had asked a\nQuaqua Indian what tribes inhabited the Rio Cuchiviro and the Indian\nnamed three, one of them the Aikeambenanos. The missionary knew the\nTamanac tongue, and in that tongue the word signified \u201cwomen living\nalone.\u201d The Indian confirmed his translation, and explained that these\nwere a community of women who made blow-tubes and other weapons of war.\nAfter the familiar Amazon custom they had seasonal amatory relations\nwith the neighboring nation of Vokearos and sent their men visitors\nback with presents, but killed their male offspring. This tale, says\nHumboldt, seems framed on the traditions which are rife among the\nIndians of the Maranon and among the Caribs; yet the Quaqua who told it\nknew no Castilian, had never before talked to a white man and certainly\ndid not know that below the Orinoco was the river of the Amazons.\n\n\u201cWhat must we conclude?\u201d asks Humboldt. \u201cNot that there are Amazons\non the banks of the Cuchivero, but that women in different parts of\nAmerica, wearied of the state of slavery in which they were held by the\nmen, united themselves together; that the desire of preserving their\nindependence rendered them warriors; and that they received visits\nfrom a neighboring and friendly horde. This society of women may have\nacquired some power in one part of Guiana. The Caribs of the continent\nheld intercourse with those of the islands; and no doubt in this way\nthe traditions of the Maranon and the Orinoco were propagated toward\nthe north,\u201d so that Columbus and other navigators who followed him\nheard of them repeatedly before reaching the mainland of America.\n\nA generation later the woman state is spoken of by Schomburgk, who\ntraversed Guiana in 1835-43. Everywhere the Caribs told him of the\nWoruisamocos, a tribe of warlike women who lived near the sources of\nthe Corentyne in a district where no white man had been. They shot\nwith the bow and arrow and used the blow-pipe. Their own fields they\ncultivated, and men came thither only as their lovers, and but once a\nyear. Schomburgk pushed on to the district where the women should have\nbeen; they were not there.\n\nIn the remote regions of the River Amazon\u2019s northern affluents, says a\nrecent geographer, the women warriors are still vainly sought.\n\nThus this world-wide, world-old story has been followed through perhaps\nthirty centuries of tradition on four continents and in five seas; and\nthe end is a doubt. Men have fought with parties of armed women, but\nnone has found the City of Women. Stories of male and female islands\nmay have arisen from the custom of naming companion islets \u201cbrother\u201d\nisles and \u201csister\u201d isles, like North Brother and South Brother islands\nin New York\u2019s East River. It is contended that Orellana concocted his\ntale to divert attention from his desertion of Pizarro; that Spaniards\nmistook young Indian braves, with topknots and berry-bracelets on their\narms, for women; and that the prose behind the poetry of the American\nAmazons is the tribe of Naupes, which still wears green stones for\namulets. It is even suggested that the New World legend grew out of the\ncoast Indian word, _Amazuni_, to denote a tidal bore upon the great\nwaterway of Brazil.\n\nIt has happened that the vivid imagination of the conquistadors\nprojected stories among the Indians which came back later with such\na wealth of detail as to seem native stuff. Is the New World Amazon\ntradition merely Book III, Chapter XXXIV of the _Travels of Marco\nPolo_, writ large upon the wax-like minds of savages by the curiosity\nof Columbus and his great companions?\n\nBefore answering, it will be well to turn from stories of a woman state\nto authentic records of women who were less than the Amazons of fable,\nbut more, or rather other, than women of the hearth. Perhaps the answer\nis there.\n\n\n\n\nChapter XIII. The Amazons of History\n\n\nWhether there have been Amazon states or no, there have been Amazon\nqueens--warrior women who knew how to lead and whom men were willing to\nfollow. The portrait gallery of history has set aside its more spacious\nhalls for women of another kind, for Helen, Cleopatra, Messalina,\nTheodora, and their sisters of blandishment. But women militant have\nalso a place. Tomyris, queen of the Massaget\u00e6, defeated and slew\nCyrus the Great. Semiramis, legendary queen of Assyria, matched her\nadulteries with her victories in arms, won all her campaigns except the\nIndian, and, in the words of Strabo, left her monuments in \u201cearthworks,\nwalls, and strongholds, aqueducts, bridges, and stair-like roads over\nmountains.\u201d Boadicea led the Britons in momentarily successful revolt\nagainst Nero. Zenobia, Arab queen, established the Palmyrene power over\nthe trade routes of the east and swayed Egypt, Syria, Mesopotamia, and\npart of Asia Minor, until the arms and gold of Aurelian encompassed\nher downfall. Under the poetess Telesilla the women of Argos repelled\na Spartan attack. Joan of Arc led the armies of France as a girl of\nnineteen.\n\nWomen have gone to war as single soldiers or in troops, in disguise,\nor with husbands, brothers, and lovers. When the Goths crossed the\nRoman frontiers their families came with them in ponderous wagons,\nand their yellow-haired wives figured in the Roman triumphs. American\nIndian women, as the Spaniards found, were able to use the bow, and\ndefended their homes when their husbands were away, and sometimes went\nwith them in battle. The aftermath of a victory among various tribes\nof North American Indians--the scalping of the dead, the torture of\nthe living--was intrusted to the women. They bear their part in the\nMexican revolutions. Thus Ibanez puts it: \u201cThe army is composed of men\nand women. No one has ever decided which of the sexes makes the better\nsoldier.\u201d\n\nTo count the women, the Spanish author says, is to count the Mexican\nsoldiers, for every one has a wife along, and more often than not\na string of children. The woman is called a \u201csoldierette\u201d or a\n\u201chard-tack,\u201d and if her man is tiring of her, \u201cthe Indian\u201d; and\ngenerals have their \u201cgeneralettes.\u201d Women constitute the commissary\nof the army. Each carries bedding for herself and man, a basket, and\nperhaps a parrot. With her sisters she forms an advance guard several\nmiles ahead of the main force when the troops are on the march. When\nthe latter reach camp they find the fires burning and a stew in the\npot. The stew comes out of the basket and the basket is filled by\nforaging along the way. The Mexican hard-tack does this thoroughly,\nIbanez thinks: \u201cShe passes over the country like a scourge of God.\nAlong her path not a tree remains with a piece of fruit, not a garden\nwith a turnip, not a coop with a chicken, not a barnyard with a pig.\u201d\nWhen a soldier dies his companion passes to another through the swift\ncourtship of circumstance; and sometimes she seizes the rifle of her\nfallen mate and uses it in his stead.\n\nAmong nomad peoples women have always shared the activities of the\nmen; the seclusion of the harem is for settled folk. The chronicles\nand legends of High Asia have their instances of feminine prowess in\narms. Marco Polo devotes a chapter to Aigiarm, daughter of Kaidu,\nking of Great Turkey and nephew to the Grand Khan. She would marry no\nman, she said, who could not overcome her by force. Suitors came from\nother lands and wrestled with her before the court. Her hand was the\nprize of success and a hundred horses were the forfeit of failure. \u201cIn\nthis manner,\u201d says Marco, \u201cthe damsel gained more than ten thousand\nhorses, which was no wonder, for she was so well made in all her limbs,\nand so tall and strongly built, that she might almost be taken for a\ngiantess.\u201d In war she fought beside her father.\n\nFrom Usbeck ambassadors at Delhi Fran\u00e7ois Bernier heard vaunts of the\nAmazonian ferocity of the Tartar women. One of their stories was of\nthe campaign of Aurungzebe against the Khan of Samarcand. A score of\nMogul horsemen had plundered a village and were binding its people to\nsell them as slaves, when an old woman said: \u201cMy children, be not so\ncruel. My daughter, who is not greatly addicted to mercy, will be here\npresently. Should she meet with you, you are undone.\u201d With a laugh the\nhorsemen tied her up also, and started with their captives across the\nplain. The old woman kept looking behind her, and at last uttered a\nscream of joy.\n\nThe raiders turned and beheld a cloud of dust, and in the midst of\nit a young woman furiously riding. Raising her great voice, like the\nheroines of Russian epic, she bade them loose their captives and she\nwould spare them. The horsemen heeding not, her bowstring twanged and\ntwanged again. Four men tumbled from the saddle, shot at a range beyond\ntheir own arrows. The young Amazon galloped in among the others, slew\nthe greater part with her unerring bow, and with her saber cut down the\nrest.\n\nThere may be an element of romantic exaggeration in each of these\nstories. But they make the point that the women of the Asiatic\nhighlands knew the bow as well as the distaff, and they bring the\ntradition of female warriors into the region where Greek fable placed\nthe Amazons. There are continued references to women bearing arms\nin Armenia, in Kurdistan, and in the early wars of Islam in Arabia.\nWomen in armor fought with Miltiades of Pontus against the Romans. The\nseventeenth-century traveler, Sir John Chardin, had adventure with a\nragamuffin and lewd-tongued queen of the Mingrelians. The Prince of\nGeorgia said the women of the Caucasus rode as well as the men, and\nhe accepted the Amazon legend. When Father Angelo Lamberti was in\nMingrelia in 1654, word came that among the dead in a raiding force\nfrom the Caucasus were a large number of women. They wore complete\ncoats of armor over bright-red woolen skirts. Their half-boots were\nadorned with brass disks and their gilded arrow-shafts bore heads\nshaped like the new moon.\n\nAs late as the Crimean war \u201cthe Black Virgin,\u201d a Kurdish woman, paraded\nat the head of a thousand horsemen before the palace of the Sultan in\nConstantinople, and led them away to the campaign on the Danube.\n\nThe outlines of a veritable woman\u2019s state almost take shape in Bohemian\nchronicle and legend of the eighth century. There was a Slavic queen\nnamed Libussa who is supposed to have founded Prague and built its\nimperial palace. She exercised her sovereign will by marrying a\npeasant, instituting a Council of Virgins, and giving women preference\nin the posts of state. When she died in 838 and affairs returned to the\nold footing, Valasca, her chief woman counselor, undertook to found a\nfemale commonwealth. Thus far more or less authentic history; legend\nadds that for a while the commonwealth really was, and that under it\ngirls were trained to arms, while boys lost their right eyes and thumbs.\n\nSt. Bernard organized the Female Crusade in 1147, in which bodies of\narmed women marched. The tradition of fighting women was kept alive\nin western Europe in the Middle Ages by girls who accompanied their\nknightly lovers as pages, and with them entered the chants of balladry.\nIt was nurtured by the romances of chivalry, in which disguised female\nwarriors like Bradamante, \u201cin prowess equal to the best of knights,\u201d\nfigured. But when, for the first time in the modern era, the Amazonian\nimpulse seized upon masses of women, there was needed, not the\nmodulated voice of the _trouv\u00e8res_, but the Gothic accent of a Carlyle\nto tell of it. The phenomenon is known as the Insurrection of Women,\nthe march on Versailles of October, 1789.\n\nThis was the sudden inspiration of perhaps ten thousand women drawn\nfrom the Central Markets and other rallying places--\u201crobust dames of\nthe Halle, slim mantua-makers, ancient virginity tripping to matins,\nthe housemaid with early broom.\u201d The mob, continues Carlyle, storms\ntumultuous, wild-shrilling, toward the H\u00f4tel de Ville. There Theroigne\nde Mericourt leaps astride a cannon, her chariot on to Versailles.\nM\u00e6nads clamor behind. It is the cause of all Eve\u2019s daughters, mothers\nthat are or that ought to be. \u201cParis is marching on us,\u201d exclaims\nMirabeau in the National Assembly as the sinister murmurs come from\nafar. Soon the esplanade is covered with \u201cgroups of squalid, dripping\nwomen, of lank-haired male rascality.\u201d They break into the assembly,\nthey compel the king and queen to show themselves, and they bring them\nback to Paris, leaving the monarchy in ruins behind them. The return,\nsays Carlyle, is \u201cone boundless, inarticulate ha-ha--transcendent\nworld-laughter, comparable to the saturnalia of the ancients.\u201d\n\n[Illustration: THUSNELDA AT THE TRIUMPHAL ENTRY OF GERMANICUS INTO ROME\n\n_By_ C. T. von Piloty]\n\nNot as idealized figures of the Greek friezes, but as turbulent,\nblood-hungry corybantes of earlier Greek story the Amazons of France\nemerged, almost on the threshold of the nineteenth century--vanguard of\nthe Revolution. Later the market women were enrolled in a brigade which\nwore the Phrygian cap, the tricolor, a baldric, a short skirt of red,\nwhite, and blue, and sabots. With pike and cutlass, it was their task\nto escort the carts which bore condemned royalists to the guillotine.\nThere were also armed battalions of women and girls in the provinces.\nIn the external wars of the Revolution about half a hundred women are\nknown to have fought, young girls in the infantry, middle-aged women in\nthe cavalry.\n\nFrench Amazonism was partly portrayed, partly parodied in the person of\nTheroigne de Mericourt. She was a popular actress, in Carlyle\u2019s phrase\n\u201cbrown-locked, light-behaved, fire-hearted,\u201d who had \u201conly the limited\nearnings of her profession of unfortunate female.\u201d At Versailles she\ncajoled the guard, \u201ccrushing down musketoons with soft arms.\u201d This\nwoman rose high, and fell far. Suspected of being a Girondist, \u201cthe\nextreme she-patriots\u201d seized, stripped, and chastised her on the\nterrace of the Tuileries, with Paris looking on agrin. Theroigne lost\nher wits from brooding over it, and passed out of the Revolution into a\nmad-house.\n\nOlympe de Gonges, widow at sixteen, blue stocking, pretended natural\ndaughter of Louis XV, entered the Revolution at middle age and\ncountervailed the declaration of the Rights of Man with a declaration\nof the Rights of Woman. She tried the patience of Robespierre and he\nsent her to the guillotine, after a jury of matrons had found against\nher plea that she was \u201cabout to give the Republic a citizen.\u201d\n\nYounger women aped men\u2019s attire and men\u2019s ways. _Les Merveilleuses_\nindecently imitated Roman costumes, going about in sandals with rings\non their bare toes. When a man clad only in a loin-cloth paraded\nbetween two stark-naked women, the lurking sense of propriety, or\nof humor, was affronted, and the group was mobbed. La Maillard, the\nopera-singer, who was Goddess of Liberty at the Feast of Reason, wore\ntrousers, fought duels, and with her female followers went about the\nstreets to compel other women to dress as she did. This provoked\nreaction and the Committee of Safety decreed that women\u2019s political\nclubs should disband and no woman henceforth have part in government.\nThus disappear the Amazons of France.\n\nIn domestic insurrections and in the defense of besieged cities, women,\nas might be expected, figure more largely than in field operations.\nPlutarch had told of the women of Argos who defended their city with\nsuch courage that a public decree gave to them the right to dedicate\na statue to Mars, and to their daughters henceforth the singular\nprivilege of wearing false beards on their wedding day. The Feast\nof the Valiant Women is celebrated in Majorca to commemorate the\npart taken by two women in repelling a pirate attack upon an island\ntown. Spanish women manned the walls of Barcelona during the War of\nSuccession and provided most of the soldiers that held Saragossa\nagainst the lieutenants of Napoleon. On the maid Agostina was conferred\nthe honor of bearing the name and arms of Saragossa.\n\nThe most remarkable woman in the Amazon story and, save Joan of Arc,\nperhaps the most dramatic figure in the whole story of her sex, was\nborn in July, 1889, in the Russian province of Novgorod. The attempt\nof Maria Botchkareva to prevent the suicide of her country in 1917,\nby taking the field with a force of women soldiers--the Battalion of\nDeath--who were pledged to obey and not to debate, to shoot the foe and\nnot to embrace him, has the romance of a lost cause and more. It is\nrelated in _Yashka_, her utterly frank autobiography, transcribed for\nher by Isaac Don Levine.\n\nOut of her old life as misused peasant girl and misused wife this\ndaughter of Russia marched away into another world where she could\nstrike as well as be stricken. In the Tsar\u2019s uniform she seemed just\na tall, powerfully built, round-cheeked young soldier. But under the\nhoyden of the surface there were commanding qualities; and it would\nalmost seem that Yashka, as the soldiers nicknamed her, could see\nstraighter than any man in the empire.\n\nHer early experiences as a woman soldier in a men\u2019s regiment were such\nas perhaps might have been anticipated. She describes her first night\u2019s\nslumber in barracks and the blows and kicks she had to administer to\nthe men on either side. \u201cAll night long,\u201d she says, \u201cmy nerves were\ntaut and my fists busy.\u201d Soon, however, she won the respect and then\nthe affection of her comrades, and a corner of the regimental bathhouse\nwas reserved for her ablutions. She joined in trench raids, herself\nbayoneted a German, killed several more with handgrenades, was captured\nand escaped, was wounded and shell-shocked, repeatedly was commended\nfor acts of bravery or mercy; and kisses greeted her when she returned\nfrom hospital.\n\nThen came the revolution, committee rule in the army, incessant\nsoldiers\u2019 meetings, refusal to attack. With Russia dying before her\neyes, Yashka proposed to Rodzianko, president of the Duma, a desperate\nexpedient--the formation of the Battalion of Death. Let the women\norganize a small command free from committees and subject to full\nmilitary discipline. The men would neither fight nor take orders, but\nperhaps if their women attacked the enemy, the men might be shamed into\nmoving forward behind them.\n\nRodzianko saw a gleam of hope in the project; Brusilov,\ncommander-in-chief, approved; Kerensky set his seal on it; and Maria\nBotchkareva found herself at the head of two thousand women of all\nclasses from princesses to peasant girls and domestic servants. \u201cWho\nwill guarantee,\u201d asked a delegate at the meeting that authorized this\nstep, \u201cthat the presence of women soldiers at the front will not yield\nlittle soldiers there?\u201d \u201cI will hold myself responsible for every\nmember of the command,\u201d was Yashka\u2019s spirited reply. \u201cOnly discipline\ncan save the Russian army. In my battalion I shall have it.\u201d And she\ndid, although the securing it reduced the command she led to the front\nto three hundred girls.\n\n\u201cI had a vision,\u201d she said. \u201cI saw millions of Russian soldiers rise in\nan invincible advance, after I and my women had disappeared in No Man\u2019s\nLand on the way to the German trenches.\u201d\n\nThere was a day in July, 1917, when it looked as if the vision was\nto become fact. Artillery had prepared the way for a general attack.\nThen the committees began to debate, precious hours passed, the day\ndeclined. Into the Battalion of Death came nearly a hundred men\nofficers, followed by soldiers who would rather fight behind a woman\nthan not at all.\n\nRifles were placed in the officers\u2019 hands, and, a thousand strong,\nthe detachment formed its battle line, every girl flanked by two men.\nCoarse jests rose around them, but the laughter died in men\u2019s throats\nwhen the little command leaped the trenches and went swiftly forward,\nalone, as it seemed. \u201cSuddenly,\u201d says Yashka, \u201cwe caught the sound of\na great commotion in the rear. In a few moments the front to the right\nand left of us became a swaying mass of soldiers. First our regiment\npoured out, and then, on both sides, the contagion spread, so that\nalmost the entire corps was on the move.\u201d\n\nThe German first line was overwhelmed and the second, and the third,\nYashka\u2019s regiment alone taking two thousand prisoners. Then word came\nthat the Ninth Corps, which was to relieve the attacking troops and\ncontinue pursuit, was debating instead of advancing!\n\nThey must needs run for it, for the German counter-attack was forming.\nBack over all the trenches they had won at such cost fled the Russians,\nthe enemy reoccupying them without a fight. Yashka, shell-shocked, was\ncarried in on the shoulders of her adjutant.\n\nThus the great moment of the Battalion of Death came--and went. Russian\nmanhood was still capable of a heroic thing. But the chaos which it had\nmade its world could not resolve into order even at the poignant drama\nof Russian women marching alone.\n\nWhat went before and was to come after was all in keeping. The tread of\nthe little battalion resounds through scene after scene of delirium.\nBehind the lines one hears agitators haranguing the women. One beholds\nKerensky banging his table and, forgetful he has just abolished\ncapital punishment, threatening to have Yashka shot because she will\nnot tolerate committee rule in her command. One glimpses snipers in\nPetrograd firing on her women as they leave for the front. Her own\nangry scorn flashes out in a violent scene when she reviews the Moscow\nWoman\u2019s Battalion--committee ruled--and notes the rouge, the slippers,\nthe fancy stockings, the evidences of a dubious familiarity with the\nmen.\n\nThere was worse at the front--the men killing their officers and\nembracing the enemy; No Man\u2019s Land \u201ca boulevard for promenading\nagitators and drunkards.\u201d Resolved that there should be some real\nfighting, Yashka shot a German in the leg as nonchalantly he approached\nthe lines. Real fighting did follow; the Russian soldiers turned their\nmachine guns on their own women. The latter were sent to another\nsector, and when the men heard that Lenin and Trotzky had seized\ncontrol they celebrated; they tried to lynch the little command. Twenty\ngirls were killed, the rest fled into the woods.\n\nIt was the end. The Battalion of Death disbanded and Yashka was seized\nand brought before the duumvirs. They bade her join them in \u201cbringing\nhappiness to Russia,\u201d and laughed at her fierce scorn. But they let her\ngo, and she follows her command out of these pages. One salutes with\npride and pain.\n\nAbout four hundred other Russian women, most of them Siberians,\nserved in men\u2019s regiments, and the colonel of the Sixth Ural Cossack\nRegiment was a woman. There was a smaller number of female fighters in\nthe Austrian armies, a few in the German. Women figured also in the\nconflicts that followed the World War. The Vilna unit of girl soldiers,\nabout a thousand strong, suffered heavy losses in the defense of Poland\nagainst Soviet Russia. \u201cTheir heads thrown back, they seemed the very\nspirit of Poland,\u201d said one who saw them in action.\n\nThese were Amazon volunteers. Until yesterday there were professional\nAmazons at many of the courts of Asia. The Celestial King of the\nTae-Pings had a regiment of fighting women. For centuries Indian\nprinces, notably of Hyderabad and the Deccan, had female guards called\nUrdu-begani, or \u201ccamp-followers,\u201d on whose loyalty they could rely\nutterly. A body-guard of one hundred and fifty girl archers, the\nloveliest that could be found in Cashmere, Persia, and the Punjab, rode\nmilk-white steeds in the service of Ranjeet Singh of Lahore. There were\nfemale sepoys in the palace at Lucknow, female guards at Bangkok and\nin Bantam. With their slender bodies incased in tunics and trousers of\nrich Eastern colors, with plumed caps on their small dark heads, and\nwith their erect and slightly swaggering carriage, these palace troops\ngave an added effect of theatricalism to the lesser courts of the\nOrient. The Amazon march of the modern stage mimics a reality of Ind.\n\nThe _Chronicle of the Cid_ may provide a prologue for the motley\nspectacle of Africa\u2019s warrior women which follows here. Six-and-thirty\nkings of the Moors and one Moorish queen attacked Valencia. The queen\nwas a negress, and two hundred mounted negresses rode behind her, all\nwith hair shorn save a tuft on the top. They wore coats of mail and\nwielded Turkish bows, and their queen drew hers so skillfully that\nthey called her the Star of the Archers. The Christians centered their\nattack on this female cavalry, slew the leader, and dispersed her force.\n\nThrough legend and doubtful chronicle of enterprises Amazonian, one\nmoves in Africa to a basis of fact as completely documented as the\nrecent deeds of warrior women in Russia and Poland. Father Alvares, who\nwent with the Portuguese ambassador to the Abyssinian court (1520-27),\ngives it on hearsay that to the south of the kingdom is a country where\nthe women have husbands but dispense them from fighting. Their queen\nhas \u201cno special husband, but withal does not omit having sons and\ndaughters.\u201d \u201cThey say,\u201d says this traveler, \u201cthat they are women of\na very warlike disposition and they fight riding on certain animals,\nlight, strong, and agile, like cows, and are great archers.\u201d\n\nIn his history of Ethiopia, Father Giovanni Cavazzi has two stories\nof negro Amazons in the Congo country of the seventeenth century. One\nis of the Princess Lliuga, who refused to submit to the Portuguese\nand fought until she won a favorable peace. Her garb was skins; her\nweapons were the bow, the ax, and the sword; her battle custom was to\nsacrifice a man--cutting off his head and drinking his blood--before\nattacking the enemy. The other story is of Tembandumba, a royal negress\nwho must have known the Amazonian tradition and who sought to establish\nthe Amazon state. Like Semiramis, she had a procession of lovers, and\nslew them as she tired of them. She ruled her state through women. All\nmale infants, all twins, and all village-born babies were killed by\nher orders, and a magic ointment was made from their macerated bodies\nmingled with herbs. The queen set the example by destroying her own\nboy baby. She told the young girls that their temporary matrimonial\nalliances should be marriages by capture, they to do the capturing in\nwar. The turbulent career of this one-eyed queen of a cannibal tribe\nwas ended by a husband who poisoned her before she had quite reached\nthe point of doing for him.\n\nUntil, in some instances, less than a generation ago, the courts of\nNegroland maintained palace troops and other fighting forces of women.\nBurton and Rothery have collected their stories. In the Congo empire\nof Monomotapa, Lopez found in 1680 battalions of women, armed members\nof the royal harem. A generation before, Jinga, queen of Angola,\nmaintained a harem of half a hundred young men. The monarch of Yoruba\nboasted that if the members of his female bodyguard clasped hands,\nthey could span his kingdom. In the time of the traveler Bosman the\nking of Whydah on the Slave Coast had four thousand armed wives. On\nthe Gle\u2019 lagoon of the Ivory Coast rumor placed a community of fetish\nwomen ruled by a queen who was able with herbs to develop artificial\nelephantiasis. These women put their male infants to death. Dahomey,\nwhich lies back of Whydah, and which became a French protectorate in\n1894, was the best known of African kingdoms--and known for two related\nthings, its annual Customs of blood sacrifice and its army of Amazons.\n\nSir Richard Burton, who went on mission to King G\u00e9l\u00e9l\u00e9 in 1863, bearing\nQueen Victoria\u2019s urgent request that he abolish the slave trade and\nhuman sacrifice in his dominions, has written the account of this\nnearest modern approach to the Amazon state. It is a veracious report\nand it reads like an evil dream. The _Thousand and One Nights_ has been\ncalled a blend of blood, musk, and hasheesh. The Dahomey story is an\nAfrican _Arabian Nights_, with native beer and trader\u2019s rum in place of\nhasheesh, with blood flowing in more turbid torrents than at Bagdad,\nand with a ranker musk--and under the musk the overpowering reek of the\nbody odors of Negroland.\n\nIn this nightmare state, half hid behind the swamps and forests of\nthe coast, one senses the controlling and corrupting presence of some\nprimitive and abominable religion. Africans, says Burton, worship\neverything except their Creator. Those of Dahomey worshiped, among\nother things, their ancestors. The Dahoman sovereign must enter\nDeadland in royal state, with a ghostly retinue of leopard wives, head\nwives, birthday wives, eunuchs, singers, drummers, bards, soldiers.\nThe retinue was swollen yearly at Customs time when criminals and\nprisoners of war, publicly sacrificed under the king\u2019s eye, went\ndrunken and giggling to their doom, while at the same hour the palace\nAmazons dispatched female victims to the land of shades. Throughout the\nyear, whenever the king would send a message to his deceased father,\nhe killed a subject and forwarded his soul with it. If he had invented\na new drum, or received a visit from a white man, or even removed from\none palace to another, the soul of some man or woman, slain for the\npurpose, must carry the news to the paternal ghost.\n\nIt was impossible, says Lady Burton, to venture from one\u2019s hut without\nseeing something appalling--skulls on posts, living victims impaled,\nevidences of cannibal feasts, animals tied in every agonizing position\nand left to die. Burton himself figured that there was an annual\nslaughter of at least five hundred persons, and during the year of\nthe Grand Customs perhaps a thousand. The institution was strenuously\nupheld by a powerful and interested priesthood; \u201cto abolish human\nsacrifice was to abolish Dahomey.\u201d\n\nThis was the woman\u2019s state, somewhat as early Greek legend pictured the\nAmazon commonwealth of the Black Sea, before art and song refined the\nfable. Women in Dahomey took precedence over men and the warrior women\ncalled themselves men. When one of the king\u2019s Amazons walked abroad, a\nslave girl with a bell went ahead, and men had to get out of the way.\nIt seemed to Burton, when he went up from the coast to the capital\ncity of Abomey, that the older and uglier the slave girl the louder\nshe rang the bell, and the more she enjoyed the ignoble scamper of his\ninterpreters and hammock men. The popular name of these women was Our\nMothers. Their official name was The King\u2019s Wives, a title of courtesy\nonly, for the monarch had his own harem and these other women were\nsupposed to be a kind of fighting nuns.\n\nThe Amazon army consisted of the Fanto company of the king\u2019s bodyguard,\nand the right and left wings, comprising five arms. The former were\ndistinguished by a headdress in the form of a narrow white fillet on\nwhich was the figure of a crocodile in blue, and their hair was cropped\ninstead of shaven. The body of the force was composed of blunderbus\nwomen, elephant hunters, razor women carrying eighteen-inch blades\nattached to a two-foot handle, archers with poisoned arrows, and\ninfantry with tower muskets. The archers were little more than heavily\ntattooed, lightly clad camp followers with knives lashed to their\nwrists. The elephant hunters were the \u00e9lite. They wore knickers under\nshort skirts, their breasts were bound with linen strips, and antlers\nwere attached to their caps. Other Amazons had the same uniform, but\nwore on their shaven heads small caps on which were blue tortoise\nfigures.\n\nTravelers of two centuries ago computed the female army as about ten\nthousand strong. The court may have deceived them by having the women\nmarch like a stage army across the parade ground, slip around, and come\nback again; or the kingdom may have been depopulated by its incessant\nwars, its blood sacrifices, the slave trade, and the dedication of a\nfourth of the females to the celibacy of arms. When Burton was there\nin 1863 he figured the total number of Amazons at about twenty-five\nhundred, of whom one-third were unarmed.\n\nThe nature of this force seems to have varied from generation to\ngeneration. Travelers report in turn that the Amazons are cadets of\nthe leading families; that they are slaves made in war; that they\nare criminals, common scolds, and women taken in adultery; that they\nare loose in morals and that they are celibates; and that the custom\nof permitting those no longer young enough to bear arms to marry was\na thrifty substitute for a state pension. Burton recites the common\nbelief that two-thirds of them are maidens, the remainder unfaithful\nwives condemned to soldiering. He thinks pretty well of their morals,\nwhich were protected by tabu, although while he was in Dahomey the\nking had to judge the cases of more than a hundred Amazons about to\nbecome mothers. The crime was l\u00e8se majest\u00e9, for in theory these were\nroyal brides, but the punishment was moderate--a few beheadings, and\nimprisonment, banishment, or pardon for the rest.\n\nDahomans themselves supposed that their peculiar institution was of\ntheir own time, had forgotten, what Europe knew, that women guarded\ntheir court two centuries before, did not dream that back to an\nunfathomed antiquity, it may be, theirs had been a woman state.\n\nBurton was present at the annual saturnalia of the Customs, and to his\nsometimes sardonic vision all was invested in African grotesqueness.\nHe noted the immense thighs of the women officers and found it hard to\nreconcile celibacy and corpulency. He described their dances, for also\nthey danced before the king, \u201cclapping palms on thighs, or on something\nfleshier.\u201d The women stamped, wriggled, kicked the dust, and ended with\na violent movement of the shoulders, hips, and loins--an anticipation\nof the most modern of popular terpsichorean contortions. One captain\nis pictured in terms that approach admiration--a fine, tall woman with\nglittering teeth and a gait that was partly a military swagger and\npartly a sensuous dance. But the costumes of all had a phantasmagoric\nquality--Amazons with beards of monkey skin, with men\u2019s nightcaps, with\nred liberty caps, with fools\u2019 caps, with human skulls, or the lower jaw\nof a skull, dangling at the waist.\n\nThese women paraded past the king while Burton looked on. It may be he\ntried to take notes and tired at the task. His narrative reads as if\nhis own head whirled with the dancers, until he could no longer frame\ncomplete sentences. He concludes that it was something like a pawnshop,\nfor the King\u2019s Valuables went by with his women.\n\nAbout in his own words and manner, but condensed, this is the picture:\n\n\u201cSixteen brilliant banners held horizontally, preceding a wheelbarrow\nwith a fancy red-and-blue flag. Five huge fans, followed by razor\nwomen. Eight images, of which three were apparently ships\u2019 figureheads\nwhitewashed, and the rest very hideous efforts of native art.\nSixty-seven women with brown faces and bead mittens. Twenty-one girls\ncarrying cylinders of red and white beads. Seventeen women with\nsilver plates fastened to the sides of their skulls, habited in red\nclothes and handling bead cat-\u00f3-nine tails. Twelve women, also in red.\nSeventeen fetish pots, three jars, one silver plated urn, attended\nby singing women. Twenty casque women with red tunics and plumes and\nblack horse tails. Eight helmet girls with red plumes, dark coats, and\nwhite loin cloths. Six pieces of plate, a tree, a crane, a monkey.\nAfter singers and dancers, a huge drum carried by a woman porter. Three\nlarge chairs, preceding about fifty heavily armed elephant huntresses,\nclad in chocolate and dark blue, with bustles of talismans behind\nand strings of cowries before. Four pots. A bullock trunk. Fourteen\nfetish women in white caps and tunics and bright yellow grass cloth.\nFive black girls dressed in blue. A line of 703 women and girls with\ncountry pots of native beer and bottles of trade rum and gin. A motley\ngroup surrounding two women in big felt hats. A band and a troop\nof bardesses. Two girls with serpent flags. Seven troubadour women\ndancing. Two warming pans. An escort of bayonet women. Royal equipages\nhauled by men harnessed with ropes. A body of armed women preceding\nseven umbrellas and drinking rum. A troop of girls with jugs, ewers,\nand jars. Twenty blunderbus women in red caps. Six kettledrum girls in\nscarlet caps and bodices and blue skirts. A calabash with a pyramid of\nfour skulls. Two dancing women with long switching tails. Fifty captive\nfemale dancers. An old cut-glass chandelier. Living representatives of\nthe mothers of the Dahoman dynasty. A company of singers commanded by\nan old woman in a broad-brimmed hat. A stunning salute of blunderbuses.\nGood night after seven mortal hours.\u201d\n\nYet there was no doubt that these fantastic women could fight.\nTheir frames were as powerful as those of the men, whose military\norganization their own paralleled; and their hearts were higher. They\nwere the king\u2019s own troops with his favor to vindicate and a tradition\nto sustain. They had greater ferocity as well as greater courage than\nthe men--\u201csavage as wounded gorillas,\u201d Burton called them, and he laid\nthis to their enforced chastity. With them, two centuries ago, Dahomey\nconquered the joint forces of Whydah and Popos, and the women fought\nbravely against the French. Travelers who saw them in maneuver at the\nannual Customs tell how they charged barefoot and half naked through\nbarriers of thorny acacia, and emerging, torn and bleeding, but with\nimpassive faces, passed in review before their sovereign.\n\nOut of one passage in the history of Dahomey a ray of light streams.\nWhen a king died at Abomey a wild orgy began among the Amazons of the\npalace. They took their own lives and they slew one another. When\nSinmenkpen passed to his fathers, five hundred and ninety-five Amazons\ndied with him; only by extorting a solemn fetish oath did Gezo end\nthis custom. There were similar practices elsewhere. Among the Behrs\nof the White Nile, Rawlinson reports, a woman\u2019s guard prevented any\nman from approaching the king, except the ministers who came to\nstrangle him when his end was near. Megasthenes, Greek ambassador to\nthe court of Sandrokotos at about B.C. 300, says that the Indian king\nwas surrounded by armed women who guarded his chamber and attended his\nhunts in chariots or upon horses and elephants. Sometimes it was their\nright to kill their lord, and the slayer married his successor. In\nBantam half a century ago the king was escorted by a girlish cavalry\nthat rode astride and carried muskets and lances; it was said that if\nhe died without issue the custom was for them to meet and elect a new\nsovereign.\n\nWhen kings died, their women guards functioned. It was the function of\npriestesses of death. This is the secret of the Amazon legend and the\nkey to practises of human sacrifice and periodic and indiscriminate\nsexual intercourse with which, alike in Asia, Africa and America, the\nlegend is associated.\n\nBefore fitting the key into the lock of legend it will be well to\nlet the rule of reason say its word. That large bodies of women\nshould withdraw themselves from the state, abjure the society of men\naltogether or except at stated intervals, live their own lives and\ndevelop their own social tradition, has seemed to skeptical opinion in\nall ages a thing not to be believed because against nature. Yet in all\nages women have done before the eyes of men something very like this.\nThousands of them have gathered in great convents, or as temple harlots\nhave served at the vast shrines of the Farther East, or as armed\npriestesses of the Nearer East have loosed the leash of fable. Their\nperiodic withdrawals from society for the performance of the Eleusinian\nand other mysteries were a routine of the classic civilizations.\n\nThere have been times when the woman state was a fact of a season,\nor of a year, or more--as when the men of an island were fishing\nelsewhere, or the able-bodied members of a tribe were away on the\nannual hunt, or the warriors were on a long campaign; and the traveler,\nseeing none but women, might misread what he saw. Doubtless there have\nbeen instances where the men of a tribe were exterminated in war, and\ntheir women, retiring to inaccessible retreats, maintained their\nindependence for a while. Time was when everywhere the women commanded\nand the men obeyed. It is not beyond imagination that, sometimes and\nin some places, with the memory of the matriarchate to inspire them,\nwomen have revolted against the cruel lot which was theirs in primitive\nsociety, and set up for themselves; for they were the daughters as well\nas the wives of the hard-headed men of the caves. This is perhaps as\nplausible as the conjecture that savage man merely concocted the story\nto dramatize the natural antipathy of the sexes, to account for the\ndeep groove of division which this sentiment had run through primitive\nsociety and to justify the fact that society gave men so much the\nbetter of it.\n\nThe roots of the Amazon tradition, however, lie deeper than what may be\ncalled the politics of sex. The truth underlying the several legends\nis to be found where, according to report, the fighting women had\ntheir commonwealth. The descendants of the Cappadocian Amazons who\ncame to the aid of Troy are to be found in the Armenian highlands. The\ndescendants of the West African Amazons, on whom, as Diodorus fables,\nthe vengeance of Hercules fell, are to be found in Dahomey and near-by\nnegro states. The secret of the Brazilian Amazons is to be sought,\namong other places, in Mexico.\n\nWith a single word out of the Old Testament the door of legend opens.\nOf the Hittites the Hebrew writers seemed to know only that they\noccupied mountainous districts in the land flowing with milk and honey;\nthat for a space the Jews dwelt with them and \u201cserved Baalim and the\ngroves\u201d; and that Solomon put a tribute upon them. From the rock\ncarvings of Asia Minor and from Assyrian and Egyptian inscriptions the\npresent age has learned more. The discovery by Sayce and other modern\nscholars of the important place once held by the Hittites has been\ncalled the romance of ancient history.\n\nThat place may be likened to the place held by the Ottoman Empire in\nits strength. Like the Turks, the Hittites were a Turanian people who\nplanted themselves across the great roads of Asia Minor and absorbed\nand crudely reproduced the culture of more civilized neighbor peoples.\nTheir capitals were at Carchemish, where they commanded the fords of\nthe Euphrates, and at Kadesh on the Orontes, whence they ruled Syria\nand the cities of the \u00c6gean. They were mountaineers from the Taurus,\nwith olive skins, mongoloid features, and the Chinese cue. Their\ndouble-headed eagle passed through the Turkomans and the Crusaders into\nthe imperial arms of Russia, Austria, and Germany; the Phrygian cap of\ntheir successors has become the headgear of revolutionary woman, and\nthe Turks still wear their peaked shoes.\n\nThe Hittite Empire flourished in the Bronze Age, when it met Egypt,\nBabylon and afterward Assyria on equal terms. It began to loom in the\nsixteenth century B.C. and it was a power to be reckoned with until\nwell into the first millennium before Christ. On its ruins arose\nCappadocia, Phrygia, Lydia, and later Pontus. The rock carvings that\nproclaimed its sway, and that Herodotus described but misread, still\nlook down on the Pass of Karabel along an old road of empire.\n\nThe Amazons of Greek legend, according to the convincing scholarship of\nSayce, were the armed priestesses of the Hittites. Their fabled capital\nof Themiscyra is the ruined city of Boghaz Keui in Asiatic Turkey not\nfar from the Black Sea. The authentic likenesses of the warrior women\nare to be found, not in the temple friezes of Attica, but in the rock\ncarvings on the hills that overlook this ancient ruin. Yet Greek art\nreflects correct observation or trustworthy report, for its warrior\nmaidens wear the kilt of the mountain-dwelling Hittites and carry the\nsame double-headed ax that is seen in their crude sculptures.\n\nIn the service of the Asiatic goddess, known variously as Astarte,\nDerceto, Cybele, the Great Mother, and Diana of the Ephesians, was a\nmultitude of armed priestesses so numerous that to the Greeks they\nseemed not a cult but a nation. Whole cities were in effect mere temple\nprecincts populated by these women and by eunuch priests; the high\npriestess of the temple ruled the city and the surrounding country,\nand had some claim, therefore, to the title of Amazon queen. At Komana\nwere six thousand of these armed maidens of the shrine. At Ephesus vast\nthrongs of them served a high priestess who called herself the Queen\nBee.\n\nThese Hittite women worshiped the Asiatic goddess with orgiastic\nfrenzies that simulated, or literally repeated, the primal processes\nof dissolution and reproduction. It was easy for the Greek mariners\nwho saw them dancing to the goddess and flourishing their weapons on\nthe shores of the Black Sea to infer that a woman\u2019s capital lay a\nshort distance inland. It was natural, also, to attribute to them the\nactual feats of the Hittite armies, and fable that the cities founded\nor subjugated by that empire on the \u00c6gean--Ephesus, Smyrna, Cyme,\nMyrina--were colonies of Amazonian origin.\n\nThe Amazon legends of Africa and South America and the customs of the\nfemale palace troops of Africa and Asia are made clear if one goes\nbehind the cult of the Asiatic goddess to the domain of primitive\nmagic whence it arose. There one finds beliefs that belt the earth and\nare reflected not only in ancient tradition, but in modern practises\nassociated with May day and Midsummer Eve, with sowing and harvest,\nwith the summer and winter solstices. Frazer\u2019s examination of these in\nthe _Golden Bough_ is deeply illuminating.\n\nFollowing the laws of sympathetic magic, men believed that in order\nto make the grain flourish and the grass renew itself in the annual\ndeath and resurrection of nature, it was necessary by some drama of\ntheir own to repeat the phenomena of decay and of new life. There must\nbe a noteworthy human death and a resurrection. Sometimes men killed\na scapegoat, sometimes a divine animal, sometimes a divine man--a\ngod-king, as he was called--such an impersonation of divinity, for\nexample, as the Grand Lama of Tibet. The killing of the god-king was\npreferred as a magic more constraining than any other upon the forces\nof nature.\n\nThere were several means of simulating the phenomena of resurrection.\nThis might be done by having two couples appear in the annual\ndrama--two sets of divine and royal mates. Frazer suggests that the\nbook of _Esther_, names and all, is based on a Babylonian religious\nfestival of this kind--that the gentle Esther is none other than the\nlustful Astarte, that Mordecai is the god Merodach, that Haman is\nHannum the Aramite god, and Vashti a goddess unidentified. The triumph\nof one set of characters and the humiliation and death of the other are\nsupposed to represent the bourgeoning of spring after the long death of\nwinter.\n\nThe common means of symbolizing and constraining the reproduction\nof new life in nature was through a period of promiscuous sexual\nintercourse in which designated persons or whole populations took part.\nIt was deemed necessary to set an example to the woods and fields, and\nin the woods and fields it was set. The saturnalia, the carnivals,\nthe May Days and St. John\u2019s Eves of old time were not, in intent,\nexcursions into debauchery; they were exercises in sympathetic magic.\nSo it befell that in savage vision the withered leaf and the green\nshoot, winter and spring, death and resurrection, came to mean two\nthings--periodic murder and lust.\n\nAfter a while the priest-kings sought escape from the custom that\ngave them only a year of life upon their throne of grace. They chose\nsubstitutes--a son, a slave, a malefactor--who for a few days reigned\nin their stead, and as a sign of kingship were made free of their\nharems, as Absalom went in unto King David\u2019s concubines in the sight\nof Israel. The king, or the mock-king, devoted to death but attended\nby beautiful women, crowned with flowers and worshiped as a god--this\nspectacle, as profoundly ironical as life itself, was staged in Mexico\nwhen Cortez came; and when Huc visited Lhasa in 1846 he found the\nTibetans electing a monarch of misrule to carouse and suffer in place\nof the pope of Buddhism, God\u2019s vicar for Asia.\n\nThe bacchic procession of the doomed king and his women, this dance of\ndeath that went around the world, was the real Amazon march. It was the\npart of the warrior women to kill the man-god whose last days they had\nbeguiled. It was their part, also, to co-operate with a multitude of\nmen in a lustful drama, so that every acorn and grass root and grain of\ncorn might heed the command to bring forth and multiply; back of the\nmyth of annual Amazon matings with neighbor tribes was this reality of\nthe saturnalia. In places the legend has suffered confusing changes, as\nin the Dahoman Customs, where the king kills instead of being killed.\nBut the same meaning underlies the Phrygian worship of the Great\nMother, the lethal privileges of the female palace guards in Hindostan,\nthe self-slaughter of the warrior women when a king died at Abomey, the\ngoing of women into the hills of Brazil with one old man as companion,\nand the recurrent tragedy of the god-man of Mexico, who dismissed the\nfair partners of his revelry, snapped the strings of his harp, flung\naway his chaplet of flowers, and ascended the altar where an Aztec with\na knife awaited him.\n\nThe meaning is death and life in nature, and the Amazon as priestess of\nboth.\n\n\n\n\nChapter XIV. The Folk of Tradition\n\n\nAmong the peoples of prodigy there were races without deformity and yet\nset apart from other men by their peculiar habits or habitat, or, as\nin the case of the giants of geography, by their unusual stature. Men\nwho dwelt in caves or whose diet was too much unlike their fellows\u2019\nwere themes of marvel. Under fables told about them the outlines of\nhistorical peoples may often be discerned.\n\nWhile the tall men merge on the one side into the colossal creatures\nof mythology, on the other they approach mortal size and the human\nquality. Their tradition has been shaped by nature myths growing out of\nvolcanic eruptions, the phenomena of frost and darkness, and storms in\nthe desert. But popular beliefs rest mainly on more tangible things--on\nthe argument that since there are giant individuals there may well be\ngiant races; on the actual existence of tall races; on the presumption\nthat men of old time were taller than those of to-day; on dim memories\nof tall vanished races such as the Cromagnous, and on an ancient notion\nthat the fossil remains of extinct animals were the bones of giants.\nTravelers have done much to build the legend. Almost always they\nunderestimate the mean stature of a people with many small individuals\nand overestimate that of a people with many tall individuals, the usual\nmargin of error running from two to four inches.\n\nAbove all, there has been the witness of geological strata uncovered to\neyes that misread their record. On the basis of a five-pound tooth and\nan eleven-foot thigh bone, found in New England in 1712 and supposed to\nhave been a mastodon\u2019s, Increase Mather reported to the Royal Society\nof London that men of prodigious stature had inhabited the New World.\nOther fossil bones found in Switzerland in 1577 became the basis of a\nlegend, which is commemorated in the colossal statues of Basle and in\nthe figures supporting the arms of Lucerne, that a race of giants from\nsixteen to nineteen feet high lived in the Alps.\n\nCtesias reported that the Seres, whom he located in upper India,\nreached a stature of fourteen feet and an age of two hundred years.\nOnesicritus declared that in those parts of India where the sun cast no\nshadow the men were eight feet high. But ancient writers were neither\nso specific nor so insistent upon the existence of a colossal race as\nlater writers have been. Near the Vale Perilous, says Maundeville, are\ntwo islands occupied by giants. The tenants of the first of these are\nof comparatively modest stature, from twenty-eight to thirty feet.\nThose of the farther isle are from forty-five to fifty feet.\n\n\u201cI saw none of these,\u201d admits Sir John, \u201cfor I had no Lust to go to\nthose Parts. But men have seen many times those Giants take Men in the\nSea out of their Ships, and bring them to Land, two in one Hand and two\nin another, eating them going, all raw and all alive.\u201d\n\nAmerigo Vespucci found a prodigious people in the island of Cura\u00e7oa\noff the coast of Venezuela, \u201cevery woman appearing as a Penthesilea,\nand every man an Ant\u00e6us.\u201d Pigafetta, writing of Magellan\u2019s cruise,\nis responsible for the belief, long held in Europe, that the tall\nPatagonians were true Titans. One of them he pictures as advancing to\ngreet the white men, dancing and singing and putting dust on his head,\nas if in token of peace. The savage towered above the Spaniards, who\ncame only to his waist. Dismissed with gifts, he returned at length\nwith other men of a like stature, and two of these the mariners decoyed\non shipboard. Leg irons were placed on them on the pretext that they\nwere ornaments, but when the Spanish purpose was disclosed they broke\nin pieces as easily as if they were the baubles they were represented\nto be.\n\nHerrera, Van Noort, Le Maire and other travelers confirmed the account\nof the size of the antipodal Indians. Lopez Vaz described them as \u201cvery\nmightie men of bodie of ten or eleven foot high, and good bow-men, but\nno man-eaters.\u201d It remained for Drake to correct report when he made\nhis own circumnavigation of the globe. This was one of the \u201cnotorious\nlies\u201d which the Spaniards disseminated; the Patagonians were \u201cbut of\nthe height of Englishmen\u201d; they are, however, somewhat above it. Five\nfeet eleven inches is the average among them and individuals reach the\nheight of six feet seven.\n\nAt the other extremity of South America the natives of the northern\nAndes have a legend of a monstrous race that arrived in huge boats\nat Cape Santa Elena about the beginning of the Christian era. Their\nknees stood as high as the heads of other men and their eyes were like\nsmall plates. They abused the Indians, their habits were abominable,\nand fire from heaven destroyed them. This is perhaps a reminiscence of\nan extinct civilization, the grotesque art of which has been brought\nto light by recent excavations. There is an Oregon tradition of an\nunderground village of gigantic Indians on Coos Bay. They bashed each\nother over the head with heavy bone knives without being hurt. When the\nsmaller Indians attacked them they fled down the river and out to sea\non two rafts and never came back.\n\nBuffon, who would not credit the pygmies, believed there had been\ngiants of from ten to perhaps fifteen feet in height. The Bible\nnarrative giving Goliath, the Philistine bravo, the stature of six\ncubits and a span, or three inches above seven feet, is conservatively\nphrased. Buffon to the contrary notwithstanding, it is generally\nthought that no man ever lived who reached the stature of ten feet, and\nno race that reached the mean stature of seven. A very few individuals\nhave exceeded the height of eight feet and there is record of one or\ntwo who have passed nine feet. According to the principles governing\nthe distribution of the overlarge individuals of a race, as worked out\nby Quetelet, the appearance of a twenty-foot giant would imply the\nexistence of a race with a mean stature of from twelve to fourteen feet.\n\nIf there was once a race a foot or so above the stature of modern man,\nit may be that the tall individuals who appear in each generation are\nnot the product of a favorable environment and fortunate combination of\nelemental forces, but represent remote ancestors of unusual size. Zell\nin his _Polyphem ein Gorilla_ argues that if races of average height\nare the normal, and if there are dwarf races, then there must have been\ngiant ones to strike the balance. At any rate, tales of such races are\nworld-wide and a tang as of reality is in some of them. The Celt, for\nexample, said that giants had a strong body odor. \u201cGiants,\u201d says Grimm\nin his summary of their tradition, \u201cconsider themselves the old masters\nof the land, live up in the castle, and look down upon the peasant;\u201d\nthe picture might be of something fabled, or of something vanished.\n\n\n_The Macrobians_\n\nAs report gave certain races a great stature, so it gave others a great\nage. These were known as the Macrobians. Herodotus mentions such a\npeople in Ethiopia; \u201cthe venerable and harmless men of Ethiopia,\u201d Walt\nWhitman calls them. Such also were the Hyperboreans, on the other side\nof the north wind. The tall Seres lived to be two hundred years old. In\ntropical India another tall race lived to the age of one hundred and\nthirty years, and died just as if they were in the middle period of\nlife. Some writers called the elderly Indians Gymnet\u00e6, or Naked Folk.\nAnother Indian people, the Cyrni, were reported to attain four hundred\nyears. Holding that the Indians were exceedingly just, and that the\njust are long lived, the ancients credited the general statement of\nCtesias that the nations of the Indus live to one hundred twenty, one\nhundred thirty, and one hundred fifty years, and the very old to two\nhundred years. Pliny adds that they never expectorate and are subject\nto no pains in the head, teeth, or eyes. There were Macrobians in\nBrazil. A German woodcut of 1505 pictures them at a cannibal feast, and\nthe accompanying legend says, \u201cThey become a hundred and fifty years\nold, and have no government.\u201d\n\nThere was a reason, named by Isogonus, for the longevity of the\ninhabitants of Mount Athos in the Balkans. They used the flesh of\nvipers for food, and hence were \u201cfree from all noxious animals both in\ntheir hair and their garments.\u201d\n\n\n_Albinos_\n\nThe Albania of the ancients was a country of Asia in the eastern part\nof the Caucasus. Somehow the early writers confused its inhabitants,\nthe Alani, with Albinos. Beeton says that there is in Albania \u201ca\ncertain race of men whose eyes are of a sea-green color, who have white\nhair from childhood, and who see better by night than by day.\u201d In the\nkingdom that men call Mancy in \u201cInd the More,\u201d says Maundeville, \u201cthey\nbe full fair Folk, but they be all pale. And the Men have thin Beards\nand few Hairs, but they be long. In that Land be many fairer Women than\nin any other Country beyond the Sea, and therefore Men call that Land\nAlbany.\u201d Also, the hens are white.\n\n\n_Sun-hating Folk_\n\nThere were sun-haters as well as sun-worshipers in the sun-smitten\nlands of the older day. Carpini tells of the troglodytes of the\nCaucasus who \u201clived in terror of the mysterious and fatal sound which\naccompanied the rising of the sun.\u201d Herodotus and Pliny describe the\nMoroccan peoples called the Atlantes. When they look upon the rising\nand the setting sun they \u201cutter direful imprecations against it as\nbeing fatal to themselves and their lands.\u201d If one believes what is\nsaid of these tribes beside the western sea, says Pliny, they have lost\nall characteristics of humanity. They do not distinguish one another by\nnames, \u201cnor are they visited with dreams, like the rest of mortals.\u201d\n\n\n_A Poisonous Nation_\n\nThe Psylli were a nation dwelling near the Great Syrtis on the North\nAfrican coast. Pliny, who sponsors them and says they were exterminated\nby the Nasamonians, tells a story which reveals the two great\nobsessions of the ancients--a curious credulity as to poisons, and an\nincredulous curiosity as to the continence of women. In the bodies of\nthe Psylli, there was by nature a certain kind of poison that was fatal\nto serpents and the odor of which rendered them instantly torpid. It\nwas the custom to expose newly born infants to the fiercest serpents\n\u201cand in this manner to make proof of the fidelity of their wives, the\nserpents not being repelled by such children as were the offspring of\nadultery.\u201d\n\n\n_The Troglodytes_\n\nWhat the moderns call cave-men the ancients called troglodytes. In\nthe phrase of \u00c6schylus they knew not how to build a house against the\nsun, but \u201clived like silly ants, beneath the ground, in hollow caves\nunsunned.\u201d Because they shared the habitations of bats and snakes,\ntheir voices were bat-like in their shrillness, and with hissing\ntones; and they ate reptiles and crickets. They were fleet-footed\nlike the creatures of the rocks, the troglodyte Ethiopians being, says\nHerodotus, the swiftest of men. The inhabitants of the country of the\nRobbers (Lestai) in Farther Asia, says Ptolemy, were savages, living\nin caves, and \u201chaving skins like the hide of the hippopotamus which\ndarts cannot pierce.\u201d Artemidorus speaks of naked night-traveling\ntroglodytes of Arabia who put away their dead amid laughter. There are\ncave-dwellers to this day in southern Cambodia, and a Chinese account\nof the thirteenth century tells of the skin breastplates which they\nwore.\n\nThe ancients knew of various races of troglodytes, notably those along\nboth shores of the Red Sea. Others were in Syria, and upon the Nile,\nand in Fezzan, and in the Caucasus. The voiceless troglodytes of Pliny\nare supposed to be the Rock Tibboos on whose whistling speech their\nneighbors still comment. The best account of the elder cave-dwellers\nhappens to be authentic history. When Xenophon was retreating with the\nTen Thousand to the Black Sea he found upon the Armenian frontier a\npeople who lived in underground burrows with vertical entrances like\nwells, up and down which they passed on ladders. Their beasts used a\nsloping path and lived with them underground, cattle, goats, and sheep\nthriving there on green fodder gathered above. These subterranean\nhabitations were also granaries and wine-cellars.\n\nWith all their lively interest in the ways of troglodytes, the ancients\nknew less than the moderns about them, and were perhaps farther in\nspirit from the cave-man. In the caverns of western Europe men of\nto-day have studied his household economy, his art, and the animals he\ntamed or hunted. Travelers in various lands have come upon underground\nchambers, many of them still occupied. In the Berber rock-towns these\nsubterranean dwellings number thousands, and the ravines which furrow\nthe plateaus serve as their streets. On the Cappadocian plain deserted\nsubterranean villages, called _kataphugia_, or places of refuge,\nunderlie occupied villages of the surface, and thither the cattle\ndescend in severe weather, as in Xenophon\u2019s time twenty-three centuries\nago. The peoples of the surface are supposed to be descendants of true\ntroglodytes.\n\n\n_The Anthropophagi_\n\nIt never occurred to the early writers to classify men according to the\ncolor of their skins, or the breadth of their skulls, or fundamental\ndifferences in their languages; and the Greeks and Romans were\nignorant of the Noachian genealogy and heedless of the apportionment\nof the earth among the sons of Shem, Ham and Japheth. But they had a\nrough-and-ready method of cataloguing savage races according to what\nthey ate, in the thought that whatsoever a man ate, that in some degree\nhe became. After naming the races of fable from the size of their feet\nor ears or other bodily peculiarity, they grouped and named, according\nto their supposed diet, various races of reality that dwelt at a\ndistance.\n\nClassic writers took passing note of the Anthropophagi, or tribes that\nate human flesh. There were such peoples in Africa and in Asia. The\nbest known account is the description in Herodotus of the Issedones.\nThese Scythians of Central Asia ate the flesh of their deceased\nrelatives prepared with other meat, and made gold-rimmed drinking cups\nof their skulls--a rite of honor to the dead. A tribe in northern Tibet\nis supposed to be descended from them.\n\n\n_The Ichthyophagi_\n\nThe races that subsisted on fish, the Ichthyophagi, were described\nby the ancients with unusual detail. One of the first accounts is\nby Herodotus, who tells of the folk that lived on platforms above\nLake Prasias. They drew their fish through trap-doors from the water\nbeneath, and the custom was that for every woman a man took to wife he\ndrove three piles into the lake.\n\nAll along the Indian Ocean and the Red Sea there were tribes of\nIchthyophagi. Their very cattle ate dried fish and the beef had a fishy\nflavor; Ibn Batuta remarked this in Yemen, and it is still true of the\nCoromandel Coast. Arrian\u2019s account of the voyage of Nearchus describes\nthe Ichthyophagi as occupying for four hundred miles the barren shores\nof the Mekran; they had few boats and were indifferent fishermen, but\nby intercepting the ebb tide with palm-bark nets they obtained their\nfood.\n\nArrian repeats a legend of the origin of these tribes in whose lines\none hears faintly the wild music of the Sirens. The island of Nosala,\noff the Mekran coast, was the residence of a Nereid \u201cwhose practice\nwas to seduce such mariners as landed there to her embraces, and then,\nafter transforming them into fish, to throw them into the sea.\u201d But the\nsun ordered the nymph to quit the island and himself changed the fish\nback into men. These were the first Ichthyophagi.\n\nFarther west, in Ariana, were fish-eating tribes who made their\ndwellings, Strabo says, of shells and of the bones of large whales, the\nribs furnishing the beams and supports, and the jawbones the doorways.\nSections of the backbones of whales were used as mortars wherein\nsun-dried fish were pounded.\n\nDiodorus Siculus has a spirited account of the Ichthyophagi along the\nRed Sea. This people, he says, do not use nets, but so wall the caverns\nand gullies of their rocky shore that the receding tide leaves the fish\nimprisoned there. Whereupon, with a shout, the tribe assembles on the\nbeach. Women and children gather the little fish next the shore; with\nsharp goats\u2019 horns the men dispatch the larger ones, throwing all upon\nthe land. The booty is put into stone pots tilted toward the south and\nthe fish are fried by the sun until the flesh drops off. The bones are\ncast into a pile and the meat boiled with fruit seeds. Then everybody\nfalls to and gorges. The heap of bones is a dietary reserve which the\ntribe pulverizes and devours when storms shut off the shore.\n\nThe life of these Ichthyophagi is thrown into a sort of rhythm by the\nneed, every fifth day, of going inland on an extended journey for fresh\nwater. For four days they fish continually and make merry in great\nthrongs, \u201ccongratulating one another with harsh and discordant songs;\nthen they fall promiscuously, as every man\u2019s lot chances, to company\nwith their women for procreation sake.\u201d On the fifth day the tribe goes\nin a body to a district lying under the foot of the mountains where\nthere are springs of sweet water. Hither, also, the shepherds drive the\nflocks. Nor do the shore folk differ much from the herds, for \u201cthey go\nmaking a horrid noise and without articulate voice.\u201d Arrived at the\nsprings, they throw themselves on their faces and \u201cdrink as beasts\nuntil their stomachs are distended like a drum.\u201d Slowly they wend\ntheir way back to salt water, and for a day recline without tasting\nfood. The following day they begin anew their fishing and feeding. Such\nis the round of their lives.\n\nDiodorus remarks, apparently to commend, that these fish-eaters \u201cfar\nexceed all other men in freedom from boisterous passions.\u201d They give no\nheed to a stranger, nor even look at one when he addresses them: \u201cNay,\nif they be assaulted with drawn swords they will not stir; and though\nthey are hurt and wounded, yet they are not in the least provoked. Even\nthough their wives and children be killed before their eyes, they show\nno sign of anger.\u201d\n\nThese accounts are not fables. But there is fabulous admixture, most\nof it arising from the primitive belief that a fish diet makes men as\ncool-blooded as the creatures upon which they live.\n\n\n_Other Dietary Nations_\n\nAkin to these nations were the Chelonophagi, or turtle-eaters,\nconcerning whom Strabo recites facts entirely in keeping. This tribe\nlives under the cover of turtle shells, which also it uses as boats.\nSome of its members, however, collect seaweed in heaps, hollow the\nheaps, and dwell under them. Their dead are cast into the sea, and\ncarried away by the tide to become food in turn for the fish and\nturtles.\n\nThe Acridophagi were grasshopper-eaters--insectivorous, ornithologists\nwould call them. The locust was, and is, a favorite diet of desert\npeoples, a staple food of the Arab, as well as of the pygmy folk and\nother singular breeds. Niebuhr likens its taste to that of \u201ca small\nsardine of the Baltic, which is dried in some towns of Holstein.\u201d What\nDampier has to say of customs he found in two Pacific islands in 1687\nmay stand without essential change for the ways of earlier acridophagi:\n\u201cThey had another dish made of a sort of locusts, whose bodies are\nabout one and one-half inches long, and as thick as the top of one\u2019s\nlittle finger; with large thin wings, and long and small legs. These\ncame in great swarms to devour their potato leaves and other herbs; and\nthe natives would go out with small nets and take a quart at one sweep.\nWhen they had enough they would parch them in an earthen pan; and then\ntheir wings and legs would fall off, and their heads and backs would\nturn red like boiled shrimp. Their bodies, being full, would eat very\nmoist, their heads would crackle in one\u2019s teeth. I did once eat of this\ndish, and like it well enough.\u201d\n\nCertain other races living in Africa the ancients knew chiefly as\nspecialists in diet. Pomponius places the Ophiophagi, or snake-eaters,\non the Red Sea. Homer gives the Lotophagi, or lotus-eaters, a habitat\non the Mediterranean coast. Agatharcides names the Rhizophagi or\nroot-eaters who dwell on the banks of the Atbara and subsist on reed\nroots; and the Elephantophagi, farther inland, who hunt and eat the\nelephant. Also in the interior Diodorus places the ostrich-eating\nStruthophagi, and there Pliny places the Agriophagi \u201cwho live\nprincipally on the flesh of panthers and lions,\u201d and the Pamphagi \u201cwho\nwill eat anything.\u201d\n\n\n_Geographical Glimpses_\n\nThe citations below, from classical, medi\u00e6val and modern writers, are\nreproduced because of their flavor and for whatever they are worth:\n\nThe Gamphasantes, who go naked, are unacquainted with war and hold no\nintercourse with strangers.\n\nIn the African deserts \u201cmen are frequently seen to all appearance and\nthen vanish in an instant,\u201d says Pliny--perhaps the mirage.\n\n\u201cOn the one side of the Senegal,\u201d says John Lok, \u201cthe inhabitants are\nof high stature and black, and on the other side of browne or tawnie\ncolour.\u201d The latter are the \u201ctawny Moors\u201d of Prince Henry\u2019s ship\ncaptains.\n\nThe Annamese of pure stock have a peculiar formation of the great toe\nwhereby they are able to pick up small objects with their prehensile\nfeet, says Keane. Their ancient Chinese name was Giao-chi, which\nsignifies \u201cwith the big toe.\u201d\n\n\u201cMany of Canton and Quansi Provinces,\u201d says a Jesuit missionary in\nPurchas, \u201con their little toes have two nailes, as they have generally\nin Cochin-China.\u201d\n\nOn the west coast of the Malay Peninsula, says the seventh-century\n_History of the T\u2019ang Dynasty_, is a naked swarthy race with red\nfrizzled hair, bestial teeth, and hawk claws who hold their markets at\nnight with veiled faces.\n\nThe Korwars of India, according to a local legend, \u201cderive from\nscarecrows animated by a prowling demon.\u201d\n\n * * * * *\n\nBecause they are recognizable peoples with representatives who may\nstill be studied, the folk of tradition are useful exhibits in the\nmuseum of history.\n\n\n\n\nChapter XV. The Horizon Lands\n\n\nNot until yesterday did men encompass the earth. But their minds were\nalways more adventurous than their feet, and from the beginning,\nalmost, the sense of remote horizons was in them. Fantastic though\nits form might be, there was a divine breadth in their speculation as\nto the earth and its peoples. The peasant of antiquity, who knew only\nhis township in Europe or his mountain canton in high Asia, had yet a\nvision of continents and distant seas. His imagination explored the\nwaste places, ascended the high places, descended into the earth. Its\nproduct was the geography of legend, which gave ground but slowly to\nthe geography of reality.\n\n\n_Beyond the North Wind_\n\nOne of the earliest countries to find a place in the geography of\nlegend was that of the Hyperboreans. It lay on the other side of the\nnorth wind. These people lived so far toward the pole that they were\nbeyond the icy blasts, and beyond all contacts of war or commerce with\nthe peoples of the south. Only the priests and the poets knew of them.\n\nThe priests knew of them because of the yearly offerings sent in to the\ntemples of Tempe, Delphi, and Delos. These were gifts of amber, and\nvirgins bore them from nation to nation across the whole of Europe.\nFor many years the holy maidens had honor and hospitality from all the\ncountries along their path. When violence was done them the journeys\nceased. Not, however, the offerings. The Hyperboreans deposited these\nupon the boundary of the people who adjoined them. The latter carried\nthem to their neighbors; and so by successive stages the tribute came\nto the shrines of Apollo, whom the distant nation held in especial\nhonor. At last the custom fell into disuse.\n\nNo return visits were made from the south, for the way was hard. Yet\nthe poets had, as always, their own means of information. Homer has\nnothing to say of the Hyperboreans, but Hesiod speaks of them, and\nPindar, and \u00c6schylus, and a host of later and lesser voices. From\nthese authorities it appeared that the Riph\u00e6an Rocks, an imaginary\nprolongation of the Ural group westward across Europe, shut the\nHyperboreans off from the south. Out of the rocks the north wind came\nsweeping down over the lower latitudes, but on the farther side of the\nrange was summer. It was a favored land, and this a favored people.\n\u201cThe muse is no stranger to their manners,\u201d says Pindar. \u201cThe dances of\ngirls and the sweet melody of the lyre and pipe resound on every side,\nand twining their hair with the glittering bay, they dance joyously.\nThere is no doom of sickness or disease for this sacred race; but they\nlive apart from toil and battles, undisturbed by exacting Nemesis.\u201d\nIsidore adds that when the cithara players smite their instruments the\nswans fly up and sing very harmoniously.\n\nRightly discerning that this was no region of the earth, Herodotus\nassigns its inhabitants to the realms of fable. But Hecat\u00e6us, Damastes,\nDiodorus, Pliny and others credit the legend, though sometimes with a\nnote of doubt, as when Pliny begins, \u201cBeyond the region of the northern\nwinds, there dwells, if we choose to believe it, a happy race known as\nthe Hyperboreans.\u201d From their country Hercules brought the olive. They\nwere a pious folk, loving justice, dwelling in woods and fields, living\non the fruits of the earth and abstaining from taking even animal life.\nNo rude winds agitated this delicious land. Here were \u201cthe hinges upon\nwhich the world revolves, and the extreme limits of the revolutions of\nthe stars.\u201d There was but one rising of the sun for the year, and that\nat the summer solstice, and but one setting, and that at the winter\nsolstice; and the day and night each lasted six months. In the morning\nof the long day the people sowed, at midday they reaped, at sunset they\ngathered the fruits of their trees; and the long night they spent in\ncaverns; and so their lives were passed.\n\nThey lived to be very old in the country beyond the north wind,\nsometimes as much as one thousand years. But a fateful note runs\nthrough all accounts of them. The happy Hyperboreans were wont to tire\nat last of their felicity. They ended a career of feasting and an old\nage sated with every luxury by leaping from a rock into the sea. At\nthe close of each life lay the rock and the sea.\n\nJust where was this worshipful nation? The answers are vague and\nconflicting. On the left bank of the Danube, it was first thought; on\nthe very verge of Asia, others said. Later its home was fixed \u201cmidway\nbetween the two suns, at the spot where it sets to the antipodes and\nrises toward us.\u201d There were Greek writers who confused the Riph\u00e6an\nRocks with the Alps and Pyrenees, and confounded the Hyperboreans\nwith the Etruscans and the Gauls. Hecat\u00e6us gives them an island home\nas large as Sicily, lying under the arctic pole, over against Gaul.\nHere Apollo has a stately grove and a renowned temple in a city where\nall the residents are harpers. This is the Britain of the bards and\ndruids, of whose people it was said in later time that they take their\npleasures sadly.\n\n\n_At the Cardinal Points_\n\nWhile the ancients peopled the rim of the earth with deformed races\nand monstrous animals, their pictures of the nations that dwelt at\nthe cardinal points show mainly the ideal treatment. In the far east,\nin the far west, in the far south, there were men like unto the\nHyperboreans of the far north. Of the Indians, the Ethiopians, and\nthe Iberians of early story the same report was had. They were \u201cjust\u201d\nand \u201cblameless\u201d--these words recur again and again--and they were\nlong-lived and fortunate. Thus real races took on some quality of myth.\nThe classic sense of equilibrium demanded this equal reverence to the\nfour quarters of heaven, just as it was fancied that, to balance the\nPillars of Hercules in the west, Bacchus had set up two columns \u201cby the\nfarthest shore of the Ocean stream, on the remotest mountains of India,\nwhere the Ganges pours down its white waters to the Nys\u00e6an shore.\u201d\n\nThis cast of thought did not die with the ancients. The epithets,\n\u201cjust\u201d and \u201cblameless,\u201d reappear in the writings of eighteenth-century\nphilosophers when they speak of the Chinese. A little later the\nbeautiful and artless natives of the South Seas laid upon the thought\nof more sophisticated lands a spell that endures. Now, as always, the\nfour points of the compass are points of fable, and the primitive\nworship that was paid them lurks in the magic with which the number\nfour is invested. The rising and setting of the sun fixed two of these\npoints and the course of the Nile northward through Egypt may have\nfixed the other two.\n\n\u201cAll evil comes from the northeast,\u201d say the Japanese. Thoreau usually\nwalked southwest. \u201cEastward,\u201d he said, \u201cI go only by force; but\nwestward I go free.\u201d Tartar tent doors, as Marco Polo notes, face\nsouth. The mythical Irish voyages were toward the west. In the thought\nof many races witchcraft is of the north. In Norse mythology hell-way\nis always downward and northward. When cutting black hellebore the\nhedge doctors of Greece faced eastward and cursed. \u201cAltars should\nregard the east,\u201d said Vitruvius. Thither the Mohammedan turns in\nprayer. The manifestations of God are in the west, says the Talmud. The\nBabylonian temples lay due east and west so that the rising sun would\nillumine their altars at the equinoxes. Some of the Egyptian temples\nwere so planned that this would happen only on Midsummer Day. The\nolder Christian churches lie east and west, although some of them are\noriented to permit the rising sun to gild their altars on the day of\nthe saint whose name they bear. The west was the seat of darkness and\nhence the rose-window was placed high in the cathedral\u2019s western wall\nto illumine the benighted, with the bell-towers flanking it to summon\nthem to Christ. The eastern side with its altar and the southern with\nwalls and windows consecrated to saints and martyrs were both sacred.\nBut the northern, or Black Side, was Satan\u2019s, and effigies of unclean\nbeasts and sculptured allegories of lascivious deeds proclaimed it.\n\nThe cities of ancient Yucatan had gates toward each of the cardinal\npoints. With the Aztecs all the world directions were significant--the\nnorth standing for emptiness, the east for sterility, the west for\nfertility, the south for good fortune. In the symbolism of the Navahos,\nwhite, the dawn color, stands for the east; blue, the sky color, for\nthe south; yellow, the sunset color, for the west; and black, the\ncurtain of night, for the north. The Pueblo Indians assigned the north\nto the air, the west to water, the south to fire, and the east to earth\nand the seeds of life. In old Chinese writings the men of the north\nare called brave, the men of the south wise, the men of the east kind\nand friendly, the men of the west upright and honest. Over the four\ncardinal points the old Brahman gods presided.\n\nThus by a primitive law of the mind illusion lurks in every corner of\nthe heaven. It lies deepest in the track of the sun. From east to west\ngo the great wanderers--Hercules, Ulysses, and the rest--and solar\nmyths thicken along their path through legendary lands. The east and\nwest dominate the thoughts of men with their eternal spectacles of\nsunrise and sunset. Whatever commerce, geography, or political history\nmay teach them, the east is still the region of the morning sunlight\nand the west of the evening shadow. Though their steps turn westward,\nmen\u2019s thoughts drift eastward. Though the east be hunger-bitten and\npoverty-stricken and its subjugated millions seem to count but little,\nit is still the gorgeous east, \u201cthe dancing-place of the dawn.\u201d\n\nBeyond the curtains of the west lie the realms of repose: \u201cIf sunrise,\u201d\nsays Max M\u00fcller, \u201cinspired the first prayers, called forth the first\nsacrificial flames, sunset was the other time when again the whole\nframe of man would tremble. The shadows of night approach, the\nirresistible power of sleep grasps man in the midst of his pleasures,\nhis friends depart, and in his loneliness his thoughts turn again to\nhigher powers. When the day departs the poet bewails the untimely death\nof his bright friend; nay, he sees in its short career the likeness of\nhis own life. Perhaps, when he has fallen asleep, his sun may never\nrise again, and thus the place to which the setting sun withdraws in\nthe far west rises before his mind as the abode where he himself would\ngo after death.\u201d\n\nThough the westward journeys of the sun are but a seeming, their trail\nlies broad across the spiritual life of mankind.\n\n\n_On the Mountains_\n\nHalf of history has been written in the passes of the mountains. What\nlies above these deep saddles of the ranges belongs in the main to\nlegend. Not much, even now, is known of the mountain tops, for men do\nnot dwell there. Antiquity seldom went up to see. The high places of\nold sacrifice were hilltops, not mountain peaks.\n\nMen have been content to travel the valleys and, where necessity\nimpelled, to cross the passes. The steeps overhead seemed fit abode for\nthe elder gods, for giants and dwarfs and griffins, for dragons whose\nbreath was the avalanche, for ghosts whose voice was the echo, for the\ncarnal revels of Satan and his witches; sometimes, also--since legend\nis its own law--for cities of enchantment, invisible and beautiful.\n\nMost famous mountain of classic story was the Atlas; the most fabulous\nlocality, even in Africa, is the superlative of Pliny. Its summit\nreached beyond the clouds and well nigh approached the very orb of the\nmoon. Rugged and precipitous on the side of the ocean to which it gave\na name, it fell by a gentler slope on the side toward Africa, and dense\ngroves covered its flanks where streams flashed and fruits abounded.\nBut in the daytime men were never seen there. All was silent like the\ndreadful stillness of the desert. A religious horror stole over those\nwho drew near. At night, fires innumerable gleamed upon its sides. \u201cIt\nis then,\u201d says Pliny, \u201cthe scene of the gambols of the \u00c6gipans and the\nSatyr crew, while it re-echoes with the notes of the flute and the\npipe, and the clash of drums and cymbals.\u201d\n\nThe legend of a mountain of nightly tumult and illumination recurs\nin Arab and Christian chronicle. Solinus repeats it. The mountain is\nFelfel in the Sahara, says an Arab author of the twelfth century,\nand genii hold court in towns on its slopes whence the people have\nfled. Ibn Khordadbeh places the realm of nocturnal revel in the\nSouthern Ocean. Argensola, writing of the Moluccas in the sixteenth\ncentury, reports that for ages \u201ccries, whistles, and roarings\u201d had\nbeen heard from a mountain in Banda. The spot is inhabited by devils,\nhe concludes. Sindbad tells of an island, called Kasil, where nightly\nresounds the drumbeat of rebellious djinns. So was Prospero\u2019s isle full\nof noises, but these were \u201csound, and sweet airs that give delight and\nhurt not.\u201d\n\n[Illustration: _The Steeps Overhead Seemed Fit Abode for Giants and\nDwarfs and Griffins--for Cities of Enchantment_]\n\nIt may be that the Atlas story grew out of the habits of the Kabyles\nwho tenant the mountain\u2019s recesses. During the heat of the day they\nwould retire to their dwellings, coming out at night to dance about the\nvillage fires to the music of drums. Similar legends among the Indians\nof South America of strange lights seen upon the mountains appear to\nhave a basis of fact. Sir Martin Conway tells of a village where the\nbells were rung and the people flocked to church in dreadful fear\nbecause, after sunset, the peak of Illampu glowed red like fire and\nthe end of the world seemed at hand. In Venezuela Im Thurn beheld a\nmountain strangely luminous at night. Humboldt saw a similar spectacle\nin Venezuela and guessed it might be the burning of hydrogen gases. In\nColombia, Zahm saw brilliant lights along the crest of the Cordilleras,\nand judged it was an electric phenomenon, the summits acting as a vast\ncondenser from which electricity escaped by a silent glow or brush\ndischarge--St. Elmo\u2019s fire. Here, perhaps, is the key to the Old World\nstory.\n\nThe Mountains of the Moon, which lift their snowy peaks on the line of\nthe equator in East Africa not far from the springs of the Nile, bear\na myth-engendering name. It was given them by Ptolemy, who perhaps\ntranslated it from native words of the same meaning. Lying within the\nsphere of Arabic medi\u00e6val geography, Eastern fable enveloped them.\nOne story was that whoever looked upon them was drawn to them as by a\nmagnetic influence and only death would release him. According to an\nArab compiler, \u201ca certain king sent an expedition to discover the Nile\nsources, and they reached the copper mountains, and when the sun rose,\nthe rays reflected were so strong that they were burnt.\u201d\n\nTo the early Greeks the Caucasus was the end of the world; beyond\nit was naught but the Ocean Stream. \u00c6schylus describes it in his\n_Prometheus Bound_ as the loftiest of mountains and speaks of its\n\u201cstar-neighboring summits.\u201d Here he pictures the fire-stealing Titan as\nchained to a rock with a vulture at his vitals. Herodotus repeats that\nthese peaks are higher than any other. No Roman general ever passed\nthem. And they stood for things dreaded and unknown--the sanguinary\nAmazons, fugitive and barbaric tribes of Israel, and the sinister\nnations of Gog and Magog. These are perhaps the mountains of Aaf of\nMalay tradition, which run their ramparts of green chrysolite clear\nabout the earth and the encompassing sea.\n\nThe high places of American Indian tradition lay in the west. The\nplains savages and some of the forest tribes looked upon the Rocky\nMountains as the boundary of the known world. These peaks held up the\nsky; the spirits of the storm haunted them, and stone giants, and\nhuge-bellied anthropophagi. Into this west ran the underground trail\nto the land of the dead. In South Dakota was the Hill of Little Devils,\nmalignant pygmies with unduly large heads, of whose arrows the prairie\ntribes stood in awe.\n\nThere were seven sacred mountains in the land of the Navahos--four at\nthe cardinal points, and three at the center; and legend gave each its\nown color, jewels, birds, and plants. One mountain was fastened to the\nearth with a lightning flash, another with a stone knife, another with\na sunbeam, a fourth with a rainbow. Almost in the Greek spirit the\nIndians of Guiana chanted the glories of \u201cRoraima of the red rocks,\nwrapped in clouds, ever-fertile source of streams.\u201d White jaguars and\nwhite eagles were upon it, a magic circle surrounded it, and demons\nguarded its sanctuary.\n\nWhenever the Kirghiz pass by Mustaghata, loftiest of the Pamirs, they\nfall upon their knees in prayer, for threescore and ten saints live\nthere. Sven Hedin, who made four attempts to ascend it, repeats its\nlegends. One story tells of a holy man who, climbing it, found on its\nslopes a garden with plum trees where old men in white garments were\nwalking. He plucked and ate the fruit. One of the graybeards told him\nit was well he had done so, for had he despised the fruit, as they had\ndone, it would have been his fate to stay, as they must, walking up and\ndown the garden till time was no more. Then a rider on a white horse\ndashed into the garden, and seizing the holy man, galloped with him\ndown the mountain side, leaving him in the valley, dazed and with only\na confused memory of what he had seen. Another story tells of forty\ngiant horsemen who swept down the mountain and routed a Chinese army.\n\nOn the summit of Mustaghata, to which neither Sven Hedin, nor the holy\nman, nor the graybeards could climb, the Kirghiz say is the ancient\ncity of Janaidar, built in a golden age when everyone was happy and men\nwere at peace. Its inhabitants had no intercourse afterward with the\npeoples below, and all the ills and woes of life are stranger to them.\nTheir groves bear fruit the year around, their flowers are unfading,\ntheir women never grow old. Cold, darkness, and death are alike unknown\nto them. The ramparts of Mustaghata are one of the seats of the realm\nof eternal youth.\n\nThough its name is but the Latin word for \u201cbald,\u201d a grim Swiss legend\nhas it that Mount Pilatus is the burial place of the Roman viceroy who\nsurrendered Jesus to the mob. When he took his own life, neither the\nTiber nor the Rhone, into which in succession his body was flung, would\ncontain it. Evil and sordid spirits raised such storms that it was\ncarried farther. An uncanonical book of the thirteenth century recites\nthat it was dropped at last \u201cinto a well surrounded by mountains,\nwhere, according to some accounts, certain diabolic machinations and\nebullitions are still seen.\u201d This spot was identified with a marshy\npool near the summit of Pilatus.\n\nThroughout the Middle Ages it was believed that if anyone threw a stone\nin this little lake, a tempest would follow. Once a year Pilate left\nit and sat on a rock arrayed in scarlet. Whoever beheld him died in a\ntwelvemonth. The fearful burghers of Lucerne made an ordinance that no\none should approach the pool unless one of their number went with him\nto see that he cast no stone. At length, in 1585, Johann Mueller, state\npastor of Lucerne, climbed the mountain with a party of friends, flung\nstones into the water, and derisively challenged the evil spirit to\ncome forth. Nothing happened, and the legend lapsed.\n\n\n_In the Desert_\n\nThe desert holds the green surprise of the oases, the promise of\nmysteries beyond its veil, and, as men have thought, the memory of\nwonderful things that were. Tradition broods over it, legends of\ncaravans that never came back, of armies swallowed up in its silences,\nof vast cities buried in the sand. Where there is so little for the eye\nto see, the most haunting things are those the ear has heard--music\nthat steals from the under edges of the dunes; voices, mocking or\nbeguiling, which call to caravan stragglers; the crash of ghostly drums\nand the clash of arms heard afar.\n\nAny survey of the deserts of history reveals the stuff of wonder. There\neach man\u2019s hand is turned against his brother, and yet in every tent\nall are safe; masked tribesmen roam the waste; stealthy slave columns\ncross it by abandoned routes; hereditary clans of dancing girls supply\nthe streets of women in the environing lands; hermits wither in rocky\ncells and militant fanatics range the plateaus; the bustard and the\nwild camel show along the uncertain skyline, and remnants of forgotten\npeoples rove below it. These are momentous details; legend has done\nmuch with less to work upon. It needs only that thirsty wayfarers\nshall have, as sometimes they do, the sudden vision of lakes of water\nshimmering in the distance, with palms fringing them and temples\nmirrored in them. Realities of an instant only, their passing leaves a\nsense of wonder that expects, and invents.\n\nMuch of the tradition of the waste places has been set down by Marco\nthe Venetian in his account of the passage of the desert of Lop. It\nis asserted as a well-known fact, he recites, that here is the abode\nof evil spirits \u201cwhich amuse travelers to their destruction with most\nextraordinary illusions.\u201d During the daytime, if men fall behind the\ncaravan, or are overtaken by sleep so that the column has passed a hill\nand is out of sight, they hear voices calling their names in tones to\nwhich they are accustomed. Following these, they are lured from the\ndirect road and perish alone. At night men seem to hear the march of\na large cavalcade on one side or the other of the road. Again they\nfollow, in the belief that the camel bells are of their own party; the\ndaybreak finds them pursuing strange paths alone. Day or night, evil\nspirits take the shape of their companions and seek to decoy them from\nthe proper route. Ghostly bodies of armed men seem to rush upon them,\nand in the terror of flight they lose the way.\n\n\u201cMarvelous indeed,\u201d concludes Marco, \u201cand almost passing belief are the\nstories related of these spirits of the desert, which are said at times\nto fill the air with the sounds of all kinds of musical instruments,\nand also of drums and the clash of arms, obliging the travelers to\nclose their line of march and to proceed in more compact order.\u201d\n\nThis is such a recital as one would rather have expected concerning\nthe desert of ancient Egypt. There were the graves of the dead, and\nreport had it that their spirits, doomed to a miserable existence in an\ninhospitable land, developed into predatory demons who meant no good to\nthe traveler.\n\nStories still current in Asia, however, have the flavor of Marco\u2019s\nreport of seven centuries ago. Doughty tells of the fantasy they have\nat Teyma of a neighboring spectral oasis, often beheld by the Bedouins.\nSlaves and horses issue from the enchanted appearance of palms; \u201cbut\nall fadeth soon if a man approach them.\u201d\n\nIn the little desert of Reig Rawan at the foot of the heights of\nKohistan the wind-blown sands sweep through the rocky fissures with\na sound that is like the music of an \u00e6olian harp accompanied by the\ndistant beating of drums. These wild harmonies of the wind in open\nspaces are the source of many strange tales. In Reig Rawan they are\nfabled to be the martial strains of armies which have been swallowed up\nin the sands, but march on to unknown destinies.\n\nThe kingdom of Prester John has been mapped in Asia, in Africa, and in\nthe imagination of men. In the latter domain lies the Gravelly Sea, a\ndesert phenomenon which Maundeville describes: \u201cIt is all Gravel and\nSand, without any Drop of Water, and it ebbeth and floweth in great\nwaves as other Seas do, and it is never still nor at Peace, in any\nManner of Season. And no Man may pass that Sea by Ship, nor by any\nManner of Craft, and therefore may no Man know what Land is beyond that\nSea. And albeit that it have no Water, yet Men find therein and on the\nBanks full good Fishes of other Manner of Nature and Shape, than Men\nfind in any other Sea, and they be of right good Taste and delicious\nfor Man\u2019s Meat.\u201d\n\nWhat lies beyond it? Mezzoramia, it may be, if it is accepted that\nPrester John was an Abyssinian. This is an earthly paradise, situated\nsomewhere in Africa. Only one road leads to it, and the road is hard to\nfind and easy to lose again. No man ever found this secret highway save\nGaudentio di Lucca. He traveled it to its end, and for twenty years\nlived behind the desert\u2019s curtains in a country of every felicity.\n\nFables of the waste tell of cities on which some sudden curse has\nfallen and turned their people into stone. The sand has not covered\nthem with the decent pity of its mantle. They lie open to the air. The\nsunshine falls on their silent market places and only the wind wanders\nin their streets. The stony figures of the men and women that once\nlived there stand where the curse had found them, disquieting things in\ntheir semblance to statuary and their ancient caricature of humanity.\n\nThe map on which Anthony Jenkinson recorded his travels in Tartary\nmakes note of a petrified city in the plains of Central Asia.\nGarcilasso de la Vega, Inca historian, tells a like tale of\npetrification based on a numerous group of stone images. The Museum\nMetallicum of Aldrovandi pictures an assemblage of men, sheep, and\ncamels converted into stone. The Arabs have a story of a petrified camp\nat Hamam Meskouteen in Numidia, where they assert that stony tents\nare pitched and stony sheep dot the plain. Most circumstantial of all\nsuch legends is that of Ras Sem, an extensive petrified village in the\nCyrenaica. It was surmised that this might be the region of the Gorgons\nof classic story, whose frightful glance turned everything into stone.\n\nThis village figures in old travel books, one of them dating as far\nback as 1594, and Sir Kenelm Digby may have had access to these when\nhe printed in the _Mercurius Politicus_ his travel tale of a petrified\ncity in northern Africa. The Tripolitan ambassador in London asserted\nthat a thousand persons had seen the wonders of Ras Sem. It was a large\ntown of circular outline, with streets and shops and a central palace.\n\nThe olive and the palm stood in the courtyards, but the trees had been\nturned into a cinder-colored stone. There were men also in different\npostures. Some were plying their trade and occupations in the bazaars\nor holding fabrics and breadstuffs in their hands, as if to attract\nthe passer-by. There were women suckling their children or kneeling at\nthe kneading trough. In the palace a man was lying on a bed of state,\nand guards armed with pike and spear stood at the door. The tenants of\nthe palace, and the men and women without--they, too, were of the same\nbluish stone. The heads of some were wanting and others of the Silent\nPeople had lost a leg or an arm.\n\nThere were camels, oxen, asses, horses, and sheep in the market place,\nthere were large birds perched on the walls, and in the houses there\nwere dogs, cats, and even mice--and all these, like their masters and\nhosts, were petrified. The pieces of money which had been brought\nthence were \u201cof the bigness of an English shilling, charged with a\nhorse\u2019s head on one side and with some unknown characters on the other.\u201d\n\nThe quotation is from Shaw\u2019s _Travels in Barbary_. The writer tells of\nan inquiry into these stories by order of the French court made some\ntime before by M. Le Maire, consul at Tripoli. The Turkish janizaries\nwho gathered the tribute would not bring him the body of an adult\nperson from Ras Sem, alleging it would be cumbersome to carry. But for\na thousand dollars they did bring the body of a little child. They\ndeclared they had run the risk of being strangled by their companions\nfor having delivered to an infidel the mortal remains of one of their\nunfortunate Mohammedan brethren, as they deemed these people to be.\nWhat they brought was the statue of a small Cupid taken from the ruins\nof Leptus.\n\nThe consul sent other persons, but none could find a trace of walls,\nbuildings, animals, or utensils where Ras Sem was said to be. They\ndid find one thing he could not explain. This was what seemed to be\ntiny loaves of petrified bread; but Shaw declares these were fossil\nechinites of the discoid kind. Little pools of \u201cheavy and ponderous\nwater\u201d were also come upon, which the wind had uncovered. This,\ncontinues Shaw, \u201cmay be the petrifying fluid which has contributed to\nthe conversion of the palm trees into stone.\u201d He thinks the country of\nthe Gorgons was farther west.\n\nFrom any one of several causes the fable of stony cities might arise.\nWhile sand does not petrify, it does preserve; and sometimes, with\nthe winds for its artisans, it has wrought its own architecture and\nsculpture in the living rock, repeating in the infinite chances of its\nlabors the outlines of minarets and templed columns, and other contours\nin which fantasy may find the forms of bygone worshipers. There seem\nto have been cases where peoples of a higher culture have built their\ncities in the desert, and have passed; and a ruder race, coming later\nupon the scene, mistook their statuary for the breathing handiwork of\nnature stricken into stillness and stone.\n\nThe typical desert legends are of splendid cities that the sands have\ncovered. There is truth under them, as there are ruins under the sand;\nhow much truth and how many ruins is a secret the desert yields but\ngrudgingly. In a series of striking passages the Jewish Scriptures have\nsketched these dead capitals of the waste with their jackal tenants.\nThe Arab deems them the home of evil spirits and hastens by. The nomads\nof Central Asia speak of opulent cities which sandstorms have blotted\nout in a night and of treasure to be found in them if one digs for it\nunder a fortunate star. But there are unearthly chances to be faced,\nand treasure-seekers will not invite them by venturing many days\u2019\nmarch from the desert\u2019s rim. One legend tells of the vanished city of\nHo-lao-lo-kia and the princes who came from many lands to excavate the\nsite. \u201cBut every time they try to dig the sand away a violent wind\narises, setting up whirlwinds of smoke and a thick mist, which sweeps\naway the path and leads the workmen astray into the desert.\u201d\n\nA passage from an antique Indian script, describing a city which\nperished two thousand years ago, may stand for a silhouette of the\nburied cities of Iran and of Turkestan, as legend has pictured them:\n\u201cThe temples and the palaces of Anuradhapura are numberless, and their\ngolden cupolas and pavilions shimmer in the sun. In the streets are\ncrowds of soldiers armed with bows and arrows. Elephants, horses,\nchariots, and countless multitudes pass in a continual turmoil. There\nare jugglers, dancers, and musicians from many lands, whose timbals\ngleam with golden ornaments.\u201d\n\nIt is more than conjecture that in these ancient lands not only cities\nbut states have disappeared under the sand. Gradually they have yielded\nto their fate, as the desert has moved upon them through periodic\ncycles of deficient rainfall. It may be that sometimes destruction came\nwith almost its fabled swiftness. MacGregor saw the sands in the very\nact of billowing over the walls and rolling through the streets of\nthe Persian town of Yazd. Much may have happened, must have happened,\nin forgotten times in the great space of fifteen hundred miles of\nlongitude and four hundred miles of latitude comprised in the Lop\nbasin; and many and circumstantial are the legends thereof.\n\nIn the Gobi Desert Sven Hedin discovered one of these buried\ncities--God-accursed he calls it--over which the wind had flung the\nsands, only to sweep them away and leave the site bare to the sun\nafter uncounted centuries had passed. Its walls had once been washed\nby a powerful stream along which millstones turned under the shade of\nluxuriant groves. There were apricot trees in the gardens, and mulberry\ntrees where the silkworm fed and spun its cocoon. There were bazaars\nloud with the tumult of craftsmen. This was the city of Takla-makan.\n\nWhat the explorer found was a dead forest, and ruins several miles\nacross. The timbers of hundreds of houses were still standing,\nchalk-white poplar wood brittle as glass. Among them were fragments of\nimages in gypsum, showing the Buddha and praying women with faces of\nthe Aryan type, all executed with refinement of taste; and there were\neven figures of boats rocking on the waves of vanished seas.\n\n\u201cAt what period,\u201d asks its discoverer, \u201cwas this mysterious city\ninhabited? When did its last crop of russet apricots ripen in the sun?\nWhen did the sour green leaves of its poplars yellow for their last\nfall? When was the trickling hum of its millwheels silenced forever?\nWhen did its despairing people finally abandon their dwellings to the\nravenous maw of the desert king? Who were the people who lived here?\nWhat was the tongue they spoke? Whence came the unknown inhabitants of\nthis Tadmor in the wilderness? How long did their city flourish, and\nwhither did they go when they saw that within its walls they could no\nlonger have a safe abiding place?\u201d\n\nPassing the ruins of other cities, the nomad has asked himself these\nand stranger questions. And out of the answers which his superstition\nand fancy have suggested has been woven the myth of the desert.\n\n\n_In the Forest_\n\nMen can lose their way in the deep forest, easily become confused\nthere, and make it a proverb that friends are not to be met in a wood.\nThere races that have passed out of the primitive culture do not feel\nat home. Through successive stages of their history the forest was held\nto be sacred, then enchanted, then ill-omened and haunted.\n\nIn the beginning men worshiped trees and groves. Pan, with his\nattendant fauns and satyrs, presided in the forest. The hamadryads\nlived in trees, and died with them; and they might contract marriages\nwith mortal youths. Sometimes the tree had its own soul, sometimes\nit was possessed by a spirit which had entered it, sometimes it was\nthe symbol, sometimes the sanctuary, of a god. Deity dwelt in the\noak of Dodona. Diana in Autun was a midday demon of the forests\nand crossroads. In the tabooed grove near Marseilles the trees were\nstained with sacrificial blood, the flames burned without consuming the\nboscage, and even the priests dared not venture there at midnight or\nmidday. The sacred bo tree is still worshiped in India. The mistletoe\nis magical above all other objects. Savages hang offerings upon trees,\nand in the same spirit the gypsy spits when he passes under them.\n\nThe wood spirits of the primitive mythologies became at length the\nstuff of folklore and travel tale--degenerate Pans and dryads that\nwanderers saw sometimes in the shadows of trees. The Old Man of the\nWoods, lame, hairy, green-eyed, ranges many countries and is most\nclearly pictured in the tales of the Brazilian Indians and the eastern\nSlavs. A mocker, misleader, and seducer, he cast a spell of terror\nupon the forest. In the wild women of Russian story it had still other\nperturbing tenants. These were good-looking creatures with shaggy\nbodies, square heads, and long hair. Sometimes they came into the\nvillages to borrow kneading troughs, but it was dangerous to meet them\nin their own domain, for they turned the solitary intruder round and\nround until he lost his way. They were fond of music and might invite\nlads and lasses to dance with them; whistling, however, they could not\nendure. Polish tales picture them as tall, thin-faced, sensual females,\nwith disheveled hair and garments in constant disarray. When groups of\nthem encountered human beings they tickled the adults to death and took\nthe youths with them for their lovers; wherefore young people never\nwent singly to the woods. In Swedish tradition this was the terrible\nSkogfrau, or Woman of the Thicket.\n\nThese beings personified the mystery of forest shadows and what\nRuskin called the medi\u00e6val dread of thick foliage. \u201cForest in every\nsemicivilized land,\u201d says Belloc, \u201cis ever a word of fear.\u201d There\nthe knights of old tale had adventure with giants and dwarfs and\nspell-weaving witches, and there the younger sons of folklore followed\nlonely paths with beasts and birds to counsel them. As the enchanted\nwoods of romance with their goblin glooms and talking trees faded from\nthe minds of men, in their place appeared the real terrors of thickets\nwhere robbers, banished men, and fugitive peoples beset the ways with\ndanger. The conception of forests as sanctuaries of peace is modern.\n\n[Illustration: _The Enchanted Woods of Romance with Their Goblin Glooms\nand Talking Trees Faded from the Minds of Men_]\n\n\n_Under the Ground_\n\nThe cellar strain that is in human nature betrays itself in the\nsatisfaction men take in roaring songs and drinking bitter liquors\nin rat-haunted sunken spaces. If groves were God\u2019s first temples,\ngrottoes were men\u2019s first dwellings. They came out of caves, and in\nflight sometimes they return to them. For their extremity mother earth\nhas provided a rocky roof, a bedchamber, a storeroom, and a fireplace.\nWherefore they deem no habitation complete until they have dug a cave\nunder it.\n\n\u201cMen,\u201d said the Caribs, \u201cshould avoid places which are enlightened\nneither by the sun nor by the moon.\u201d Yet there are races whose legends\nhave dug a cellar under the entire earth; if its surface is the floor\nof one world, it is the roof of another. Beneath it are the happy\nhunting grounds of the Indian. According to Cherokee myth the living\ncan descend thereto if, after fasting, they follow back the streams to\ntheir springs and have one of the underground folk to guide them, for\nthe springs are doorways to the world below. There one finds people,\nanimals, and plants about as they are above, but the seasons are\ndifferent, for are not the springs warmer than the air in winter, and\ncooler in summer? Navaho legend makes the surface of the earth the top\nstory of a structure five stories high. Beginning as ants, beetles,\ndragonflies, locusts, and bats, mankind climbed from one story to\nanother, or rather was expelled from each, usually for sexual sin.\n\nThe gods\u2019 land, or Elysium, of the Celts was commonly placed upon far\nislands of the west, but sometimes in the hollow hills called Sid. Here\nwere fair meadows and stately palaces and musical trees and a beautiful\npeople whose berry diet kept them ever young; in the song of the magic\nbirds of this underworld there were seven years of joy and oblivion.\nThese people were the Tuatha D\u00e9 Danann. Giraldus Cambrensis describes\na like people, but of fairy stature, dwelling underground, swearing\nno oaths, forswearing human ambition and inconstancy, and subsisting\non milk and saffron. Yet the Nagas of Hindoo story and the gnomes of\nEuropean folk-tale may be true historical races.\n\nWith his keen sense of an earthly origin primitive man was deeply\ninterested in burrowing creatures--in the scarab with his little round\nball that symbolized the sun in Egypt; in the beetle of the South\nAmerican pampas, which symbolized the Creator; in the rats and mice\nwhich various tribes worshiped; in the runway of the armadillo which\nin Brazil was an entrance to the land of shades; in the tunnel of the\nmole, and the cities of the marmot. This underground world of tiny\nanimals figures large in the folklore of early peoples, shaping their\ngenealogies, influencing their councils, intervening in their affairs\nfor good and ill, at times deciding their destinies.\n\nThere was sorcery underground. Life came from it with each recurring\nspring. The dead were laid there, and far beneath were the abodes of\ntheir spirits. In the caverns were witches who had some command over\nlife and death. There also were the haunts of necromancers, and though\ntheir dens were squalid, all the riches of the world were around them.\nLegend became sumptuous and prodigal when it left the surface of the\nearth and plunged into the darkness under it.\n\nThe story of Aladdin\u2019s descent into this realm carries nearly all the\nelements of subterranean myth. His false uncle, the African magician,\nconducted him to a valley between mountains near a large Chinese town.\nWhen he muttered a spell the earth opened, and the lad went down a\nstone staircase into a palace where were brazen cisterns brimming with\ngold and silver. Beyond in a terraced garden was a magic lamp. Securing\nthe latter and starting back, the youth paused to look at the fruits\nthat hung from trees in the garden. These were of various hues, and\nthough he did not know it, they were precious stones. Aladdin would\nhave wished they were figs or grapes or pomegranates; but he filled his\npurse with them and crammed them in his bosom.\n\nBecause the youth was slow in passing up the lamp, the magician who\nwas waiting without lowered the stone over the staircase, and Aladdin\nwas left in darkness. But a genie of frightful aspect appeared when he\nchanced to rub a ring his false uncle had given him. The apparition was\na slave of the ring, and with it began the cycle of deeds and gifts\nthat won the Chinese gamin a princess and a throne.\n\nOne element is missing in this descent, type otherwise of a thousand\nothers. That is women. There were beautiful enchantresses as well as\nfoul witches under the ground. They figure in a characteristic story of\nIndia told by Hiouen Thsiang. A good-natured fellow, versed in magic\nformulas, entered a cavern with thirteen companions. They came to a\nwalled city with towers and lookouts of gold, silver, and lapis-lazuli.\nYoung, laughing maidens greeted them at the outer gates, and at the\ninner gates were two slave girls each holding a golden vessel full\nof flowers and scents. Before the men went farther, these told them\nthey must bathe in the tank that stood there, anoint themselves with\nperfumes, and crown themselves with flowers. But they must wait awhile\nbefore they bathed; only the master of magic could immerse at once.\nOf course the thirteen ignored the warning, and when they entered the\ntank they became confused. They were found afterward, says the Chinese\nauthor, \u201csitting in the middle of a rice-field distant from this\ndue north, over a level country, about thirty or forty li,\u201d with no\nrecollection of how they got there.\n\nThe sorceress and enchantress motives are developed into drama in\nthe great myth of Tannh\u00e4user. This minnesinger of the Middle Ages\nwas riding through the dusk toward Wartburg, where minstrels were to\ncompete for a prize, when he saw a glimmering figure on the slopes of\nthe mountain called the H\u00f6rselberg. White arms were stretched to him\nin the gesture that is always more eloquent than words, and, leaving\nhis charger, he followed the woman. Flowers bloomed in her footsteps,\nnymphs attended her, and a rosy light lay on the path as she led the\nknight to a cavern\u2019s mouth and thence to her palace in the heart of the\nmountain. There for seven years he was the willing slave of the pagan\nGoddess of Love, and partner in the revels of her court.\n\nSatiety and an awakened conscience came together. The minstrel longed\nfor a breath of pure mountain air, for the tinkle of sheep bells,\nfor the sky of night and its stars. When Venus would not release her\nthrall, he spoke the Virgin\u2019s name--and the mountain-side opened. He\nfound himself again aboveground and heard the chime of church bells.\n\nTo one priest after another Tannh\u00e4user made confession of his great\nsin, but the shocked clerics dared not give him absolution, and at\nlength he stood before the Pope.\n\n\u201cSooner shall this staff in my hand grow green and blossom,\u201d said\nthe stern vicar of Heaven, \u201cthan that God should pardon thee.\u201d With\ndarkness in his soul, Tannh\u00e4user turned away. Three days afterward\nthe papal staff put forth buds and blossoms, and messengers were sent\nin haste from Rome. They reached the H\u00f6rselberg only to learn that a\nhaggard wayfarer had just entered the mountain. The minstrel was never\nseen again.\n\nThe golden age will issue from underground, according to a noble legend\nof the medi\u00e6val time which concerns Frederick Barbarossa, head of the\nHoly Roman Empire. He was not drowned in Cilicia while on crusade, as\nreport had it. He is sleeping in a cavernous chamber in the Kyffh\u00e4user\nBerg which rises from the emerald meadows of Thuringia. His long red\nbeard has grown quite through the stone table where he sits in slumber.\nThe good knights surround him, and once in a hundred years he rouses\nhimself and asks if the ravens still fly around the mountain. When the\nbirds of omen no longer call about the steeps he shall awake and sally\nforth with his horsemen, and the peace of all men shall follow.\n\nThus at times has legend walked the earth, as men might cross the flat\nhousetops of an Eastern city, with the thought that what counted most\nwas just beneath its immense roof.\n\n\n_Darkness_\n\nThe dark has other creatures besides the bat and owl, other spectacles\nthan those that pass in dreams. Sometimes in Celtic legend a mist\ndescended on a man, and until it lifted the towers and orchards of\nelysium were all about him. There is a class of Eastern legends which\ntell of men around whom a sudden shadow fell, so that they were seen no\nmore, or next were seen in another place. Maundeville has a tale of a\ncloud which settled down upon a land and did not lift again. This was\na province called Hanyson in the kingdom of Abchaz which is next to\nthe kingdom of Georgia. One must travel three days to ride around the\nprovince, and one dare not ride through it, for thick twilight covers\nit. Out of the gloom the people of neighboring lands hear voices of\nfolk, and horses neighing, and cocks crowing.\n\nThe story is that a cursed emperor of Persia that was hight Saures\novertook a Christian host in the plain that was hight Megon and would\nhave destroyed it. \u201cBut anon a thick Cloud came and covered the Emperor\nand all his Host. And so they endure in that Manner that they must not\ngo out on any Side; and so shall they evermore abide in Darkness till\nthe Day of Doom, by the Miracle of God. And then the Christian Men went\nwhere liked them best. Also ye shall understand that out of that Land\nof Darkness goeth out a great River that sheweth well that there be\nFolk dwelling there by many Tokens; but no Man dare enter into it.\u201d\n\nSome report of the long Arctic night reached the Asiatic countries of\nlower latitudes, and Marco Polo when he traversed them. He gives a\nhearsay account of what he calls the Region of Darkness. It is distant\nfourteen journeys by dog-sled across the tundras from the country of\nthe Tartars. The atmosphere in this twilight land is \u201cas we find it\njust about the dawn of day, when we may be said to see and not to see.\u201d\nIts people are tall and well made, but pale, stupid, and brutish, and\nwithout prince or other governance. They have great stores of furs of\nermines, martins, and foxes. Under cover of the prevailing darkness the\nTartars raid them, plundering them of their furs and driving off their\ncattle. That they may not become lost forever in the gloom, the raiders\nride mares that have young foals, and these are left on the frontiers.\nWhen the Tartars would return, they lay the bridles on the necks of the\ndams, and maternal instinct finds the homeward track.\n\nFable and fact ride abreast through this narrative, as horsemen through\nthe chill obscurity of dawn, and a great thing has come of it. Marco\u2019s\naccount of the peltry of the north had more to do than aught else,\ntradition says, with the founding of the Hudson Bay Company and the\nopening of the northern half of the American continent.\n\n\n_Distance_\n\nThe haze on all these horizon lands is the haze of distance. There are\ntwo phrases which come to the ear with the sound of unlocking doors.\nOne is Once upon a Time, which children hear; it is distance measured\nin years. The other is Beyond the Mountains, which plainsmen use; it\nis distance measured in miles and difficulties. For either distance,\nfetters fall.\n\nThree tales may declare this as well as a thousand, and a thousand\nmight be told. Russian peasants speak of a land which they call\nBielovodye, and which lies, as they think, somewhere on the borders of\nMongolia in the distant east. It is a country of peace and plenty, and\nnobody lives there.\n\nRubruquis gives just a glimpse, as of something seen afar through a\nnarrow window. \u201cA Chinese priest,\u201d he says, \u201ctold me also for truth\n(which neverthelesse, I doe not believe) that there is a province\nbeyond Cataia, into the which, at whatsoever age a man enters, he\ncontinueth in the same age wherein he entred.\u201d\n\nThe widest horizons of time and space are reached in a single artless\nsentence in a gypsy folk tale: \u201cThey went then further than I can\nremember, till they reached the knoll of the country at the back of the\nwind and the face of the sun, that was in the realm of Big Women.\u201d The\nmen who made this journey skirted all the coasts of illusion.\n\n\n\n\nChapter XVI. Lands of Legend\n\n\nThere are countries whose boundaries have not been fixed by armies or\ntreaties, nor their ways marked out by trade. The dreams of men have\nmade them. Their substance is reality, yet their effect is vision. By a\nsort of conspiracy of wish, to which men of imaginative mind have been\nparties and all others have yielded assent, these countries have been\nsupposed to be different from what any was or could be. It has been\neasy enough to create the illusion, for one\u2019s view of another land is\nalways more or less a symbolic drawing.\n\n\n_Ophir_\n\nThe geographical table in the tenth chapter of Genesis tells a straight\ntale which men debated for something more than two thousand years and\nonly in the present century have accepted at its face value. In one\nphrase the Scriptures link Ophir and Havilah, and then add that \u201ctheir\ndwelling was from Mesha, as thou goest unto Sephar, a mount of the\nEast.\u201d Where was Ophir? Perhaps the learned men of Alexandria were the\nfirst to ask the question. What was Ophir? This question nobody thought\nof putting, and it was vital.\n\nOphir was a magic word which let no man rest once he had heard it. The\nspell of gold was in it. Even as they wrote, it seemed to intoxicate\nthe Jewish prophets, poets, and chroniclers. Isaiah speaks of the\n\u201cgolden wedge of Ophir.\u201d It is said of wisdom in the Book of Job that\nit cannot be valued with the gold of Ophir, with the precious onyx or\nthe sapphire. \u201cThen shalt thou lay up gold as dust, and the gold of\nOphir as the stones of the brooks,\u201d says another passage Oriental in\nits opulence of suggestion.\n\nFrom Ophir came the fleet of Solomon and Hiram of Tyre, fetching gold,\nfour hundred and twenty talents, and sandalwood. The arrival of the\ntreasure fleet is associated in the narrative, for some reason one may\nonly guess, with the coming to Jerusalem of the Queen of Sheba. The two\nincidents constitute the most gorgeous episode in Jewish history.\n\nSheba\u2019s queen comes to visit Solomon with a very great train, with\ncamels that bear spices, and very much gold and precious stones. She\nsees the meat of his table, the sitting of his servants, and the\nattendance of his ministers. She proves him with hard questions, and\npride dies in her. The report she has heard in her own land of his\nwealth and wisdom was a true report, she declares, but the half had not\nbeen told. Then she goes back, and her camels take across the deserts\ngifts richer than they had brought. Gold of Ophir travels north, and\nsouth again, and legend follows it.\n\nTwo other place-names appear on this piece of Hebrew brocade. One is\nEzion-geber, Solomon\u2019s port on the Red Sea in the land of Edom. The\nother is Tharshish, where the king had ships. Once in three years\ncame the navy of Tharshish, bringing gold and silver, ivory and apes\nand peacocks. There was nothing in these imports that one might eat\nor drink or use for shelter or raiment. The commodities were typical\nof ancient commerce in their magnificence, their vain show, and their\nuselessness--and the cargo has freighted the imagination of men ever\nsince. There was contraband in the ships of Tharshish. Among the\nelephants\u2019 teeth and peacocks was stowed away the spirit of the East.\n\nWhere was Tharshish? Where was Ophir? Where was Havilah, mentioned\nrarely, but in a significant context?\n\nIt was long thought that Tharshish was the Carthaginian port of\nTartessus beyond the Pillars, where now is the Spanish port of Cadiz.\nBut Spain had few apes, little gold, and no ivory. The text of Genesis\nseemed to point to the Arabian coast as the seat of Ophir. But Araby\nhad no elephants and its gold came from elsewhere. Ophir was sought\nalso in the African spiceland of Punt, in the Midian country of\nnorthern Arabia, and at the mouth of the Indus in Hindostan. Once in\nevery three years came the fleet, so said the text; and into this was\nread the meaning, not of periodic sailings, but of voyages that covered\nthree years. Ophir, therefore, must lie in the far East, and men sought\nit in the Malay Peninsula, in that Golden Chersonese where were ivory\nand apes and peacocks, as well as precious metals.\n\nFor one splendid century it was Portugese instinct to advance steadily,\nto see clearly, and to do great things easily--the legacy, perhaps,\nof that incomparable spirit, Prince Henry the Navigator. Within the\ncentury after his death, his countrymen had gone around Africa, opened\na sea route to the Indies, and made the coveted Spice Islands their\nown. Also, they had discovered Ophir, or rather almost discovered it.\nWhat they found was the missing port of Tharshish, and Havilah, the\nland which scriptural writers linked with Ophir, and dismissed.\n\nA Portugese squadron, outbound for the Indies in 1505, put in at the\nlittle African port of Sofala on the Mozambique Channel, looking east\ntoward Madagascar. Learning that the Arabs, or Moors, as they called\nthem, were trafficking here for gold brought down to the coast from the\ninterior, its captains said that this must be Ophir. It has taken four\ncenturies to show how near this casual judgment was to the truth. The\ngold of Ophir reached the Indian Ocean through the African port once\nnamed Tharshish and now called Sofala, and came from the Mashona and\nMatabele region between the lower Zambesi and the Limpopo rivers in\nwhat is now Rhodesia. It was Hottentot gold, not gold of Araby.\n\nWhat was Ophir? When at length this question was asked, the Scripture\ntexts, which pointed eastward toward Arabian regions where gold was\nnot, slowly yielded their paradox. Ophir was not a country at all.\nIt was a port, perhaps the greatest of the ancient world. Here the\nproducts of India, of Africa, and of the Eastern Mediterranean were\ninterchanged. The gold of ancient Rhodesia (Havilah) became gold of\nOphir, just as figs of the Levant become Smyrna figs and the white\ngrapes of Spain become Malaga grapes, when freighted on ships outbound\nfrom those ports.\n\nIn the days of its decline Ophir was known to Ptolemy, the Alexandrian\ngeographer, as the Sapphar Metropolis; to Arrian, the Greek geographer,\nas Portus Nobilis, and to the Romans as Moscha. It lay where Genesis\nplaces it: \u201cand their dwelling was from Mesha, as thou goest unto\nSephar a mount of the east.\u201d There, under the shadow of Mount Sephar,\nnearly opposite the island of Socotra and about midway along the\nsouthern coast of Arabia, its ruins lie around a silted inlet of the\nsea. Mesha, or Moscha, signifies a wharf or landing place, and was\nat the inlet\u2019s mouth. Ophir stood at the head of the inlet. The name\nsignifies simply The City, The Metropolis, as the Roman used the single\nword _urbs_ to designate his capital.\n\nThis was the great mart of Himyaritic civilization. The Himyarites were\nthe settled folk of southern Arabia--the Min\u00e6ans and their successors,\nthe Sab\u00e6ans. It may be that their civilization was the earliest in the\nworld, still older than the Egyptian and Chaldean. There is reason to\nbelieve that the carrying trade of the Red Sea and the Indian Ocean\nwas in their hands for a greater part of the period during which it\nhas been assumed that the Ph\u0153nicians controlled it. The merchants of\nTyre and Sidon were brief interlopers in a sea-borne commerce which\nfor thousands of years had been the monopoly of the Sab\u00e6an Arabs.\nThat the latter worked the mines of ancient Rhodesia in the land they\ncalled Havilah is the simple and unavoidable inference from facts which\nnevertheless required about a generation of arch\u00e6ological research to\nestablish, and which the geographer, A. H. Keane, has summarized in\nhis striking monograph. The Himyaritic inscriptions in southern Arabia\nand the inscriptions on the extensive ruins of ancient gold workings\nbetween the Zambesi and the Limpopo were made by the same people.\n\nThe going of Solomon\u2019s ships and the ships of his Tyrian ally to Ophir\nand on to Tharshish, and the coming of Sab\u00e6a\u2019s queen to Jerusalem, were\nwhat they are represented to be, brilliant and exotic incidents in the\ntroubled march of Jewish history. This traffic covered only about a\ncentury, and millenniums of Arab commerce between Ophir and Tharshish\nenvelop it. After that century Israel and Ph\u0153nicia disappear from the\nIndian Ocean, and the South Arab takes up the gold trade anew. At this\ntask the Portuguese found him.\n\nThe Jew was the prosperous visitor of an hour at the port of the\nSab\u00e6ans. Perhaps their queen made a return call to learn why he had\ncome and whence the gold in his wallet. The answer was not in Solomon\nhimself; truly, indeed, the half was never told her. It was David whose\nconquest of Edom had given Israel temporary control of important trade\nroutes. The wealth of Solomon was in part a transportation charge, and\nin part a police tax upon \u201cthe traffick of the spice merchants and all\nthe kings of Arabia.\u201d They paid it rather than have their caravans\nplundered on the roads the Jew controlled. The gold that Israel and\nPh\u0153nicia brought from Tharshish direct, like the gold which Spain\nbrought from Peru, was not obtained in trade exchanges. It was wrung\nfrom slave labor, Hottentots and Bushmen--whose present physiognomy and\ncomplexion show an Asiatic strain--toiling for taskmasters, as since\nthey have toiled, under the sjambok.\n\nEzion-geber, the Jewish port, lay at the head of the Red Sea. Tharshish\nlay nearly six thousand miles to the south as coasting vessels made\nit, and voyages were probably by way of some port in the west of\nMadagascar, where Semitic influences have been discovered. Midway\nbetween Tharshish and Ezion-geber, and midway between the east and west\nof antiquity, lay Ophir. The age-long vision of a golden land lifts\nfrom its name. In its stead loom the shadowy outlines of a mighty port,\nwith strange ships at anchor, and clinking bags and odorous bales upon\nthe wharves, and hawk-faced merchants at their traffic, where now are\nruins and the oblivious sea.\n\n\n_Lotus-land_\n\nThe country of the lotus-eaters was a promontory jutting out into the\nMediterranean Sea from the land of the Gindanes. Whoso tastes the fruit\nof the lotus, Homer said, forgets his native shore, his family, and his\nfriends. In an age that avows a world-weariness to which the wandering\nGreeks were strangers, this brief glimpse of a land released from\nremembrance has been an arresting thing.\n\nLater poets expanded the Odyssey legend, wrote new significances into\nit, and sometimes provided it with a different ending, as in the fine\npoem of Tennyson. The Victorian gives no hint that the companions of\nUlysses fled from Lotus-land. It seemed to them better to stay there.\nThey had traveled unto fatigue, and their island homes were still\nfar beyond the wave. Dear as were the last embraces of their wives,\nit was likely that themselves were now all but forgotten, that their\nsons had inherited them, and that their deeds before Troy were sung\nby minstrels as things of long ago. Why return like ghosts to trouble\njoy? So the mariners burst into choric song declaring the delights of\nlong rest and dreamful ease and mild-minded melancholy upon a slumbrous\nshore. Then the rhythm changes to carry their resolve:\n\n We have had enough of action, and of motion we,\n Rolled to starboard, rolled to larboard, when the surge was seething\n free,\n Where the wallowing monster spouted his foam-fountains in the sea.\n Let us swear an oath, and keep it with an equal mind,\n In the hollow Lotos-land to live and lie reclined\n On the hills like Gods together, careless of mankind.\n\nIn the Homeric story the lotus strand was a halting place for Ulysses\nand his men on the way from the Ciconian coast to their adventure with\nthe giant Polyphemus. Their momentary pause in the enchanted Libyan\nland is the slightest episode in the Odyssey. After nine days of stormy\nfaring they anchor by a fragrant beach and go ashore for water and a\nfeast. Three of their number wander farther and hospitable natives bid\nthem eat the fruit of their trees. Having eaten, a spell of oblivion\nfalls on them and they would travel no more; but their comrades bind\nthem and carry them aboard the ships, and hastily the company sails\naway.\n\nHerodotus locates the land of the lotus-eaters in the Syrtic district\nof the North African coast, whence a caravan route leads to Egypt.\nThis people, he says, live entirely on the fruit of the lotus tree.\nThe fruit is about the size of the lentisk berry, and in sweetness\nresembles the date. The lotophagi even succeed in obtaining from it a\nsort of wine. Rawlinson, who identifies the lotus with the rhamnus,\nasserts, however, that it looks and tastes \u201crather like a bad crab\napple.\u201d\n\nThere has been controversy as to what the ancients meant by the lotus.\nSome writers said it was a kind of clover, the poa of Strabo. The lotus\nof Egypt and India is a water lily whose roots and seeds are eaten by\nthe poor. Pliny says that the lotus of Homer was a tree \u201cthe size of a\npear tree, though Cornelius Nepos calls it low.\u201d The latter describes\nits fruit as yellow, the size of a bean, and sweet and pleasant to\nthe taste. It was pounded into a paste and stored for food, and a wine\nlike mead was made from it. In the district where Ulysses anchored,\nand which has been identified with the modern Jerba, the tree still\nflourishes; Arabs eat its fruit and make a wine of it. Its commercial\nname is jujube, and in the Mediterranean countries it is prized as a\nwinter dessert fruit.\n\nIf there were poppy dreams in the orchards of Africa, the secret of\nthem passed with the wine the ancients brewed there. The longing for\nforgetfulness remains. Those who have come by it honestly through toil\nhave found, as Ulysses did, that lotus-land is a port of call upon\nstruggling seas.\n\n\n_The Incense Country_\n\nThe world commerce of ancient times was in four commodities--gold,\namber, precious stones, and incense. With transportation by pack,\ncaravan, and small coasting craft, nothing of greater bulk or less\nintrinsic worth could be carried far at a profit. The first three of\nthese commodities were come upon more or less by accident. Incense was\nthe root, bark, gum, seeds, dried leaves, or flowers of various trees,\nshrubs, and plants, and was gathered at stated seasons of the year.\nThe business had the element of certainty, so far as anything could be\ncertain in ages when land and water travel were pursuits of hazard,\nwhen there was little law upon the desert and none upon the sea. The\nincense trade was therefore the great trade of antiquity. By it the\nnations of the east, west and south first came to know one another.\n\nHow important was this traffic Pliny bears witness in his _Natural\nHistory_. Page after page, chapter after chapter, book after book are\ndevoted to the incense, perfumes, and unguents of the East. It is an\nimpatient, although a faithful, testimony. The Latin writer groans over\nthe enormous prices the precious gums command, recites how they are\nsophisticated in the Alexandrian warehouses with resin, turpentine,\nand Cyprian wax, lists the nine substances with which Indian nard\nis imitated, and rails at the superstition which uses scents for\nsacrifice, the sinful luxury which drenches the body with them, and\neven mingles them in the wines of the table. Consider, he says, the\nvast number of funerals celebrated every year throughout the world,\nthe heaps of incense piled up in honor of the dead, the quantities\noffered to the gods. Is anybody the better off? It seems to Pliny\nthat the immortal ones were kinder to men when a salted cake was the\nbest they could hope to find on their altars. At the very lowest the\nIndians, Seres, and Arabians took from the empire one hundred million\nsesterces every year--\u201cso dearly do we pay for our luxury and our\nwomen.\u201d\n\nNot content with the prodigality of nature, Pliny continues, luxury has\nseen fit to combine all pleasant odors into a single whole, and hence\nhave come unguents. The Persians quite soak themselves in these blended\nperfumes, to conceal from themselves that they live in dirt. There are\nRomans who go still further, for they plaster themselves with unguents.\nSome of them, and Nero of the number, even sprinkle therewith the soles\nof their feet. On festival days the very eagles on battle standards,\nthick with the dust of the camps, are anointed. Pearls and jewels have\na value that lasts, but scents die as soon as they are born. To what\ngood is this all, Pliny asks again.\n\nFew others put this question. For the living, for the dead, and for\nthe very gods, there must be a savor of satisfaction. Gums were burned\nto purify the air of dwellings, to mask the odors of burnt sacrifice,\nto disguise the intimations of mortality when the bodies of the dead\nsmoked on funeral pyres. Their use to these ends was the primitive\nsanitary science of the East. In the rites of embalming, their fumes\nreanimated mummy and mortuary statue and nourished the souls of the\ndeparted on the journey to the spirit-land. The gods above were fed by\nthe smoke of sacrifice and their favor was flattered for the projects\nof men. So it befell in Egypt, and the pages of Herodotus are in\nevidence that the whole country had become a vast drug shop.\n\nMusk came from the highlands of China, and from India, gum benzoin\nfrom Java, sandalwood from the Golden Chersonese, cloves from Eastern\nislands unknown. Balm of Gilead, the most precious of odoriferous\nsubstances, came from Judea, and according to Pliny battles had been\nfought over it between Jews and Romans. There were other spicy roots,\nleaves, and petals that grew in desert gardens or mountain parks of\nthe East; the geography of scents was wide and vague and little known.\nBut the true incense land of the ancients had definite bounds. It\nlay on both sides of the promontory known variously as the Aromatic\nCape and as the Cape of Spices and now as Cape Guardafui, where the\ncontinent of Africa juts farthest into the Indian Ocean. This land had\ntwo provinces--Punt, which is the modern Somaliland, and Sab\u00e6a, which\nis southern Arabia.\n\nCinnamon and cassia were taken from Punt, and some frankincense, the\n\u201ctrue incense,\u201d as the name signifies and as the Christian altars\nof Europe afterward came to know it. From Sab\u00e6a were taken large\nquantities of frankincense, as well as myrrh and ladanum. The latter\ncountry had credit also in the ancient world for a long list of balms\nthat came from elsewhere. The secret, never more than half known, was\nthat Sab\u00e6a imported odorous things as well as grew them. It brought\nthem in from more eastern countries and sent them forth on its ships,\nor on the camels that traveled the incense route northward to Petra,\nwhence they were dispensed to the Mediterranean peoples. The incense\nland was the center of world commerce, which was above all a traffic\nin sweet savors, and the countries commanding the southern approach to\nthe Red Sea had the same significant relation to it that now belongs to\nSuez, the northern approach to that sea.\n\nThe air of incense-land was as heavy with traditions as it was reported\nto be with odors. The desert hemmed in both Punt and Sab\u00e6a, and its\nmysteries stole in with the sands. The rites of a dim religion were\nwrapped around the harvest of the precious gums. Merchant subtleties\nspread afar the stories of more than mortal perils to be met by those\nwho entered the places of fragrance. The effect of these fables was to\nenhance prices and confirm the Arab monopoly. To the ancient world the\nland of incense was an enchanting, and yet a forbidding and a forbidden\nland.\n\nIts enchantments were felt even at a distance. The whole country of\nArabia, says Herodotus, is scented with spices, and exhales an odor\nmarvelously sweet. Diodorus declares that even before the mariner\nsights this coast its delights come out to meet him upon the sea. The\nbreezes of spring waft to him the fragrant breath of trees and shrubs,\nand keener satisfactions than he may have elsewhere, for these are\nno old and stored aromatics, but fresh from new-blown flowers. Pliny\nis skeptical, yet repeats the story with further detail. Under the\nrays of the noonday sun, he says, the entire peninsula gives forth an\nindescribable perfume, the blend of many beguiling odors. Thus it was,\nwhile still far out, the fleet of Alexander knew it was nearing Araby\nthe Happy.\n\nThe languors of incense floated through the towns and villages of Sab\u00e6a\nand enveloped its lofty capital. Timbers and floors of the houses\nwere of sweet-scented woods, and fagots of frankincense and sticks of\nmyrrh, burning in the fireplaces, gave them a perpetual fragrance of\nsacrifice. To counteract these bland but debilitating suavities the\nArabians of the south brought the gum of storax down from Syria. This\nthey burned in goat skins and found its pungent smell a reviving thing.\n\nSaba, the country\u2019s capital, was a dream-city of spices and gold. From\na steep which commanded the surrounding lands its temples and palaces\nreared their roofs amid delightful groves. The trade of countless\ncenturies had drawn vast riches to the incense metropolis. The houses\nof the merchants were resplendent with precious metals and precious\nstones. Reclining upon couches inlaid with silver, they drank from\ngem-studded goblets of gold. The camels padding northward, and the\nships faring north, east, and south, brought back the wherewithal to\nsustain a life of sensual magnificence. Chief among the voluptuaries\nwas the Sab\u00e6an king. From his seat of judgment in a gorgeous palace he\ndetermined all disputes with the authority of an absolute sovereign.\nYet his own freedom of movement was restrained by the priestly class.\nHe was a prisoner of the palace, and, should he venture outside its\nscented courts and shaded gardens, the rabble assailed him with stones\nand drove him back to them. So an oracle had prescribed.\n\nOver the gathering of incense, and its coming and going in the land\nof the Sab\u00e6ans, priestly tradition had flung a mantle rich in fable\nand somber with fear. Eight days\u2019 journey to the northeast from the\ncapital, in a district a hundred miles long by fifty miles wide, stood\nthe sacred groves in a soil of milky white a little inclining to red.\nThither at the time of the rising of the Dog Star, when the heat was\nmost intense, went the Arabians to make incisions in the trees. The\nunctuous foam which gathered on the bark was permitted to remain and\nharden; nor was it removed until autumn. The gum which assumed the\nform of globular drops was called male incense. More esteemed were the\npieces where two drops had adhered into the semblance of breasts, which\nwere called female incense.\n\nBy inherited right the harvest was the privilege of three thousand\nfamilies. Their persons were deemed to be holy. While pruning the\ntrees and gathering the gum they must receive no pollution either by\nintercourse with women or by coming in contact with the dead. They\ncarried their produce to the capital upon camels by an appointed road\nand were admitted at a single gate. It was death to deviate from this\nroad.\n\nVarious deductions were made from the camel loads to pay for carriage,\nthe service of the temples, the expenses of the state, and the\ntransportation taxes laid by other countries through which the overland\ncaravans were to pass. The entertainment of strangers at the capital\nwas provided for out of a tithe taken from frankincense. In its journey\nof more than a thousand miles northward from Saba to Petra in the land\nof the Nabatheans, successive peoples, beginning with the Min\u00e6ans,\nreceived the freight and passed it on. Mecca and Medina, afterward\nholy places of Islam, were stations on the incense route. It was a\ndrowsy traffic that went up and down this ancient road. The suns of\nthe desert, falling upon the bales, drew from them that which made the\ncarriers nod upon their beasts in a dream of delight. They revived\nthemselves, legend continues, by inhaling the pungent fumes of bitumen\nand goat\u2019s-beard.\n\nThere were other than ritual terrors in gathering frankincense and the\nrelated substances. Herodotus heard the story that the groves were\ninfested by small winged serpents of the same sort that invade Egypt.\nThese clung to every branch, but if one burned gum storax under the\ntree they were dislodged; a like report had it that in Malabar great\nserpents coiled themselves about the sandalwood trees.\n\nThe cinnamon and cassia which the Sab\u00e6ans imported from Punt, on the\nAfrican side of the Gulf of Aden, or themselves gathered there, were\nharvested with difficulty and peril, and only after the consent of the\ngod had been given. The entrails of forty-four oxen, goats, and rams\nwere offered up, nothing could be done before sunrise or after sunset,\nand when the harvest was made a priest set aside the god\u2019s portion with\nthe point of a spear. A third portion was devoted to the sun, and this\nburst at once into flame.\n\nThere were great birds which collected sticks of cinnamon for their\nnests, which were fastened with mud to a sheer face of rock that foot\nof man could not climb. Sometimes these nests were broken down by means\nof leaden arrows. Sometimes the merchants, like the diamond-seekers in\nthe Sindbad tale, placed large pieces of meat on the ground, and their\nweight caused the nests to fall when the mother birds bore the meat\naloft to their young. The Arabians, returning, collected the cinnamon.\n\nCassia grew on the marshy shores of a lake where were a number of\nwinged animals much resembling bats, which screeched horribly and were\nvery valiant. The Arabians covered their bodies and faces with the\nhides of oxen, leaving only holes for their eyes. While they gathered\nthe bark they were kept busy shielding their eyes from assault from the\nair.\n\nThere was still a long journey for these aromatic stuffs before\nthey reached the marts of Arabia, at least when the people of Punt\nthemselves made it. They put forth over vast tracts of sea upon rafts\nwhich were neither steered by rudder nor impelled by oar or sail. At\nthe time of the winter equinox they went to sea on a wind from the\nsoutheast, and when they doubled the promontory of Arabia the northeast\nwind met them and took them from gulf to gulf. They skirted shores\nwhere forests, set afire by the heat of the sun, were blazing. It might\nbe five years before their rafts, laden with copper, cloths, bracelets,\nand necklaces, were hauled up again on the beaches of Somaliland.\n\nThere may have been a memory of musk in stories told about cassia\nand about ladanum. The ends of cassia branches of the length of two\nfingers were cut off and sewn in fresh skins of cattle. When the skins\nputrified, maggots ate away the woody parts but left the bark, which\nwas too bitter to invite their attack. As to the ladanum of northern\nArabia, Herodotus remarks that, although found in a most inodorous\nplace, it is the sweetest-scented of all substances. Goats gathered\nit. These animals cropped the sprouting shoots of mastic branches when\nthey were swollen with a juice of remarkable sweetness. Drops thereof\nwere wiped up by their unlucky beards, and became clotted with dust and\ndry from the sun. Men with shears collected it, and that was why the\nRomans found goats\u2019 hairs therein.\n\nOut of such stories were framed the geography, polity, and ritual of\nthe land of incense. What came of them was a monopoly, a mystery, a\nspell that was slow to pass. In the smoke of altars one may almost\nglimpse the temples of this dim domain, and in the tinkle of the\ncensing bell hear the bells of camels along an ancient path.\n\n\n_Gog and Magog of the North_\n\nThe pastures of High Asia were the range of Gog and Magog. The Caucasus\nwas their prison home. Sometimes these formidable races were pictured\nas roving the steppes and deserts of the north, sometimes as swinging\nback and forth against the walls of mountain valleys, where the policy\nof Alexander or divine compassion for the rest of mankind had confined\nthem. Always they were seeking a way out, and sometime they would find\nit, and the world would shudder down in ruin under their tread.\n\nThese races were the nightmare vision of two thousand years. There are\nwords the very sound of which evokes the myths of fear. Such are Gog\nand Magog, with their harsh internal echo and inhuman suggestion. They\nwere associated with the terrors of Scythia, known and unknown--the\nincursions of dwarfish, shrill-voiced nomads upon the civilizations of\nthe south, the sense of vast desolate spaces where prodigious things\nhad their beginning. These misgivings, made definite by biblical\nimagery and by the literal statements of the Koran, grew into legends\nwhich were enriched by contributions from classic fable and shared by\nthe Jewish, Christian, and Moslem worlds.\n\nMagog was a son of Japheth, says Genesis. In the book of _Ezekiel_ it\nis declared that the Lord will bring Gog with his horses and horsemen\nout of the north, and Persia, Ethiopia and Libya with them. They shall\nascend and come like a storm and like a cloud shall cover the land.\nThey shall think an evil thought, to take a spoil and to take a prey.\nBut the fury of the Lord shall come up in His face and there shall be\na great shaking in the land of Israel. Gog shall fall upon the open\nfield, and a fire will be sent upon Magog and among them that dwell\ncarelessly in the isles. The wreckage of their shields and staves shall\nburn for seven years, and Gog shall have a place of graves in Israel,\nthe valley of the passengers on the east of the sea.\n\nThe burden of prophecy is taken up anew in _Revelation_. When the\nthousand years are expired, Satan shall be loosed from his prison and\nshall go out to deceive the nations which are in the four quarters of\nthe earth, Gog and Magog, to gather them together to battle. They shall\ncompass the camp of the saints about, and fire will come down out of\nheaven to devour them.\n\nThe Koran buttressed biblical prophecy with a historical narrative.\nIt concerns the journeys of Doul-Karnain, the Lord of the Two Horns,\na personage variously identified with Alexander, Julius C\u00e6sar and\nAugustus, but by the east believed to be Alexander. When he went forth\nwith his army he marched to the going down of the sun and found it set\nin a miry fount. He marched to the farthest east and found a people\noppressed by the heat. Then he marched north and in a valley between\ntwo mountains he found a people who told him that Gog and Magog laid\nwaste their land. \u201cBuild us, O Doul-Karnain,\u201d they begged, \u201ca rampart\nbetween us and them.\u201d He bade them bring him blocks of iron, and when\nhe had filled the space between the mountains, he caused them to blow\nupon the wall with bellows, and heated it fiery hot, and poured molten\nbrass upon it. Gog and Magog could not scale it, nor were they able to\ndig through it.\n\nEzekiel wrote when the memory of an invasion of Scythian horsemen\nwas still fresh in Asia the Less, and he drew his imagery from it;\nto him, and to John after him, Gog and Magog were symbols of earthly\npower opposed to Jehovah. But the Semitic world, Jew and Arab alike,\nscanned the vigorous picture of a nation from the steppes riding over\nthe world, and saw in it inspired prophecy of a Mongol devastation\nof civilization. So Josephus thought: Gog and Magog were Scythian\npeoples. Thrice and four times, on the immense canvases of Asia and\neastern Europe, the fading colors of the Ezekiel vision took on the\nfreshness of actuality--and the restoring brush was wielded in turn by\nGenghis Khan, Othman, Tamerlane and Akbar. Thus history has been kind\nto men of literal minds; but it has seen a misshapen fable grow up\nin its shadow. The north had been the home of the monstrous races of\nclassic myth, and all their bestial and godless traits were merged in\nthe Tartar tradition.\n\n[Illustration: \u201cBUILD US, O DOUL-KARNAIN,\u201d THEY BEGGED, \u201cA RAMPART\nBETWEEN US AND THEM\u201d]\n\nBald, deformed anthropophagi mustered behind the barrier of the\nScythian mountains. Gog was the Turkish race, Magog was the Mongol.\nThe campaigns of Alexander had left legends that persist to this day\nin Central Asia, and these were gathered up in the accumulating myth.\nAlexander had also left earthworks and monuments of his marches in\nthose regions, and these became memorials of the terrible peoples of\nEzekiel. At first the two races were placed a little to the north of\nPalestine, but tradition moved them farther to the north and east to\nbring them within the Alexander cycle. As Eden was at the end of the\neast, so Gog and Magog were in the farther north, \u201cin Scythia beyond\nthe Caucasus and near the Caspian Sea,\u201d says St. Jerome, writing in an\nage when that sea was thought to be a gulf of the Arctic Ocean.\n\nConfused reports about the Chinese wall grew into a fable of Iskander\u2019s\nwall, which at one time was deemed to be in the Far East, and again\nwas identified with the fortifications which the Sassanid kings had\nbuilt in the passes of the Caucasus, fragments of which are still to\nbe seen at Derbent. It seemed most fitting that the Caucasus with its\ntowering peaks, its broken valleys, and its remnants of diverse peoples\nshould be the mountain prison of these predestined scourges of mankind.\nThere also were to be found the Ten Lost Tribes, who had joined them.\nMaundeville merges the two traditions and connects them with a third;\nGog and Magog and their Jewish associates all paid tribute to the queen\nof Amazonia. According to Ricold of Monte Croce, they could not with\npatience hear Alexander\u2019s name.\n\nThere was a legend that both races escaped, guided by an owl and a hare\nover their mountain walls; wherefore the Tartars wear owl feathers\nin honor of their deliverance. But Astrakhan has the story that they\nare prisoned still in remote valleys of the Caucasus, where twelve\ntrumpets, blown by the winds, keep them in terror against the day when\nthey shall break forth and destroy the world.\n\n\n_Prester John\u2019s Kingdom_\n\nWhen the Christian world was hard put to hold its own in its crusading\nadventure in the Holy Land, word came to it that it had an ally in\nthe rear of Islam. Somewhere in the remote east, on the farther side\nof Persia and Armenia, there was a king and priest who ruled over a\nChristian people. He had taken the field with a great army, defeated\nthe Moslem kings of Media and Persia, seized their capital of Ecbatana,\nand marched to the relief of Jerusalem. Without boats to cross the\nTigris, he had gone north into colder lands, intending to cross upon\nthe ice and reach the holy city by a roundabout road. But the winters\nproved too mild, and after waiting several years he had gone home again.\n\nThus the Europe of the twelfth century heard the story of Prester\nJohn. In one form or another it was repeated by Otto of Freisingen, by\nMaimonides, and by Benjamin of Tudela. In the travels of the latter,\nJohn is a Jewish king reigning in gorgeous state over a Jewish nation\nof the deserts. Popular tradition had it that the royal Christian of\nAsia had addressed a letter to the Pope of Rome and to the Greek and\nRoman emperors. Its recital of splendors and prodigies was a challenge\nto the spirit of wonder.\n\n\u201cI, Presbyter Joannes, the Lord of Lords, surpass all under heaven\nin virtue, in riches and in power,\u201d runs the letter. \u201cIn the three\nIndies our Magnificence rules, and our land extends beyond India; it\nreaches towards the sunrise over the wastes, and it trends towards\ndeserted Babylon near the tower of Babel. Seventy-two provinces, of\nwhich only a few are Christian, serve us. Each has its own king but all\nare tributary to us. Our land streams with honey, and is overflowing\nwith milk. In one region grows no poisonous herb, nor does a querulous\nfrog ever quack in it, no scorpion exists, nor does the serpent glide\namongst the grass, nor can any poisonous animals exist in it or injure\nany one. With us no one lies, for he who speaks a lie is thenceforth\nregarded as dead.\u201d\n\nThe royal letter writer recites that in his dominions is the earthly\nparadise, claims as his subjects all the peoples of prodigy, and\ndescribes in detail his human menagerie in the Caucasus. The accursed\nfifteen nations imprisoned there eat their foes, only desisting at\nPrester John\u2019s word. They will \u201cburst forth at the end of the world,\nin the time of Antichrist, and overrun all the abodes of the Saints as\nwell as the great city Rome, which, by the way, we are prepared to give\nour son who will be born, along with all Italy, Germany, the two Gauls,\nBritain and Scotland.\u201d\n\nWhether this letter was ever received or no, Pope Alexander III did\ndispatch to Prester John a letter which, between the lines, reads like\nthe reply to an irritating missive. It asserted the papal claims to\nuniversal dominion and demanded that the priest-king recognize them.\nThe messenger who bore it eastward in 1177 was never heard of again.\nMeanwhile the pagan Mongols had broken into Europe and it became papal\npolicy to conciliate their good will and if possible win them over\nas allies of the Cross against the Crescent. The monkish envoys who\npenetrated the heart of Asia found a power as vast as that claimed for\nthe Christian monarch, but it was in the hands of the sons of Genghis\nKhan; and there was no Prester John.\n\nThis was a Nestorian fable, said Rubruquis; \u201cabout nothing they make a\ngreat fuss.\u201d As to their King John, \u201cI traversed his pastures and no\none knew anything about him.\u201d Rubruquis speaks of Ung-Khan, prince of\na province in Mongolia southeast of Lake Baikal. According to Marco\nPolo, who entered Asia in the same generation, this was Prester John.\nThe Christian chief of a Hunnish tribe, he was defeated and slain by\nGenghis Khan. The legend faded out of the consciousness of the west,\nonly to be revived and domiciled in Abyssinia when Europe learned of\nthe power of its sovereigns and that they were Christians of the Coptic\nfaith.\n\nThe tale of this Asiatic priest-king who wanted to put his armies at\nthe disposal of the hard-beset Christians of the west has the irony\nand pathos of allegory. Without purporting to do so, it tells the\nstory of a great eastern adventure of the church which the Greek and\nRoman communions had almost forgotten. The Nestorians had been cast\ninto outer darkness in one of the schisms of the Eastern Empire in the\nunhappy sixth century, when, as Gibbon says, Christians were \u201cmore\nsolicitous to explore the nature, than to practice the laws, of their\nfounder.\u201d The offense of Nestorius, patriarch of Constantinople, was\nthat he called Mary the Mother of Jesus and not the Mother of God,\nand contended that in Christ the divine and human natures subsisted\nindependently of each other. He was excommunicated, and died in exile.\n\nHis followers, driven from the empire, went forth into Asia and\nestablished an empire of the spirit wide as that afterward claimed for\nthe Prester John of legend. They founded churches in Persia, Bokhara,\nSiam, and Sumatra. They penetrated India and contended with Buddhism\nin Tibet. They won millions of followers in Cathay, where their\nreligion was tolerated under an imperial edict of the seventh century\nas \u201cvirtuous, mysterious, and pacific.\u201d From Palestine to China they\nheld the field for the Christian faith, and their communicants were\nmore numerous than those of either the Greek or Roman church. There\nare places in Asia which have not seen a Christian missionary since\nthe Nestorians passed, as soon they did. In Kurdistan and Persia their\nfaith survives in the affections of perhaps three hundred thousand\nworshipers.\n\nIt was the weakness of this faith that it nowhere had a country of\nits own, and therefore no powerful central hierarchy sleepless in its\ncause. For better or worse it was never able to draw the sword; it\nspread itself only by persuasion and the tolerance of pagan countries\nwhose princes followed other cults. It must be that some dreamy\nNestorian monk, familiar with the west and its ways, and pondering what\nhis church had done in Asia and might have done had the fates been\nkinder, wrote in the days of its decline the letter which gave it the\ncountry it lacked and set forth its spiritual dominion in terms the\nwest would understand.\n\n\n_The Witch Realm of Lapland_\n\nIn the dark ages a tradition arose that there was a witch nation in\nthe north of Europe. Its citizens were the Lapps, whose descendants\nstill fish, hunt and pasture their reindeer in the wilder districts\nof Norway, Sweden, Russia, and Finland. They are the most timid and\ninoffensive of men. They seem never to have had government of their\nown, but have been overtaxed, exploited, and at times enslaved by\nstronger neighbors. Swarthy, dwarfish, and shrill-spoken, with broad\nheads, upturned noses, and bandy legs, they may be the survivors of\nthe small, dark race that once overspread the continent. Such a people\nwould need supernatural powers to overcome their manifold handicaps,\nand with these legend endowed them.\n\nTheir sinister reputation came to them because of their gnome-like\naspect, because they were still in the stone age of culture, and\nperhaps because they were pagans after the remainder of Europe had\nbecome Christian. Their magic drums were the terror of settled lands.\nThey could make themselves invisible. They could raise the winds. \u201cThey\ntye three knottes on a strynge hangying at a whyp,\u201d wrote Richard Eden\nin 1577. \u201cWhen they lose one of these they rayse tollerable wynds.\nWhen they lose another the wynd is more vehement; but by losing the\nthyrd they rayse playne tempests as in old time they were accustomed\nto rayse thunder and lyghtnyng.\u201d Tales of ships which went too near to\nLapland and were heard of no more were rife among the seafaring states.\nYet Ivan the Terrible sent for Lapp magicians to read the portent of a\ncomet, and the Norse princess Gunhild lived in their country to learn\nits lore.\n\nMuch of the superstition of the neighbor Finns has entered into the\nLapland tradition. Their magic songs picture their small cousins\nas living in almost legendary lands--Lapland itself, a dark, vague\nnorthern country where the people wore tall hats and spoke in whining,\nmumbling voices: Turja Fells, with its wonder-working maidens; and\nPohjola, \u201chome of the north,\u201d where the old woman, Louhiatar, \u201cthe\nblind whore of Pohjola,\u201d queened it in a realm that had neither sun nor\nmoon. These songs have much to say of hazy headlands and spells wrought\nupon them and on the main. A furious old wife sweeps the sea, with a\ncloth of sparks on her head, and on her shoulders a cloak of foam.\nFour maidens of the air mow grass on a cloudy cape in a foggy island.\nThe sharp maiden Terhetar sifts the mist on a shrouded promontory. A\nwood spirit shrieks at people and fills the forest with murk when they\nwander there.\n\nIn the Orkney and Shetland islands, the Lapps were known as Finn-folk.\nSometimes they crossed the North Sea and, hiding their identity,\nappeared among the islanders, with whom they intermarried; skilled\npersons, however, detected them by their wrinkled visages and the odd\nblemishes upon their skins. The visitors knew the language of birds\nand beasts, into which, indeed, they could transform themselves; and\nwith impunity they rode the tricky water-horse. They could control the\nweather, predict the future, cure diseases of men and cattle. It was\na slight task for them to make the passage from the continent. Most\npeople believed they swam across--for either they were seals who took\nhuman form, or men who could take the seal form. Sometimes when fisher\nfolk harpooned a large seal they found a strange little man struggling\nin the waves.\n\nThese credulous island tales carry the legend of a witch nation of the\nnorth almost into the twentieth century.\n\n\n_The Spice Islands_\n\nThe ninth edition of the _Encyclop\u00e6dia Britannica_ forgot to mention\nthe Moluccas. A standard atlas of the world published in the United\nStates neglects to describe them. A day\u2019s sail to the southeast from\nthe large Philippine island of Mindanao brings one to them, but\nAmerican travelers do not make this trip. Only a strait, to the right\nand to the left, separates the group from New Guinea and Celebes, and\nnarrow are the seas between it and Java to the south; yet these are\nnames of consequence in modern geography, while it is a name all but\nunknown. There is magic, modern magic, in the tropic islands of the\nPacific. These islands do not share it, though they lie on both sides\nof the Line in the fairest of summer seas.\n\nThey have another name, the Spice Islands. For the space of two\ncenturies men who followed the great waters thought of them and of\nlittle else. It was spices that Columbus sought when he sailed west\nfrom Palos in 1492 and the man who discovered sassafras in America had\nhonors comparable to his own. It was an eastern route to the spice\nregions that engaged Portuguese endeavor and conducted the ships of da\nGama into the Indian Ocean in 1497. It was a western route to the Spice\nIslands that Magellan sought in his voyage around the world a score of\nyears afterward. The royal grant to del Cano, who brought one ship\nhome from that expedition, was conditioned on the annual payment of\ntwo cinnamon sticks, three nutmegs, and twelve cloves; and the coat of\narms which he was licensed to bear had the effigies of two Malay kings\nholding spice branches; to have gone around the world seemed to Spain\na lesser thing than to have discovered a route to these islands. To\nreach them was the object of the attempts to open a northeast passage\naround Asia and a northwest passage around America. To determine their\nownership was the subject of two papal bulls and a dynastic agreement\nbetween the royalties of Spain and Portugal; and they fell at last as a\nprize of war to Holland.\n\nIn the age of discovery India and China were small words compared\nwith the Spice Islands. The place this forgotten group once held in\nthe imagination of men is one of the great illusions of commercial\ngeography.\n\nNor was it all illusion. If the world trade of antiquity was mainly\nin incense, the world trade of the Middle Ages was mainly in spices,\nand for a similar cause--with the primitive transportation of the\nperiod, less valuable and more bulky things could not be carried far\nat a profit. Nowadays the meats, grains, vegetables, and fruits of\nall climes travel long distances to the dinner table, and men\u2019s diet\nhas both variety and quality. In former times the range of eatables\nwas small, the quality poor. The service of spices was to improve\nand diversify the flavors of viands, to disguise the shortcomings of\nmedi\u00e6val cookery as well as medi\u00e6val larders. The salt-fish diet of\nEuropean winters created the spice trade with the east.\n\nWhen the Turkish seizure of Egypt in 1521 closed the southern overland\nroute to the east the same year that both the Portuguese and the\nSpanish reached the Moluccas, the stage was set for the romance of\nspice. Passing from unknown sources through various hands, it had\nreached the west at a tenfold price. Here was opportunity to deal\ndirect in what all Europe wanted.\n\nIt was known that these were not the only spice lands. Cassia grew in\nSomaliland and cinnamon in Ceylon, and both were used in food as well\nas incense. The ginger root came from a reed of Cochin-China. Benjamin\nof Tudela, Ibn Batuta, and Friar Odoric had described the pepper\n\u201cforests\u201d of Malabar, and Marignolli had even told of pepper wars\nbetween Jews and Christians. Through the Chinese port of Amoy, so Polo\nthought, there passed a hundred times as much pepper as came to all\nChristendom. But somehow the Moluccas, whence came cloves, nutmegs, and\nmace--the husks of nutmegs--seemed to be the kingdom of spicery.\n\nThey had won this distinction centuries before the first western\nship entered those seas. Although the islands have an area of only\ntwenty-five thousand square miles and a population of less than four\nhundred thousand persons, their two sultanates of Tidor and Ternate\nachieved dominion at about the same time as the Italian republics of\nVenice, Genoa, and Pisa, which in power they paralleled; and the one\ngroup of states, no less than the other, lived on the spice trade.\nThe colonial empire of the Moluccas extended over the neighboring\narchipelagoes and penetrated the continent; their trading settlements\ndotted the wide spaces of Malaysia. Java was their export market, and\nthere Polo saw the testimonials of their power in a spice trade that\nseemed to him to account for the greater part of the world\u2019s supply of\naromatic and pungent vegetable substances. They had already entered\ninto a political decline when the Europeans came, and this eastern\nventure of the Portuguese executed for them the same decree of fate\nthat it was to do for the maritime states of the Mediterranean.\n\nWhen Serrano reached the Moluccas he wrote to his friend, Magellan:\n\u201cI have discovered yet another new world, larger and richer than that\nfound by Vasco da Gama.\u201d The caravels of Portugal went no farther, and\nthe nation took such pains as it could that none others should go so\nfar. It was Portuguese policy in the spice trade, as it had been Arab\npolicy in the incense trade, that the sources of supply should remain\nunknown. Always the unknown is magnified. Robert Thorne, writing from\nthe Spanish court in 1527, declared that the islands abounded not\nonly in cloves, nutmegs, mace, and cinnamon, but in \u201cGolde, Rubies,\nDiamondes, Balasses, Garnates, Jacincts, and other stones and pearles.\u201d\nThe precious commodities he thought the simple natives would part with\non equal terms for the lead, tin, and iron of the north; and, measure\nfor measure, they would traffic their spices for corn, their diamonds\nfor pieces of glass.\n\nIn these islands fable found another home. Here, it was said, were men\nhaving spurs on their ankles like cocks, horned hogs, hens that laid\ntheir eggs several feet under ground, oysters so large that the shells\nwere used as baptismal fonts for children, crabs with claws so strong\nthat they could break the iron of a pick-ax, stones which grew like\nfish and out of which men made lime, and a river well stored with finny\ncreatures and yet so hot that it scalded the unwary bather. Drake,\nrefitting here in his voyage around the world, saw \u201can infinite swarme\nof fiery wormes flying at night making such a shew and light as if\nevery twigge or tree had been a burning candle.\u201d Also he saw bats as\nbig as hens and crayfish that dug holes like conies, and one of which\nwas a meal for four hungry men.\n\nThese decorations of fancy can add but little to the great theme of\nforgotten islands once the goal of the world\u2019s desire.\n\nThere was another curious chapter written when Dutch succeeded\nPortuguese. It was such a chapter as monopoly writes, and it comes\ndown into the nineteenth century. The ships of Holland cruised in the\nsurrounding seas, cutting down spice groves wherever they found them.\nBefore they were exported, all nutmegs were treated with fire and lime,\nso that no plantations could be started elsewhere--but pigeons carried\nthem to other islands and mother cloves were taken away in hollow\nbamboos, and the produce of home orchards multiplied, and the world\nspice trade dwindled in relative importance as the food of mankind\nbecame more varied.\n\nDampier tells of an island where the ground under the trees was\ncarpeted with cloves several inches thick, left there to decay. Another\ntraveler tells of seeing three heaps of nutmegs burning at one time,\neach of which would have filled a church. So the Dutch East India\nCompany reduced supplies in striving to maintain prices. The spicy\nodors that floated over the seas surrounding the Araby of fable became,\non occasion, a fact of the Molucca group. It was the incense neither of\nnature nor of religion, but of a dying commerce.\n\nThe nutmegs of to-day are grown mainly in the island of Penang in the\nBritish East Indies and in the island of Grenada in the British West\nIndies, while cloves come from the African island of Zanzibar.\n\n\n_Arcadia_\n\nArcadia is at once a country and a province of the imagination.\n\nThe real Arcadia is a mountainous plateau some forty miles square in\nthe central part of the Peloponnessus of Greece. Its chief exports in\nthe old time were asses. Its inhabitants were--and are--gruff-spoken\nherdsmen and peasants, equally scornful of letters and politics. They\nseldom went outside their own valleys, and few strangers came among\nthem. They had no central government and no relations with the other\nstates of Greece, and they wanted to be let alone. Yet they were\nwilling to fight--for pay; and sometimes they had to fight because\nSparta was their neighbor and they were on a war track. When Arcadia\ntook the field in force as the ally of another state, almost always it\nespoused the wrong side. In the quarrels of the Greek republics, and\nin the series of wars in which Pompey, Julius C\u00e6sar, Mark Antony, and\nAugustus figured, it shared the hard lot of the vanquished. Although it\nlay remote and its spirit was aloof, the plateau had at least its share\nof the troubles of the world.\n\nThe Arcadia of poetry occupies the same boundaries, but has had a\ndifferent history. All that the poets have done has been to stress\ncertain facts and forget the others. This land, as it seemed to them,\nstood like a fortress of rustic innocence above the turmoil of politics\nand the bustle of maritime trade that was ancient Greece. At each of\nthe corners of the plateau, like bastions, rose a group of mountain\npeaks, from which, on a fair morning, one might see the whole of\nArcadia, the neighbor states of the coastal plains, and beyond them\nthe Mediterranean. Great groves of gnarled oaks grew upon the mountain\nsides, there were pine forests, and in the open fields stood the\ngraceful plane tree, beloved of the classic world. Though the Arcadians\nwere unlettered, pastoral song had its birth among them, before the\ninspiration of Theocritus gave it a home in Sicily. Pan was their\ntutelar deity, and it seemed to the rustics sometimes that they could\nhear the plaintive music of his pipes as the goat-god reclined under\nthe plane tree. In this artless land, myth has it, Hermes strung cords\nacross the shell of a giant tortoise and made the harp.\n\nArcadia was equally skilled at the harp and the flute, and to these\nthe shepherds sang their simple lays. Aside from their love of music,\nthey seemed to the Greeks of the towns men of ignorant rusticity, and\nthey figure as simpletons--\u201cacorn eaters\u201d--in the Middle Comedy. The\nRomans copied this as they did everything else in Greek drama, and the\ndull Arcadian of the stage moved Latin audiences to laughter; \u201cArcades\nambo,\u201d both sweet innocents, is a phrase of the period. But the Romans\ncaught also the spirit of their rustic song, and the Arkady of poetry\nwas born in the Virgilian bucolics. Its outlines are disclosed in\nthe Tenth _Eclogue_, in passages which tell of browsing goats, and\nclover-rifling bees, and bubbling springs where dark-blue violets\nblow, and, animating the scene, the vintagers of mellow grapes and Pan\nhimself, red with elderberries and with cinnabar. \u201cArcadians, none but\nye can sing!\u201d exclaims the poet.\n\nOn this delicate outline the Renaissance laid the rich colorings of its\nfancy. The rugged, troubled mountain land became the one land in all\nthe world of simple peace and rustic innocence and wistful charm of\nthings ideal. Sanazzaro\u2019s Arcadian pastoral went through sixty editions\nin a century. France, Spain, England, and Holland, following Italy, all\nmade their excursions into Arkady. There was a succession of romantic\nsketches wherein lyrics declaring the loves of swains and bewailing the\ndeath of virgins are interspersed with dialogues that tell in prose\nthe poetry of pastoral life. The classic work of this school is the\n_Arcadia_ of Sir Philip Sidney. There, and not in the Morea, the Arkady\nthat is a province of the imagination may best be explored.\n\nIt is a tale of knightly youths and dainty maidens and one sentence\nwill declare its quality. When Pamela disrobed for the bath and set\nfoot in a stream \u201cthe touch of cold water made a pretty kind of\nshrugging come over her body, like the twinkling of the fairest of the\nfixed stars.\u201d\n\nHere, says Sidney, the very shepherds have their fancies lifted to\nso high conceits as the learned of other nations are content both to\nborrow their names and imitate their cunning. The hills garnish their\nproud delights with stately trees, the humble estate of valleys is\ncomforted with the refreshing of rivers, and the thickets declare the\ncheerful disposition of well-tuned birds. Sheep pasture with sober\nsecurity and by them are pretty lambs whose bleating oratory craves the\ndam\u2019s comfort. The herd girls sing their lays, while on the uplands\npipes the shepherd boy \u201cas though he shall never be old.\u201d\n\nThis is vision, all of it, sunshine and haze working their spell upon a\nrocky hillside. There are wolves in the sheepfolds of life.\n\n\n_Bohemia_\n\nBohemia is a subtler Arcadia, another province of youth and love and\ndreams; but youth passes thence, and love is a brief madness, and the\ndream may fail of fulfillment. Like Arcadia, the Bohemia that is a\nstate of mind has its reality in a mountain-girdled land, but, unlike\nArcadia, it has shifted on the map, refusing to be confined by any\nboundaries known to geography.\n\nNow even the name of it, with its music and implications of poetry,\nis lost to geography, and in its stead is the harshly named\nCzecho-Slovakia. Wherefore the Bohemians of art and literature, and\nunregulated impulse and fantasy, have no homeland they can call their\nown. This is a fitting thing. In a sense there never was a Bohemia,\nalthough there was always the fortress land which nature placed at the\nheadwaters of the Elbe on the borders of Germany. The Celtic tribe\nwhence it was named is only a shadow in history, and the Bohemians who\nfought with Poles and Germans, who wanted to be Protestant, who started\nthe Thirty Years\u2019 War, who were a dukedom, and a kingdom, and a part of\nthe Holy Roman Empire, were Slavs who called themselves Czechs.\n\nTheir literature is older than the German, their university at Prague\nwas one of the earliest centers of European culture, their capital is\nthe westernmost outpost of the east in Europe, their patriotism is a\nproverb, and their glass fabrics, their beer, and their beet sugar\nare staples of world commerce. Upon this people and their hill-walled\nhome the name of Bohemia and the traditions of \u201cthe gayest and most\nmelancholy country of the world\u201d fit but loosely. Whence the Bohemia\nthat is a haunting word on the lips of youth?\n\nShakespeare budded it, and the gypsies, and Frenchmen who knew too\nlittle, and Frenchmen who may have known too much. _Winter\u2019s Tale_ gave\nBohemia a seacoast and centuries of critics a chance to say its author\nnodded. Yet under the puissant Ottokar the country did have coasts on\nboth the north and south of Europe. The scene of the play is near the\nhead of the Adriatic. The Bohemia it pictures, instead of lying inland,\nis probably the maritime province of Istria, and historically the\nbackground is correctly named.\n\nFrom _Winter\u2019s Tale_ the Bohemians of the studio and pothouse got\nthemselves a coast, a glamour, and their First Citizen. \u201cPlaces remote\nenough are in Bohemia,\u201d the poet says. Here again is shepherd\u2019s love,\nand a prince whose courtship of a \u201cqueen of curds and cream\u201d is timed\nby the flowers as they pass--\u201cdaffodils that come before the swallow\ndares, and take the winds of March with beauty,\u201d and violets dim, pale\nprimroses, bold ox-lips and the flower de luce. \u201cThe fanned snow that\u2019s\nbolted by the northern blasts\u201d is far away.\n\nOn this scene of Arkady enters a figure in no wise Arcadian--Autolycus,\nearliest Bohemian, citizen of no country and of all. He is a vagabond,\na minstrel, a ballad-monger, a ribbon peddler, a cut-purse. His is\nthe footpath way, and his revenue, he explains, is the silly cheat.\n\u201cEnter Autolycus singing\u201d is the stage direction. Exit Autolycus also,\nsinging, \u201cA merry heart goes all the day, your sad tires in a mile-a.\u201d\n\nHere is a blood-brother of Villon, and Bohemia is already a province\nof his song. It becomes a kingdom with the coming of the gypsies.\nMedi\u00e6val France called them Bohemians, and thought them such, as other\ncountries thought them Egyptians. The roadside was their home, the\nworld was their country, they paid no taxes or rents, and report had it\nthat they had written the canons of their creed on cabbage leaves which\na donkey found and devoured. They practiced the wandering arts, were\nmusicians, metal-workers, horse-dealers, bear-leaders, snake-charmers,\nherb-venders; their women read palms, and were \u201cpleasaunt dauncers.\u201d\n\nThe gypsy philosophy found its first devotees in rogues of old Paris,\nwho called themselves dukes in Bohemia; Hugo has sketched their lawless\ncommonwealth in his _Notre Dame_. The Bohemia of artists and dreamers,\nlike many a country of the map, had ruffians, cheats, and vagrants for\nits early colonists. It was left to Murger to fix its frontiers, write\nits laws, and treat for its admission into the league of ideal lands.\nThe results are spread at large in his _Scenes de la Vie de Boh\u00e8me_.\n\nMuch has been written of the whereabouts of this land and of the\nconditions by which one becomes a citizen, but the matter is found\nentire in Murger\u2019s preface and in Arthur Symons\u2019s introduction to\nthis preface. \u201cAny man,\u201d says Murger, \u201cwho enters the path of Art,\nwith his art as his sole means of support, is bound to pass by way of\nBohemia.\u201d To Symons, Bohemia is \u201cthe sentiment youth has of itself\nat the flowering moment of its existence\u201d; the sadness of it is the\nconsciousness of the flight of youth.\n\nThe whereabouts of the country that has been mapped as neighbor both to\nGermany and Italy? Murger answers that Bohemia \u201cneither exists nor can\nexist anywhere save in Paris.\u201d But that is only Murger\u2019s answer.\n\n\n\n\nChapter XVII. Islands of Enchantment\n\n\n\u201cThe thirteenth day of May we passed by the Island of Paris, and\nthe Island of the bankes of Helicon, and the Island called Ditter,\nwhere are many boares and the women bee witches.\u201d This glimpse of\nMediterranean travel from one of the sixteenth-century wanderers whose\nvoyages are recorded in Hakluyt might be paralleled from the outer\nAtlantic, the Caribbean, the Indian Ocean, or the South Seas. In the\n_Arabian Nights_, for example, Sayf Al-Muluk and his companions came in\nturn to the isle of the old men of the sea; to the isle of ghouls who\nsleep under cover of their ears; to the isle of gigantic blackamoors\nwith protruding eyeteeth; and to the isle of trained apes \u201cbigger than\nhe-mules.\u201d\n\nSuch folk seem at home in the wilderness of waters. These distant\nspaces of the sea are little worlds of their own which imagination\nfeels free to dower with peculiar institutions and stock with peculiar\npeoples. In islands of reality or fantasy men place their ideal states,\ntheir pirate realms, their abodes of exile, their refuges from the\nrestraints and traditions of life--the sanctuaries of pursuits and\ncompanionships other than those of which they have tired. In them,\nalso, they place the regions of repose; to reach felicity one must\ncross water.\n\nOn journeys thither one might sight the shores of the folk of prodigy.\nThere were islands of men, and islands of women, and islands of\nhermits, and islands of witches, and islands of satyrs, and islands of\ngiants, and islands of dwarfs, and islands of dog-headed, ox-worshiping\ncannibals. The impulse thus to set aside a maritime domicile for the\nnondescript nations was strongest with Arab geographers and Celtic\nstory-tellers. It culminates in the romancing narrative of Maundeville,\nwho dotted the eastern seas with the archipelagoes of his fancy and\nsettled them with the creatures of fable.\n\nWhen the spell of terror woven in classic times began to lift from\nthe Atlantic, its islands swam into sight as to the strains of harp\nmusic. They appeared to belong equally to geography and to poetry.\nOf Madeira, the discovery of which is associated with the romance of\nfugitive English lovers, an old writer declared that such a delightful\nland \u201ccould only have been discovered by love.\u201d For reasons as yet\nunexplained, nearly all the newly found islands of the eastern Atlantic\nbore the names of animals or birds. About them, Sir John Hawkins wrote,\n\u201care certaine flitting Ilands which have been oftentimes seene, and\nwhen men approched neere them, they vanished.\u201d The older maps show one\nsuch island which was called St. Brendan\u2019s. It is a memory of the Irish\nsea epics, and the latter are themselves a review of the entire island\nstory.\n\nIn these five wander-tales the empty spaces of the Atlantic are filled\nin with islands which were loaned to the Irish by Homer from the\nOdyssey and Plato from his Atlantis; by the Greek, Lucian, from his\nRabelaisian _True History_; by the Roman, Seneca, with his vision of a\ncontinent in the west; by him who saw the Sea of Glass from the rock\nof Patmos; by Arab story-tellers, and by early Moorish and Spanish\nchroniclers from their narratives of the shadowy Antillia, the Isle\nof the Seven Bishops, and the legendary journey of the Deluded Folk.\nCeltic fancy passed a wand over this jumble of material, and a strange\nnew world appeared. Headlands of snow and ice and islands of perpetual\nsummer were within a day\u2019s sail of one another, pagan fables and\nmonkish marvels were domiciled together, there was much mist and much\nsunshine, and around all was \u201cthe mighty and intolerable ocean\u201d which\nSt. Brendan saw at Sliabh Daidche.\n\nTennyson has set one of these tales, _The Voyage of M\u00e6ldune_, to his\nown music. It was a journey of revenge a chieftain made with his men to\nslay the man who has slain his father. They came to the Silent Isle,\nwhere their voices were thinner and fainter than any flittermouse\nshriek; to the Isle of Shouting where wild birds cried from its summit\ntill the steer fell down at the plow and the harvest died in the field;\nto the Isle of Flowers where were blossom and promise of blossom and\nnever a fruit; to the Isle of Fruits, and in every berry and fruit the\npoisonous pleasure of wine; to the Isle of Fire, which shuddered and\nshook like a man in a mortal affright; to the Bounteous Isle, where the\nmen began to be weary, to sigh and to stretch and yawn; to the Isle of\nWitches, naked as heaven, who bosomed the burst of the spray; to the\nIsle of the Double Towers, that shocked on each other and butted each\nother with clashing of bells; and to the Isle of a Saint, who told the\nmen, \u201cGo back to the Isle of Finn, and suffer the past to be past.\u201d\n\nThis narrative may stand with variations for all of the Irish sea\ntales. Under the sway of some overmastering motive the hero puts forth\nupon the deep--for revenge, or to save a comrade condemned, or to seek\na woman, or to reach the Land of Promise, or to find the Lord upon\nthe sea. The voyagers pass from island to island. Complaisant Circes\ngreet them from one shore and indignant female virtue repels them from\nanother. They come to the isle called the Delicious, to the Isle of\nSheep, to the Isle of Laughter, to the Moving Isle which was a whale\u2019s\nback, to the isle which is the mouth of hell. They see demons racing\ntheir horses on a magic course, and red-hot swine issuing from caves,\nand stinging cats, and Judas on his rock, and ants the size of foals.\nA griffin assaults them, the Cyclopes threaten them, birds sing psalms\nto them. Repentant, or triumphant, or prophetic, or stricken in years,\nthey come back at last to an Ireland that has forgotten them.\n\nWho fares on from island to island with these Celtic dreamers may visit\nthe whole realm of fable.\n\n\n_The Sunken Lands_\n\nGazing into the ocean depths in warm latitudes one sees the fronds of\ntall aquatic plants sway slightly as if a slow breeze stirred them.\nWalls of coral rise there with a wavering semblance to palaces. The\npurple mullet swims in and out of sunken grottos. Such sunlight as\nreaches them is subdued to softness, like that admitted by cathedral\nwindows when it is late afternoon. These seem to be groves and gardens\nand habitations under the sea. Beings like one\u2019s fellow mortals, but\nmore beautiful and gentle, might live there and rove in the dim peace\nof meadows beneath the foam and tumult of the reefs.\n\nSuch thoughts come without bidding. Always men have sought the land of\nheart\u2019s desire, and sometimes they told themselves that it was under\nthe sea; or perhaps that what they saw there was not the promise of\nwhat should be but the wreck of what had been.\n\nThe sea is a mirror as well as a window. It repeats the curves of\nshore and sky and all that is between--cornfields, and grazing cattle,\nand the burden of orchards, and cottage smoke, and the loom of church\ntowers. Here is an underworld, though it be but the simple magic of\nlight upon smooth water. There is a subtler magic of mist and water\nand uncertain sun gleams when one stands on the west coast of Ireland\nand looks seaward through the eyes of a people in whom wonder never\nflickered down in doubt.\n\nDwelling alone on the outer coast of the world as the ancients knew it,\nthese folk had beheld strange things in the great waters that roared\nalong their cliffs. Shadowy islands showed themselves in thick weather,\nand, though no trace of them remained when the cloud bank lifted, these\nwere no tricks of mirage wrought by fog and muffled sunlight. They were\nisles of enchantment that might have floated out of sight, but more\nlikely had sunk beneath the wave, not to emerge again until another\nseven years were gone. The glints of splendor upon the distant sea were\nnot the track of the sun in broken water. They came from the golden\nroofs and spires of a sunken city.\n\nSo out of things seen--as in a glass darkly--upon, above, and under the\nbillow, and out of things imagined or hoped for, men have wrought the\nlegend of cities that sleep beneath the ocean. The tale of Atlantis\nis the oldest form of the legend. But the tales of lost cities are\nnot legend altogether and the tale of Atlantis may not be legend\naltogether. There are submerged ruins on which romance bases itself as\nupon reality, there are authentic historical happenings, and there are\nlocal traditions which, it may be, retain the memory of cities that\nwere upon islands or coasts engulfed by the sea.\n\n[Illustration: _In Islands Men Placed Their Ideal States.... To Reach\nFelicity One Must Cross Water_]\n\nAlong the Italian coast the columns of sunken Roman villas have given\nrise to stories of drowned cities. The ruins of towns lie under the\nZuyder Zee. Some inroad of the deep may be preserved in the legend of\nVineta, the fabled city beneath the Baltic near the Holstein coast.\nThere have been subsidences within historical time in the waters about\nthe British Isles, and the ocean has taken toll of the English coast\nitself. The Channel shoal called the Goodwin Sands, and Seal Rock,\nfragment of the Irish island of Inis Fit\u00e6 which was split into three\npieces in the eighth century, are tokens of these subsidences. In the\nAzores group, scene of the Atlantis legend, four islands appeared in\nthe eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, and sank again. Expedition\nIsland, northwest of Australia, which Dutch naturalists visited within\na generation, lies under seven fathoms of water. The populous island\nof Torca in the Indian Ocean went out of sight in a sheet of flame in\n1693. Tuanaki, an island in South Polar waters, has not been seen in\nninety years. The cloud bank which Peary called Crocker Land has been\nremoved from maps of the Arctic region. Three new islands have been\nborn in the Aleutian group, one of them as late as 1909. The strange\nstone images on Easter Island have given rise to conjecture that it\nmight be the remnant of a continent and a civilization lost beneath the\nPacific.\n\nThus there is a broad basis of fact for the legends of sunken cities.\nSome of these are of great beauty. Whether the product of pagan or\nChristian brooding, the sound of church bells is in them--peals that\ncome floating solemnly to the surface from towers through which deep\nwaters are moving. When the sunshine falls upon calm seas, so fisherman\nsay, they can discern these towers, and rising about them the peaked\nroofs of houses like those of the Middle Ages.\n\nBeyond all others the Celts are the people of the lost lands. These\nseem part of the Celtic heritage of defeat and dreams. The legends of\nWales tell of a fair land sunken by the folly of a drunken prince.\nThe lost Lyonesse, a great promontory of Cornwall, was such another\nland, and the Scilly Islands are the remnants. Tennyson and Swinburne\nhave rescued its memory from oblivion and Walter de la Mare pictures a\nscene \u201cin sea-cold Lyonesse, when the Sabbath eve shafts down on the\nroofs, walls and belfries of the foundered town.\u201d The story of Is, the\nvanished Breton capital, has been told in folk-song, in poetry, in\nstately music. It is one of the haunting fables of men, and back of it,\nas of so many tales of ruin and overthrow, is the figure of a beautiful\nand wicked woman.\n\nThe city of Is lay far in the west of France, where the coast of\nBrittany makes its great thrust into the Atlantic. Peasants point out\nthe blocks, visible at low tide in the Bay of Douarnenez, which they\nsay are its foundations. The city was builded in a wide plain below\nthe level of the sea, and strong walls, controlled by sluice gates,\ndefended it from the encroaching waves. It was an habitation of vice\nand pleasure, and it had a king as blameless as Arthur, and he a\ndaughter as cruel, as lustful, and as fair of face as Arthur\u2019s sister,\nMorgan le Fay. King Gradlon and Princess Dahut are the central figures\nin the drama of Is.\n\nDahut dwelt in a tower, where she entertained a long train of lovers,\ndrowning each as she tired of him. To please a paramour she stole from\nher father\u2019s neck in his sleep the silver key which unlocked the sluice\ngates and let in the sea. Awakened by the warning tumult of the waters,\nGradlon mounted a horse and fled, bearing his daughter with him. But\nthe floods moved after him and a voice bade him sacrifice to the sea\nthe beautiful demon who rode with him. Dahut fell to her death in the\nwaves, and their course was stayed. At Quimper the king rebuilt his\nseat, but Is was lost forever beneath the Atlantic. Though it happened\nfifteen centuries ago, there are Bretons who say that the faint chime\nof bells still comes to them when wind and tide move shoreward together.\n\nNine is the number of islands under the sea to the west of Erin.\nThey appear above the surface once in seven years. Though a man may\ndescry them from the coast, yet might he go toward them in a currach\nfor two days and not come up with them. Some of them are larger than\nIreland itself. They have been seen by trustworthy observers,--Otway,\nfor example. In a paper read before the Royal Irish Society, Westropp\ndescribes O Brasile, the best known of these, as he saw it in 1872: \u201cIt\nwas a clear evening with a fine golden sunset, when, just as the sun\nwent down, a dark island suddenly appeared far out to sea, but not on\nthe horizon. It had two hills, one wooded; between these, from a low\nplain, rose towers and curls of smoke. My mother, brother, and several\nfriends saw it at the same time. One cried out that he could see New\nYork!\u201d\n\nIllusion, but for thousands of years Irish eyes have beheld these\nphantom islands lift and fade in the west, and the Celtic glamour is\nin the legends that tell them. \u201cLost Kilsapheen,\u201d sighs the poet,\n\u201cits palaces and towers of pride ... all buried in the rushing tide\nand deep sea waters green.\u201d Churches and convents and castles are in\nthese islands, and those who have seen them or thought they saw them\nreport more intimate touches--an old woman coming out of a cabin to cut\na cabbage; the bleating of sheep and lambs heard in a fog on the open\nsea; the apparition of \u201can old Scotch gentleman\u201d wearing the raiment\nof another century upon an enchanted shore. Sometimes a seeming of\ntumult troubles these realms of shadow. There are flames and smoke and\nfugitives. Then the spell passes and there is naught but the slant of\nthe gull\u2019s wing and the roll of a porpoise on a distant billow.\n\nThe inhabitants of the islands are people of a vanished time, and\nsealmen, and mermen, and giants, and the prisoners of giants. If you\ncan find the golden key to one of the sunken lands it will rise to the\nsurface and remain there; but the key has been hidden under a cairn\nor is buried in the ruins of a Druid temple. There are other ways of\nlifting the spell. Casting a clod of earth upon an island when it is\nabove water may disenchant it. Another way is by dropping a coal of\nfire upon it, or knocking the glowing ashes from your pipe upon the\nshore, or shooting a red-hot arrow from a boat, for \u201cfire is hostile\nto anything phantasmal.\u201d So was Inishbofin fixed above the surface of\nthe sea. Fishermen landed upon it in a fog and lit a fire. Then the fog\ncleared and they saw an old woman driving a white cow to drink. One of\nthem seized the cow\u2019s tail and found in his hand a spray of seaweed;\nand the woman and cow were turned into rocks. This was ages ago.\n\n\n_Where Eden Lies_\n\nEden, Elysium, and the Fortunate Isles are one. They are upon the earth\nand yet not of it. They are no part of the realm of shades and it is\nnot through the gates of death that one enters them. Mortal men have\ndwelt in them, or may reach them, and thither the heroes pass without\nleaving \u201cthe warm precincts of the cheerful day.\u201d These are the ideal\nlands of afternoon sunshine and airs that are at once a sigh and a\ncaress. The poetry and pity of men created them that there might be\nsome place of happiness with portals less somber than those of the\ntomb, and without the sadness of irrevocable farewells upon the paths\nthat lead to it.\n\nSo the realms of bliss were placed afar, at the end of difficult\njourneys which yet might be attained, or at least attempted. Eden lay\neastward. The Fortunate Isles of the Roman and the Elysian lands of\nthe Greek and Celt lay westward. In the conception of men these were\nislands, Eden almost as much as the others. The four sacred rivers\nflowed from it and around it, and in later times, what men who came\nnear to it particularly noticed was the sound of falling water.\n\nIt seemed to Columbus that the rushing current of the Orinoco flowed\ndown from Eden\u2019s steeps. It seemed to men before him that paradise\nmight lie in the southern hemisphere, deemed \u201cthe noblest and happiest\npart of the globe,\u201d and perhaps in the South Seas. There were those\nwho made Eden a coast on the northern ocean, and others who placed it\namong the fountains of Armenia. To most men the island of Ceylon was\nits seat. There Carpini heard the plash of its waters, and Maundeville\ndrank thereof, as he reports, to his bodily betterment.\n\nThe Fortunate Isles, the Elysian abode of the heroes, were placed by\nthe Greeks in the extreme west, near the river Oceanus. Their position\nreceded with the advance of world-knowledge and finally was fixed in\nthe Canary and Madeira islands, furthest outpost of Roman discovery.\nSatire though it is, the _True History_ of Lucian describes the Blessed\nIslands in the very term men used when they were glad to believe.\nAs his party approached these islands, odorous airs came out from\nshore, in which one could detect the mingled breath of the rose, the\nnarcissus, the hyacinth, and the lily. There was music from harp and\nlute, and then, as the boat grounded on the beach, \u201cthe guardians of\nthe isle immediately chained us with manacles of roses, their only\nfetters.\u201d\n\nThese were the same islands which the Celts called by many beautiful\nnames and whither the coracles of legend journeyed. It is hard to tell\nwhere the sunken islands of their history give way to the imaginary\nislands of their geography, and these to the ideal lands of their\nmyths. The three groups seem to lie one behind the other in the outer\nseas of the _Imrama_. The farthest group was the Celtic other-world,\nand yet so near was it to the coasts of the New World, that a claim\nfor the discovery of America is based on St. Brendan\u2019s voyage to the\nLand of Promise. The group may best be called an archipelago where\npagan and Christian ideals shared dominion. Therein was not only the\nLand of Promise, but \u201cMagh Mell of many flowers,\u201d the Land of Truth,\n\u201cwhose truth was sung without falsehood.\u201d There was the Land of the\nLiving, and the sensuous Land of Fair Women. In all these happy\nislands music swelled, and laughter, and there was neither wailing nor\ntreachery, and death was not; and the magic food was unsalted pork, new\nmilk, and mead.\n\nIt was the singular fate of this god\u2019s land of the Celt to become\nconfused with the geographical story of both Europe and America. The\nmemory of actual Irish voyages to the New World may be in the legend,\nand inference from wreckage carried from afar, along with the stuff\nof old dreams. Of the latter is a Spanish story wherein the Celtic\nparadise masks itself as the Island of the Seven Cities to which seven\nbishops had led their flocks to escape the Moor. Men whose hap it was\nto sight this shadowy coast were carried in a barge to the shore and\nentertained in a lofty hall by men who spoke their own tongue, though\nwith the antique accent. Europe credited the tale, nor guessed that the\nbarge was the same as that which bore the wounded Arthur unto Avalon.\n\nThese dream isles, at once aspiration and allegory, were found also,\nor rather they were sought, in the eastern seas. It is recited in the\nBuddhist records that the king of Udyana had a true report of the\nsilver walls and golden roofs of an island of the sages in distant\nwaters. The Chinese emperor, Tshe Huan Ti, of the third century before\nChrist, heard of a happy land seven hundred miles to the eastward in\nthe Yellow Sea, and sent young men out to find it. They saw it on a far\nhorizon and a roseate light was upon it. But storms drove them back.\nThe Japanese tell of such a land lying toward the sunrise, and call it\nOraisan.\n\nMaundeville knew of an island in the eastern ocean. It was something\nlike the places of eternal bliss in the far west, and yet was the home\nof people who were much as other men are except that they were better.\nWhen Alexander would have conquered them, an embassy bore him this\nmessage, \u201cNothing may thou take from us but our good Peace,\u201d and he let\nthem alone. In this isle of Bragman was \u201cNo Thief, nor Murderer, nor\ncommon Woman, nor poor Beggar, nor ever was Man slain in that Country.\nAnd because they be so true and so righteous, and so full of all good\nConditions, they were never grieved with Tempests, nor with Thunder,\nnor with Lightning, nor with Hail, nor with Pestilence, nor with War,\nnor with Hunger, nor with any other Tribulation, as we be, many Times,\namongst us, for our Sins.\u201d\n\nThe island paradises of mankind lie upon many waters and in every\nquarter of the earth. Alike for the Indians of Chile and of the\nAmerican Northwest, Elysium was in the distant Pacific. The natives\nof Haiti believed it was in western valleys of their own island. The\nnatives of Australia called it \u201cthe gum-tree country.\u201d The Semang of\nthe Malay Peninsula said it was across the sea in a land of screw\npines and thatch palms. It was their ancient island home, said the\npeople of the Celebes. It was northwest of Tonga, the Friendly\nIslanders thought, and Bulotu was the name they gave it; yams and\nbreadfruit were plentiful there, hogs abounded, and there were reefs\nfor shark-catching. Many Kanaka tribes named it Havaika, which is\nperhaps Java, or the Samoan island of Savaii, points of dispersion\nin their migrations. The natives of Torres Straits called it the\nisland of Kibu; in its treetops ghosts sat twittering. But the Solomon\nIslander could hear their laughter as they bathed in the surf of his\nown sea-befriended paradise. \u201cThese Marquesas,\u201d a nun said to Frederick\nO\u2019Brien, \u201cmake no more of death than of a journey to another island,\nand much less than of a journey to Tahiti.\u201d\n\nAmong races of higher culture Elysium takes on a more ordered beauty,\nyet remains na\u00efve. Annwfn is its Brythonic name and it lies at the end\nof a long voyage; no infirmity is there, and sweeter than white wine is\nthe drink from its mighty well. Before men embarked for it, they said\nin Babylon, there was a formidable land journey to take, over a high\npass guarded by scorpion men in the mountains of Masu, along a road\nof black darkness, through a park of precious stones, across a bitter\nriver--and then the waters of death; these may have been the Atlantic,\nor the sea of the Arabs. Elysium was far to the east in some mellow\nclime beyond the ocean, so the Slavs thought; and thither the birds and\ninsects went in autumn. It is a land of lotus lakes in the west, and\nits name is Sukhavati, say the Buddhists of Nippon; out of it comes a\ncontinual harmony of flowing rivers, murmuring leaves, and soft bells\nswung by softer winds. It is a kingdom in the northern ocean and its\nname is Vaikuntha, some Hindus say. Others speak of a paradise which\nthey call Svetadvipa, \u201cthe white island\u201d that is somewhere in the north\nbeyond the Sea of Milk.\n\nFor inland peoples the thought of a sea to be crossed, as every day\nthe sun crosses the sea to its rest, gave way at times to the thought\nof a river with a difficult bridge, and paradise on the farther side.\nSuch in the Hindu classics was the land of the Uttarakarus which lay\non the shores of the northern ocean beyond the radiance of the sun and\nthe moon. A river that petrified whatever entered it flowed between it\nand the countries of the south. Lakes with golden lotuses and tanks\nof crystal water shimmered in the light airs of this favored land. In\nits odorous orchards birds always sang, and beautiful maidens, hanging\nby their long hair, grew among the blossom-burdened branches--another\nglimpse of the enigmatic women of Wak-wak. Amid the sound of music and\nlaughter these Indian Hyperboreans did their pious deeds, nor shed the\ngod-unlawful tear, until ten thousand and ten hundred years had passed.\nThen they died, and fowls with sharp beaks carried their bodies to\nmountain caves.\n\nAn Irish myth of the Middle Ages holds closer to the facts of existence\nthan any of these stories of terrestrial felicity, and there is a\nnote of sadness in the beauty of it. In a lake in Munster were the\nislands of life and death. There was no port for death to enter the\nfirst island, but age and pain and sickness were there, and all the\nwearinesses of years. Its inhabitants learned at last to look on the\nopposite island as the place of repose, and, steering their barks to\nits shore, they entered upon eternal rest.\n\n\n\n\nChapter XVIII. The Terrible Ocean\n\n\nIn some of its moods the sea presents itself as a symbol of eternity.\nFor ages it was more than the symbol; it was eternity itself.\nMen shrank from contemplation of it, as they might shrink from\ncontemplation of the hereafter. A voyage into its outer spaces was like\nthe voyage of the soul into the shadows that lie beyond life. Still,\nthis conception shapes the imagery and colors the faith of the race.\nLife is a passage down a river that reaches an immeasurable sea. Death\nis a journey upon dark waters. The bark of salvation spreads its sails\nfor the pure of heart, and favoring winds waft them to the Beautiful\nShore. In the songs of Christendom one hears soft winds blowing over\nexpanses of peaceful water. The earth geography of Homer is the\nheavenly geography of Bunyan. The Ocean Stream that flowed around the\nworld is the river that flows by the Throne of God.\n\nClassic mythology ties up the sea\u2019s infinities with those of time\nthrough the medium of the Styx, which was at once a branch of the Ocean\nStream and the river that encircled the land of shades. The lake of\nAvernus which afforded entrance to the nether world, Charon\u2019s ferry,\nthe rivers Cocytus, Acheron, and Phlegethon, and the Stygian Pool\nitself, all gave to a Roman death the aspect of maritime adventure,\nalthough underground. The freer Greek fancy placed the Elysium of the\nsoul somewhere in the western ocean, where the sun sank to rest. There\nwere the Isles of the Blessed, or Fortunate Isles, where there was\nneither rain nor snow, but the shrilly-breathing west wind fanned and\nwatered the land.\n\nOther isles were there, the abodes of formidable men and dangerous\nwomen and prodigious animals. But one could get along very well by\naccepting the fictions of the poets as good enough geography and\nethnography without launching maritime expeditions to confirm them.\nThe western ocean offered the peoples of the Mediterranean no present\npromise or profit to match its terrors, and to alloy delights that\nhad too spectral a cast. Unlike the Indian Ocean, it was not a great\nhighway of trade. Thick clouds covered it, perpetual darkness reigned\nupon it. It was an unnavigable morass and a confusion; so said Hesiod,\nPindar, and Euripides, voicing the beliefs of their time.\n\nThere was one race that without fear put forth upon the sea. This was\nthe Ph\u0153nicians, and their rich African colony, the Carthaginians. Their\nadventures beyond the Pillars of Hercules brought profit to them, and\nthey saw to it that the tidings of them should bring dismay to others.\nA Ph\u0153nician fleet sent out by Necho, a Pharaoh of the XXXVIth dynasty,\nseems to have sailed around Africa. About B.C. 500 a Carthaginian fleet\nunder Hanno explored the African west coast as far as the mouths of\nthe Senegal and Gambia. At nearly the same time another Carthaginian\nfleet under Himilco discovered the British Isles, but it brought back\ndepressing stories. The islands were four months\u2019 distant from the\nStraits of Gibraltar, and the voyage thither was through waters haunted\nby frightful monsters and thick with entangling seaweed, where wild\nstorms and protracted calms succeeded one another.\n\nThese were not true tales, but other nations believed them, and the\nseafaring Semites were permitted to build up trading stations along\nthe coasts of the outer ocean--in western Africa, in Lusitania, in the\nScilly Islands, and in Cornwall. None challenged their monopoly of\nthe tin trade of the Cassiterides. They covered their tracks so that\nwhoever had the temerity to test their fables, or seek to tap their\nsources of raw material, would not know whither to go. Strabo tells\nhow the Carthaginians concealed from everyone the passage to the Tin\nIslands: \u201cWhen the Romans followed a certain shipmaster, that they also\nmight find the market, the shipmaster of jealousy purposely ran his\nvessel upon a shoal, leading on those who followed him into the same\ndestructive disaster. He himself escaped by means of a fragment of the\nship, and received from the state the value of the cargo he had lost.\u201d\n\nAccording to Eratosthenes, the Carthaginians went further: \u201cThey drown\nany strangers who sail past on their voyage to Sardinia or to the\nPillars.\u201d Thus through piracy, stratagem, and fable they maintained\ntheir monopoly on the waters of the west, and for once Greek curiosity\nplayed into a rival\u2019s hands. Tyrian and Punic marvel tales were\nelaborated and adorned by the poets of Attica, until everyone felt that\na journey beyond the Pillars was a thing not to be undertaken. All that\nthe earlier Greeks knew, even of the western Mediterranean, was that\nnear it was a mountain called Atlas on which the sky rested, and that\nthe world ended at the pillars set up by Hercules.\n\nOne Greek was determined to learn more, and see if his countrymen could\nnot also profit from the tin and amber trades. The journey of Pytheas\nof Massilia, at about B.C. 333, along the coasts of northern Europe\nis one of the noteworthy scientific expeditions of history. He is the\nfirst to speak of Thule. He found where amber came from. He noted that\nthe cereals gradually disappeared as one traveled north, that the\nnorthern grain was threshed in barns instead of upon open threshing\nfloors, and that fermented drinks there were made from corn and honey.\nIn a peculiar passage he asserted that beyond Britain there was neither\nearth, air, nor sea, but a mixture of all three--something like the\nelement which held the universe together. This substance, which he\ncompared to the jellyfish, rendered navigation impossible and led the\nRomans later to name those waters the Sluggish Sea. The apparently\nfabulous statement, made on hearsay, has been interpreted as referring\nto the dense fogs of the northern seas, to the blended effects of\nmist and light, and to the broken ice or slush that floats there in a\ntranslucent state. The reference to the jellyfish may be either to its\ntranslucence or its luminosity.\n\nAll that Pytheas reported of northern Europe was discredited. How, asks\nPolybius, could a private individual conduct such a vast expedition\nwith his narrow means? Strabo accuses the Massilian of having forged\nhis tales, \u201cmaking use of his acquaintance with astronomy and\nmathematics to fabricate his false narration.\u201d His complete vindication\nis the work of modern scholarship.\n\nThe next report of consequence from the outer seas comes nearly three\ncenturies later and was made to Sertorius, the Marian general under\nwhom for a time Spain maintained its independence of Rome. A tale of\nthe Fortunate Islands--probably of the Canaries--drifted in through the\nStraits and found the great soldier weary of life in camp and field.\nTwo sailors had arrived from islands which they described as about\ntwelve hundred miles west of the coast of Africa. Rains seldom fell\nthere, they said. The dews watered the earth, which yielded its fruits\nin abundance without the labor of man. The seasons were temperate,\nthe air was serene and pleasant, and soft winds blowing from the west\nand south brought days of bright moist weather. Even the barbarians\nbelieved that this was the seat of the blessed.\n\nThere was that in the jaded commander which lifted to the thought of\nnew horizons. Sertorius, says Plutarch, was seized with a wonderful\npassion for these islands and had an extreme desire to go and live\nthere in peace and quietness, safe from oppression and unending wars.\nBut the Cilician pirates, who were his allies, wanted not peace, but\nspoils. So the remainder of his life was spent in wars and government,\nand the world was denied an adventure instinct with romance and\npregnant with the potencies of great discovery.\n\nWith the voyage of Polybius in the fleet of Scipio along the west\nAfrican coast, the campaigns of C\u00e6sar in Gaul and Britain and the\nreduction of both into imperial provinces, even the incurious Roman\nbecame possessed of adequate geographical knowledge of the western\ncoasts of Europe and the waters near them. This knowledge, however, was\ntinctured with the marvelous, and was not long retained. Strabo, for\nexample, pictures the men of the Scilly, or Tin, Islands as wearing\nblack cloaks and tunics reaching to the feet, and as walking with\nstaves, thus \u201cresembling the Furies we see in tragic representations.\u201d\nHe must have meant the Druids.\n\nIn the same century in which the legions were withdrawn from Britain,\nProcopius, the foremost historian of the Eastern Roman Empire, was\nborn. Yet in that century of dissolution most of what the ancient world\nhad learned of the coasts and waters of the Atlantic was forgotten.\nThe western ocean had been a domain over which mists of ignorance and\nsuperstition hovered, sometimes rising for a moment of distant vision,\nsometimes falling like a blank curtain. In the sixth century A.D. they\ndrew so closely to the shores of Europe that even England was lost\nbehind them. It had ceased to be a Roman province and was become a land\nof ghosts.\n\nProcopius tells his story with due note of its dreamlike quality; and\nyet, he says, numberless men vouch for its truth. It is the story of\nthe English Channel become the ferry of souls. The fisher folk on the\ncontinental side are subject to the Franks, but pay no tribute, because\nit is their task in regular turn to transport the souls of the dead to\nBritain. Those on duty for each night keep indoors until a knocking is\nheard and a mysterious voice summons them. Arising from sleep, they go\ndown to the beach, where they find strange boats awaiting them. These\nseem to be empty, but when they seize the oars and push off they find\nthe gunwales only an inch above the water. In silence they make the\njourney and in an hour find themselves on the opposite shore, although\ntheir own skiffs could scarcely cross in a night and a day. When the\nkeels grate on the beach, suddenly the boats ride high on the waves.\nThere is none to greet them, but again a voice is heard, announcing the\nname and station of the spectral passengers.\n\nThus the end of the ancient world found men knowing only a little more\nabout the western ocean than they did at the beginning. The chief\nadvance over the Homeric age was that they knew it was an ocean and not\na circumfluent river. The old idea was not dead that it was a morass\nmade unnavigable by seaweed and mud, too thick and too shallow for\nsailing ships to venture upon. This notion was fostered by observing\nthe unfamiliar phenomena of ebb tides, with the long windrows of weed\nand the wide expanses of muddy flats they laid bare upon the coasts.\nPlato had deepened the belief and provided a reason for it in his story\nof Atlantis. \u201cThat is the reason,\u201d he concludes, \u201cwhy the sea in those\nparts is impassable and impenetrable, because there is such a quantity\nof shallow mud in the way.\u201d\n\nMen had no such notions, or fears of the open seas to the east,\nalthough they were careful not to get too far from their shores.\nThey knew that inhabited lands were beyond them, and that by not\nimpossible shores and islands they could reach these. The Periplus of\nthe Erythr\u00e6an Sea had full accounts of the coasts from Aden clear\nto the mouth of the Ganges, and reports also on Indo-China and China\nitself. There were pirate-haunted archipelagoes and islands tenanted\nby the monsters of Oriental fancy. But these were Eastern waters and\nit behooved men to know something about them and to take a chance upon\nthem, for a great traffic moved across them--silken fabrics, spices,\npepper, gold and silver and precious stones from the hidden storehouses\nof Asia. Wherefore men faced the seas of sunrise with no such fears as\ninvaded them when they looked out upon the empty and spectral Atlantic.\n\nAnother race beside the Ph\u0153nician was unafraid of the western sea. This\nwas the Northmen, of whom it was said that they never slept under a\nsmoke-blackened roof, nor ate and drank at any hearth. Their tradition\nlooked outward, where that of the Mediterranean races looked inward.\nThe ocean was the whale path of their skalds, and their hearts sang\nalong it. Its waters carried the challenge and promise of the present,\nnot the glooms or pallors of the hereafter. When their long boats drove\nthrough the Straits of Gibraltar into the old Roman world to pillage\nand rule there, it was the return visit of the men of the outer spaces,\nferocious and blithe sea-rovers who thus requited the trafficking and\ntimid excursions of Ph\u0153nician and Roman into the seas that washed the\ncontinent.\n\nThe very names of Viking chieftains--Sigurd Snake-eye, Thord the\nYeller, Ottar the Swart, Harold Blue-tooth, Eric Blood-ax, Thorfinn\nSkull-cleaver, Sweyn Split-beard--sketched a hardihood that made light\nof supernatural terrors upon the sea and knew none other. These men of\nthe viks or fjords rid the coasts of Europe in the eighth and ninth\ncenturies of every fear except of themselves. Then they went westward\nto America.\n\nThere is a bolder note in their geographical tradition than in aught\nthat had been before. One catches the swing of the Atlantic surges and\nthe pulses of people at home there in the chapter, \u201cOn the Situation of\nCountries,\u201d which begins the chronicle of the _Heimskring\u2019la_: \u201cIt is\nsaid that the earth circle which the human race inhabits is much cut\nasunder with bights and bays, and that great seas run into the land\nfrom the outer ocean. Of a certainty, it is known that a sea goes in at\nthe Norva Sound (Gibraltar) right up to the land of Jerusalem; and from\nthat sea, again, a long bay, which is called the Black Sea, goes off\nto the northeast, and it divides the two World-Ridings, that is to say,\nAsia on the east from Europe on the west. To the north of the Black\nSea lies Sweden the Great, or the Cold (Russia); and this is reckoned\nby some as not less in size than the Great Saracen Land, or even the\nGreat Land of the Bluemen (the Moors). And the northern parts of this\nSweden are unpeopled, by reason of the frost and the cold, just as the\nsouthern parts of Blue-Land are waste because of the sun\u2019s burning.\nMighty lordships are there in this Sweden, and people of manifold kind\nand speech; there are giants and there are dwarfs--aye, and Bluemen,\nand folk of many kinds and marvellous, and wild beasts, and dragons\nwondrous great.\u201d\n\nWhen the pagan Northmen became Christians their ferocity was moderated,\nand their spirit of enterprise, as it seemed, almost extinguished.\nTheir old contempt of the sea did not pass into the veins of the\npeoples over whom for a time they had dominion. Rather the confused and\ncredulous views of the churchmen became their own, henceforth occupying\nthe entire field of European thought. Adam of Bremen, eleventh-century\nchurchman, pictures the sea as his time conceived it--the old\nforbidding canvas of classic legend framed with the icicles of Gothic\ndiscovery.\n\nTerra Firma, says Adam, is entirely surrounded by the infinite and\nterrible ocean. The northern spaces of the deep are covered with ice\nand darkness and this expanse is called the frozen, glutinous, or\ndarkling sea. It is stiff with salt and covered with black ice, formed\nlong before and so dry that it will burn like peat.\n\nThe German bishop even borrows a tale from the Northmen to engender\nterrors to which they had been stranger. Their king, Harald Hardrada,\nthe most daring of men, had reports from Frisian mariners which caused\nhim to set sail for the limits of the earth. In the darkness he\narrived at the North Pole--a profound vortex into which the ebb tides\nwere sucked and out of which the flood tides were disgorged. His ship\nplunged down into the boiling chaos, but the sea which took could also\ngive, and the outward heave of its vast bosom flung the vessel back\nagain beyond the clutch of the whirlpool.\n\n[Illustration: ROARING FORTIES _By_ F. J. Waugh]\n\nAs late as 1406 a chronicler tells of English ships, bound for\nBordeaux, which penetrated an unfrequented sea where four vessels from\nLynn were swallowed up in a whirlpool, which thrice a day drew in and\ncast out the flood. When fishermen of that time went a few miles from\nland they used only haaf-words--a sea speech in which persons, animals,\nand things had other names than what they bore ashore; so might they\navoid offense to whatever was astir in the deep.\n\nIt is refreshing to turn from the gloomy imaginings of the West to\nIndian and Chinese legends of the Seven Seas. In the quainter fancy\nthat animates them, at least the note of fear is missing. From the\nPuranas, Gerini has made these identifications: The Sea of Salt Water\nsurrounds India. The Sea of Sugar Cane Juice surrounds Burma. The Sea\nof Wine surrounds the Malay Peninsula. The Sea of Clarified Butter\nsurrounds the Sunda Archipelago. The Sea of Milk surrounds Siam and\nCambodia. The Sea of Curds or Whey surrounds South China. The Sea of\nFresh Water surrounds North China and Mongolia.\n\nFear of the ocean, and above all of the Atlantic, is, however, the\ndistinctive note in medi\u00e6val Arab geography. This was perhaps a native\ngrowth of the desert, and its spirit is in the Koran passage which\nspeaks of \u201cblack night upon the deep, which wave on wave doth cover,\ncloud upon cloud, gloom upon gloom.\u201d Arab merchants and pilgrims\nranged to the ends of the Moslem world. Save Marco Polo, Ibn Batuta\nwas the earth\u2019s greatest and most curious traveler. To the Arab port\nof Bassorah, sailors from the Nile, the Mediterranean, and even the\nChina Sea brought the gossip of mankind. Yet a dread of the deep sounds\nthrough the works of Arab geographers, as through the saga of Sindbad,\nwith the effect of a refrain.\n\nAround the fair meadows of the world swung the terrible ocean, the Sea\nof Darkness as the Arabs called it. To Massoudy the Atlantic was the\nGreen Sea of Gloom. None dwelt there, none could sail there, none knew\nto what infinite distances it reached. Ibn Khaldun described it as\nthe boundless, impenetrable limit of the west. Other lights of Islam\nspoke of the whirlpools into which vessels were drawn, and argued that\neven if sailors knew the direction of the winds they did not know\nwhither the winds would carry them; nor could they carry them anywhere,\nfor there was nowhere to go, and in the realms of mist no prospect\nof getting back. Sane men would not attempt a venture out of sight\nof land, said certain of the doctors. To plan such a journey, it was\nasserted, was evidence of an unsound mind; to embark upon it was ground\nfor depriving a man of his civil rights.\n\nIdrisi, Mohammedan savant in the service of King Roger of Sicily in\nthe twelfth century and the greatest of Arab geographers, utters the\nauthoritative Arab word upon the sea: \u201cThe ocean encircles the ultimate\nbounds of the inhabited earth, and all beyond it is unknown. No one\nhas been able to verify anything concerning it, on account of its\ndifficult and perilous navigation, its great obscurity, its profound\ndepth and frequent tempests; through fear of its mighty fishes and its\nhaughty winds; yet there are many islands in it, some peopled, others\nuninhabited. There is no mariner who dares to enter its deep waters; or\nif any have done so, they have merely kept along its coasts, fearful of\ndeparting from them.\u201d\n\nWhether this was in some part a literary convention--a gesture of\ngeography--or the expression of an unshakable dread, the sentiment\nlimited the service of Islam to mankind. The Arab coasting trade had\nreached as far as China and as far down the eastern side of Africa\nas Zanzibar. But this people, so resourceful on land, never pushed\ntheir coasting adventures around the Cape of Good Hope, as Prince\nHenry and his Portuguese successors did from a farther north on the\nother side of Africa. Nor did they attempt, as Columbus did, the\ncrossing of a great sea. Nor did they essay, as Magellan did, to prove\nby a circumnavigation the rotundity of the earth on which their own\ngeographers had spoken with the clearest voices of the Middle Ages.\n\nA group of remarkable legends illustrates the later annals of the\nwestern ocean and carries them on to the Columbian adventure. Idrisi\ntells a story of the eight Deluded Folk, or Lisbon Wanderers, who went\nout to sea when the wind blew from the east and for more than a month\nwere carried before it. They reached an island supposed to be one of\nthe Canaries, where they found a people who spoke Arabic and who sent\nthem back when a wind arose from the west. St. Brendan voyaged for\nseven years among seven islands of the west, according to a story\nwidely circulated in the eleventh century. The tenth-century tale of\nthe island of the Seven Spanish Bishops who had left Spain to escape\nMoslem rule was revived by a Portuguese ship captain who claimed to\nhave reached the island; but when Prince Henry bade him go back for\nproofs, the romancer took refuge in flight.\n\nIt may have been that the Ph\u0153nicians made atonement at last for the\nfables of paralyzing fear which they had spread abroad, and on the\nouter verge of the Old World in the days of their decline left their\nsecret as a legacy for the bold to profit from. The scene is Corvo,\nwesternmost of the Islands of the Sun, as the Azores were called;\nand the passage, though from a Portuguese writer of the seventeenth\ncentury, refers to events a generation before the Columbian discovery.\nSays Manoel de Faria y Souza: \u201cOn the summit of a mountain called\nthe Crow was found the statue of a man on horseback, without saddle,\nbareheaded, the left hand on the horse\u2019s mane, the right pointing to\nthe west. It stood on a slab of the same stone as itself; beneath it,\non a rock, were engraved some letters in an unknown language.\u201d\n\nOne explanation of the legend is given by a traveler of the last\ncentury, who said that the superstitious folk of the island fancied\nthey saw in a promontory which reaches far into the sea the semblance\nof a person with his hand stretched out toward the New World. This,\nthey declared, was the work of Providence, and Columbus read the sign\naright. But the tale may not so easily be interpreted and dismissed.\nA hoard of Carthaginian coins, so runs a report which Humboldt\naccepts, was discovered in Corvo in 1749; and there are other stories\nof equestrian statues of Carthaginian design erected upon Atlantic\nislands. Against the utter drama of the legend--the parting gesture of\ngood will of a bold and subtle race of ancient time--may be set another\nlegend, more in keeping with the superstition and fears of the Middle\nAges. This was no equestrian statue pointing westward, if the Pizzani\nmap of 1367 was to be believed. It was the figure of a saint with his\nback to the sunset and his outstretched hand warning mariners away from\nthe unnavigable seas behind him.\n\nThe monkish monument was the parable of a twilight time. To the\nfifteenth century the deep was an eerie domain where the creatures of\npagan and Christian story couched upon the ocean floor, showed their\nunholy shapes among the waves, chattered on desert island strands,\nand wove their enchantments in the mists. In the north the witches of\nLapland raised storms and wrecked the ships that passed their shores.\nTo the south none might sail beyond Cape Bojador on the African Gold\nCoast. Who did so was turned from white to black, and never came\nback. There the flaming sword of the sun was laid across the paths of\nthe sea. What was beyond it was boiling brine and air heated into a\nflame--a landless firmament of water and a starless firmament of sky.\n\nLooking westward, men cowered before visions of the Hand of Satan,\nthrust upward from far horizons to drag ships into the depths. Or \u201cthe\nwind that blows between the worlds\u201d might carry mariners away on a\njourney from which was no returning. Or currents, setting always in one\ndirection, might sweep them into illimitable space. If the world was\nflat, one might sail off its edge. If it was round, its very rotundity\nwould present a sort of mountain up which no ship could climb on the\nbackward voyage. As to the Atlantic races, the medi\u00e6val maps told\none what to expect. What chance of succor, or agreeable converse,\nor a profitable traffic from spouting monsters, satyrs, sirens and\nconch-blowing tritons? Could one warm his hands at the witch-fires of\nthe sea?\n\nOut of these gray forebodings the ships of Columbus, with one stout\nheart and many questioning ones aboard, sailed into the unknown, as\nvessels move through the sluggish dark before the dawn breeze springs\nup and the sky reddens toward sunrise. Ere long the caravels were\nsteering among isles fanned by soft breezes and bathed in tropical\nsunshine, and naked, kindly peoples were hailing the mariners as\nvisitors from the skies. Morning had broken at last upon the western\nocean, and in its level rays a path lay sparkling clear across the\nsea--the path of enterprise, of conquest, of gold, the path of\nvictorious dreams. Along that highway hardy spirits soon would press\non great adventures. In the stead of ghost-ridden hearth-keepers,\nmumblers of old fable, shrinkers from the outer surges, there were\nmen who dared go round the earth in flimsy barks and lead a handful of\nfollowers against the haughty empires of the Cordilleras.\n\nTerror was dead upon the deep. Somewhat of fable remained.\n\n\n\n\nChapter XIX. The Sargasso Sea\n\n\nIf there were no Sargasso Sea there would still have been a legend of\none to satisfy the demand of the mind, in a world of change and motion,\nfor a place where there was neither. Conscious of the flight of time,\nnoting the flow of rivers, the wind\u2019s wandering, and the climbing and\nfalling of the waves of the ocean, the mind has created realms where\ntime stands still, countries of morning calm and afternoon sunshine,\nand spaces where the pulse of the sea is asleep. Peace there was in\nthe grave, but what was sought was a paradox--something alive and\nyet motionless in time and space. There were stagnant pools in the\nimagination, grotesqueries, junk heaps, a sense of silences and of slow\ndecay that was no decay at all but the serenity of noon in a swamp. The\noutward symbol of these moods men would have in the world about them.\n\nFor uncounted ages that symbol had been a fact of the mid-Atlantic.\nPeople must have known of the Sargasso thousands of years ago, though\nthe memory of the voyages in which they learned of it is no more, and\nthe tales that seem to speak of it are not accepted as facts. Plato\nhad told of the thick waters that rolled over the sunken Atlantis,\npreventing the passage of ships. When Columbus entered this sea and\nsaw tunny fish playing about his caravels, he remembered a story of\nAristotle that certain ships of the Semites, coasting beyond the\nPillars of Hercules, were driven before a gale from the east until they\nreached a weedy sea, resembling sunken islands, among which were tunny\nfish. On his voyage to Britain Himilco reported that he found vast\nfields of floating weeds which retarded his vessels and brought them to\ndanger.\n\nThe ancient view of the Atlantic was that it was a region of baffling\ncalms and shallow water and mud and seaweed. This was based on Punic\nreports, and the Carthaginians told such tales of the open seas\nas would frighten other nations from them. Yet their distorted\nstatements had so much of truth intermixed with error that it is hard\nto believe they intended altogether falsely, and were vindicated only\nby coincidence when a grassy sea, greater than their dominions at their\nwidest, was found west of the Azores. With flagrant exaggeration,\nhowever, they had spoken of sea grasses with needle-like tops, a sort\nof marine wheat with stalks as close together as in sheaves of grain.\nIn B.C. 300 Theophrastus had written of wide-leaved weeds that drifted\nfrom the Atlantic into the Mediterranean. In his poetic account of\nthe African west coast Festus Avienus described in detail the weedy\nimpediments to navigation, using, so he says, the journals of Punic\nships. Scylax recited that the sea beyond Cerne on the coast of\nMauretania could not be navigated \u201cin consequence of its shallowness,\nits muddiness, and its sea grass.\u201d With easy exuberance of fancy Lucian\nhad told in his _True History_ of encountering a floating forest in\nthe sea and of sailing right over the tops of the trees toward \u201cthat\ncontinent which we supposed lies opposite our own\u201d--a reference which\ngains in significance from its casual character.\n\nThough most of them have been lost, there were strange Sargasso\nlegends in the ancient world, based on reports of floating seaweed and\nthe claims of captains that this had put them in hazard. What weedy\ngrowths could do in restless water men knew by observing their effects\nin rivers, notably on the upper Nile. The envoys of Nero had been\nhalted there by a sea of floating vegetation; a long line of travelers\nthereafter had a like experience, and a tragedy of this floating\ngreenery is of our own time. By the blocking of the Nile channel in\n1880 Gessi was held prisoner for three months with five companies of\nsoldiers and a multitude of freed slaves, and most of them died before\nhelp came.\n\nThe burden of these old fables was of a stagnant death in silent spaces\nof the sea where nothing ever happened. The weedy continent was a trap\nwhich closed in upon ships and suffered no escape, even though with\ndouble banks of oars the rowers strove. Death claimed the crew, and\nslowly the sea claimed the galleys. Marine plants crept over bow and\nstern and writhed into the cabins and climbed the masts and swathed all\nin a green decay; and silently, as the timbers parted below and the\nweight of vegetation massed above, the vessel sank, perhaps into some\nharbor of the lost Atlantis.\n\nA prison for lost souls, the St. Brendan legend calls the grassy sea\nof the west. The ferment was working in men\u2019s imaginations. There must\nbe a spectral haven in the sea, a place into which vessels might come,\nout of which they could not go. For a while in the waters of the east\nthis was the Island of Lodestone, which drew and held to itself all\ncraft that had iron in their timbers. In Maundeville the legend of\nthe Sargasso Sea is full blown, though with him it is truth--travel\ntruth--of a magnetic rock.\n\n\u201cI myself,\u201d he said, \u201chave seen afar off in that Sea as though it had\nbeen a great Isle full of Trees and Bush, full of Thorns and Briars,\ngreat Plenty. And the Shipmen told us, that all that was of Ships that\nwere drawn thither by the Adamants, for the Iron that was in them. And\nfrom the Rottenness and other Things that were within the Ships, grew\nsuch Bush, and Thorns and Briars and green Grass and such manner of\nThings, and from the Masts and the Sail-yards it seemed a great Wood or\na Grove. And such Rocks be in many Places thereabouts. And therefore\ndare not the Merchants pass there, but if they know well the Passages,\nor else that they have good Pilots. And also they dread the long Way\nmore far by many dreadful Days\u2019 journeys than Cathay.\u201d\n\nThus the Port of Missing Ships came into view as the creation of\nclassic and medi\u00e6val legend, to which modern exploration had given a\nsure place in the sea. It fulfilled a stagnant something in the souls\nof men. It offered harbor to certain of their dreams. It yielded a\nlast resting place to derelicts that had wandered far, among them the\nderelicts of fancy. It gave reply to questions that arose whenever\nthe argosies went out and did not come back. Against the eternal\nrestlessness and fated journeyings of the Flying Dutchman it summoned\nup the picture of a fated and eternal calm. It added to the terrors of\nthe sea a horror that was half poetry. This became poetry altogether\nwhen men had ceased to believe and yet wanted to believe, and in their\nart evoked the vision of ruinous hulks of Tyrian, Roman, and Spanish\nships side by side upon a spectral main, silent witnesses of all the\nmaritime adventures of mankind.\n\nThe actuality behind the mask of legend, a vast expanse of sea in the\nAtlantic, in many places resembling an inundated meadow, Columbus\ndiscovered on his first voyage, when for three weeks he traversed it.\nBut instead of having misgivings, he rejoiced at what he conceived to\nbe evidence that land was not far distant. On one of the floating weed\nmasses he saw a white tropical bird of a kind that does not sleep upon\nthe sea. His journal speaks little of the apprehensions of the sailors,\nbut his son Fernando recites these--their fears that the weeds, which\nplainly retarded the ships, would halt them altogether; that the\nmarine growths might conceal the lurking rocks, shoals and quicksands\nof a shallowing ocean; and that, run aground or fatally entangled in\ngulfweed, the ships might rot and fall apart far from any shore or any\nhope of aid. Memories of the Atlantis legend raised in their minds the\nmenace of drowned lands and the monumental ruins of a lost continent.\n\nTo Columbus, however, the Sargasso Sea stood, not for a lost continent,\nbut for the boundary between the worlds. Where it began, west of the\nAzores, the New World began also, and the Old World ended. This was\nno theoretical meridian, he thought, but a true physical line of\ndemarcation drawn by nature between the hemispheres. He could sense a\ndifference in climatic conditions in crossing the line, and the compass\nseemed to show magnetic deviations. On his return he believed that he\ncould determine his longitude by observing the first floating masses\nof tangled seaweed. So persuasive was his imaginative force, so great\nhis influence in Europe, that soon after his arrival there the eastern\nboundary of the weedy sea became the globe\u2019s first, and last, political\nboundary of an all-embracing kind. Title to newly discovered lands\neast of it was awarded by a papal bull to Portugal. Title to newly\ndiscovered lands west of it was awarded to Spain.\n\nOviedo gave this expanse the name of Sargasso Sea, from Sarga\u00e7o, the\nPortuguese word for seaweed. It was freely traversed by the explorers\nwho followed Columbus. The world-rounding expedition of Drake reports\nthat for five days \u201cwee sayled through the sea of Weedes, about the\nspace of one hundred leagues, being under the Tropicke of Cancer.\u201d The\nsize and exact location of the sea were long a matter of conjecture.\nVarenius, for example, placed its northern limit opposite the\nmid-Sahara and its southern opposite the Cape of Good Hope. The note\nof Humboldt in his _Views of Nature_, published near the middle of\nthe nineteenth century, is the first scientific account of it. This\nwas based on rather scanty observations of English and Dutch sailing\nvessels which took a course through it from the West Indies to Europe.\nHumboldt thought the Sargasso Sea comprised two weed banks, the larger\none west of the Azores, the smaller between the Bermudas and Bahamas,\nwith a transverse band connecting them. Fuller reports, since made by\nsteamers, with the careful records of the German Hydrographic Office,\nhave enabled scientists, and particularly Doctor Kr\u00fcmmel, to correct\nthese conclusions and plot the true outlines of the sea.\n\nThe Equatorial Current sets west from the coast of Africa. The Gulf\nStream sets north and east from the Straits of Florida--still following\nthe direction, Donnelly ingeniously contended, that was given it by the\nlost continent of Atlantis, around which it flowed. The two currents,\nmoving in nearly opposite directions, impart a circular motion to\nthe waters that lie between, so that all things adrift over an area\nof millions of square miles, seaweed, driftwood, and hulks of ships\nare drawn toward a common center, which may be called the floating\nstorehouse of the North Atlantic. Banks of weed are found as far west\nas the Bermudas, and this outer grassy sea covers an expanse of about\nthree million square miles, or as much as continental United States.\nBut the true Sargasso Sea of dead waters, where gulfweed is found\nthickly, covers an area of about one million two hundred thousand\nsquare miles, or the size of the Mississippi Valley. It is an ellipse\nwith the Tropic of Cancer as its longer axis. The sea stretches through\nfifteen degrees of latitude and more than twenty-five degrees of\nlongitude, the two foci of the ellipse being near 45\u00b0 and 70\u00b0 west.\n\nWith the shift of winds and calms the weedy sea itself shifts somewhat,\nbut its mean location remains unchanged. Humboldt was convinced that in\nhis time it was precisely where Columbus had found it three and a half\ncenturies before, and Maury\u2019s study of marine observations leads to the\nconclusion that there has been no change in the last fifty years. Of\nall the larger aspects of nature this is perhaps the only one that is\njust as it was in the time of Columbus. During thousands of years, when\nthe ocean was battering at the coasts of the continents, breaking down\nor building up the shore; when earthquakes and volcanoes were causing\nislands to appear and disappear; when the wind and rain were at their\nunending tasks of bearing everything terrestrial into the deeps; and\nwhen races of men were remodeling some small portions of the earth\u2019s\nsurface with roads and ports and bridges, the Sargasso Sea may have\nbeen the only thing immune from change. This eternal vortex might well\nbe called the true Navel of the World.\n\nEven now, when many ships ply these waters, and after the records\nof centuries seem to have assured that there are no reefs or shoals\nunder their greenery, travelers admit a sense of uneasiness as their\ncraft plunges into what seems a sunken meadow. Nearer view, however,\ndiscloses that the patches of vegetation are discontinuous. The larger\nsingle masses may be several acres in extent, or may not be more than a\nhundred feet across. The weeds commonly lie in long parallel rows that\ntail to the prevailing winds. By noting the rows, the mariner can tell\nwhether the wind has been blowing steadily, or has recently shifted,\nand in which direction. The lines are sometimes so near together as to\nseem one mass, or they may be as far apart as two hundred feet. In some\nplaces the weeds in them barely touch, in others they are so crowded\nthat their tops are thrust a little distance above the water.\n\nA distinctive fauna, sparse in species but unnumbered in individuals,\nhas been developed among these masses. The floating berries are thickly\nincrusted with white polyzoa. About sixty animal species peculiar\nto the area have been noted, among them small fish, shrimps, crabs,\nmolluscs, gastropods, and one insect. The fishes have developed a\nstrong protective resemblance to the shapeless weeds among which they\nfeed. Strangest of these is the _Antennarius marmoratus_, a little\ncreature not more than four inches long and indistinguishable from a\nplant spray. It seems half adapted for walking; its fins, which suggest\nthe extremities of four-footed creatures, have real toes, and the front\nfins have the form of arms with elbows and fingered hands.\n\nThe Prince of Monaco conducted a scientific expedition into these\nwaters in 1905, and in 1911 the United States Hydrographic Service sent\na party of scientists for a three months\u2019 study of them; but adequate\nknowledge is still wanting.\n\nThere is a Sargasso question: How does the weed get into the sea? The\nold theory was that it is a true oceanic plant. To those who held to\nthe belief in a sunken continent the grassy domain was a sort of canopy\nsuspended over it, the flying banners of the lost Atlantis. There is\nstill good scientific opinion of which the French are the leaders, that\nthe weed grows in the area where it is found, reproducing itself by\nfissure, the parent stem throwing off branches which multiply in turn.\nThe bulk of scientific opinion outside of France is that these meadows\nof the sea are the spoil of the neighboring islands and continents. The\ngulfweed which covers them, it is held, has been torn from the shores\nof northern Brazil, of the West Indies, and of North America as far as\nCape Cod, and has drifted into this vortex--a journey that may take\nalmost half a year. The French contend that even without these admitted\ncontributions from America there would still be a weedy sea about the\nTropic of the Crab.\n\nFrom time to time commercial enterprise has canvassed the possibilities\nof a Sargasso adventure. It may be that a profitable fishery will\nyet be established there with the Azores for its base, and that the\nkelp will be converted into potash for fertilizer or for gunpowder.\nThus would the arts of war and peace draw support from the sea, that,\nif legend speaks truly, sleeps over the continent which spread them\nthrough the antediluvian world.\n\n\n\n\nChapter XX. Atlantis\n\n\nUnder the Sargasso Sea, if a few accomplished thinkers, a somewhat\nlarger number of speculative scientists, and a host of dreamers are\nright, lies the lost Atlantis. This legend of a continent beyond the\nPillars of Hercules, which reached a high level of civilization,\nextended its rule along both shores of the Mediterranean, sent its\narmies to battle with Egypt and Athens, and \u201cin a day and a fatal\nnight\u201d sank beneath the sea eleven thousand years ago, is the most\nhaunting and poignant thing that has come down from antiquity.\n\nThe story derives from Plato, who attributes it to his relative, Solon,\nwho had it from a priest of Egypt. It is told briefly and completely\nin the _Tim\u00e6us_ and with much greater detail in the _Critias_;\nunfortunately, the latter portion of this work is wanting and the\nnarrative ends abruptly, before recounting the cataclysm outlined in\nthe earlier work. Both are built upon the conversation between Solon\nand the Egyptian priest. Discoursing on the ignorance of the Greeks\nconcerning their own history, the priest said that they knew nothing\nof a thing which was preserved in the sacred books of the temple at\nSais--that, nine thousand years before, the Athenians had repelled an\ninvading force which threatened the conquest of Europe and Asia. This\nforce had come in through the Straits of Gibraltar from the Atlantic\nSea, \u201cwhich was at that time navigable.\u201d\n\nBeyond the Straits, according to the _Tim\u00e6us_, lay the island of\nAtlantis, greater than Libya and Asia (Minor) together. Other islands\nsurrounded it, and farther west was a continent. Between Atlantis and\nthis continent rolled an ocean so great that, compared with it, the\nland-locked Mediterranean was merely a harbor. A powerful dynasty of\nkings arose on the island, subjugated the surrounding archipelagoes\nand a part of the unnamed continent beyond, and in the Old World\nswayed Libya up to Egypt and the northern shore of the Mediterranean\nas far as Tuscany. They undertook to complete their conquest of the\nMediterranean coasts, but the Athenians, though deserted by their\nallies, beat off their ships. While the fleet from beyond the Straits\nwas still in the Inland Sea, it would seem, the island of Atlantis was\nsunk, and the earthquakes that submerged it and the monstrous waves\nthat followed spread ruin all along the Mediterranean shores.\n\nHere is the passage in which Plato records the concluding words of\nthe priest of Solon: \u201cBut after (the battle) there occurred violent\nearthquakes and floods, and in a single day and night of rain all your\nwarlike men in a body sunk into the earth, and the island of Atlantis\nin like manner disappeared and was sunk beneath the sea. And that is\nthe reason why the sea in those parts is impassable and impenetrable,\nbecause there is such a quantity of shallow mud in the way; and this\nwas caused by the subsidence of the island.... There are remaining in\nsmall islets only the bones of the wasted body, as they may be called,\nall the richer and softer parts of the soil having fallen away, and the\nmere skeleton of the country being left.\u201d\n\nThe longer account in the _Critias_ describes the civilization of\nAtlantis. It begins, as all chronicles used to do, with the affairs of\nthe gods, and their amorous interest in the daughters of men (_Gen._\nvi: 2). The sea god Poseidon fell in love with Cleito, a mortal island\nmaiden, and she bore him five sets of twins. The ten sons became kings,\neach ruler of a tenth part of Atlantis, but all subject to the eldest\nson, Atlas. The capital of the island became his abode, as it had been\nhis mother\u2019s before him. Poseidon himself had laid out the palace\ncompound, making alternate zones of sea and land; \u201cthere were two of\nland and three of water which he turned as with a lathe out of the\ncenter of the island.\u201d\n\nAt this point in the account, the divine figures disappear and it\nbecomes seemingly a straight historical narrative. Its picture of\nthe capital is more exact in its topographical, architectural, and\nengineering detail than many that have come down to us of the older\ncapitals of Asia, or than any biblical picture of Jerusalem. The laws,\nreligion, and arts of the people are all adequately noticed.\n\nThere was a barrier of lofty mountains around the shores of the\nisland, their flanks sloping precipitously to the sea. In the upland\nvalleys were rich and populous villages. The middle of the island was\na great and fertile plain surrounded by a ditch one hundred feet deep.\nAbundant rivers coursed the plain and the moisture of the rainy season\nwas supplemented in the summer by a system of aqueducts. In the center\nof the plain was a magnificent city.\n\nAssuming that this is no dream geography, it is necessary to determine\nthe size of Atlantis, and in doing so to reconcile a conflict of\nstatements in Plato\u2019s story. He speaks of it as a large island, though\nsmall as compared with a land domain west of it, which \u201cmay be most\ntruly called a continent\u201d; yet he says Atlantis was larger than Libya\nand Asia combined. The tale becomes incredible if Libya receives its\ncommon Greek extension as the whole of Africa, and if Asia is taken in\nthe larger sense; for such an island there would not be room in the\nAtlantic. The passage is brought into harmony with the context if other\nancient definitions are followed, so that Libya is made to mean the\ndistrict immediately west of Egypt and Asia to mean Asia Minor. This\nwould give the legendary Atlantis a territory of perhaps three hundred\nthousand square miles, or about twice that of the state of California.\n\nThere are precise figures for the great central plain and they\nharmonize with such an estimate of the island area. The plain was\nthree hundred and forty miles long by two hundred and thirty wide--in\nother words, exactly the size of the state of Washington, but with\nits greater dimension from south to north. The topography of the\nwhole island suggests that of California, although its shape was more\ncompact. Its central plain lay within its mountain barriers as the San\nJoaquin and Sacramento valleys lie between the Sierras and the Coast\nRange. And in its mineral riches, its mild climate, its system of\nirrigation, and in the products of its fields, orchards, and vineyards\nit was very like the Pacific coast state.\n\n\u201cWhatever fragrant things there are in the earth,\u201d says Plato, \u201cwhether\nroots or herbage or woods, grew and thrived in that land.\u201d He mentions\nmelons--\u201cfruits with a hard rind\u201d--chestnuts, and \u201cthe pleasant kinds\nof dessert which console us after dinner when we are full and tired of\neating,\u201d which may mean, among other things, grapes and oranges; and\nall these \u201cthe sacred island lying beneath the sun brought forth fair\nand wondrous in infinite abundance.\u201d In this picture there is but one\nunfamiliar figure. Herds of elephants roved there, where California can\nshow only the fossil remains of the mastodon.\n\nIn the account of the capital city it is illuminating to recur to the\nPacific state, for the metropolis of Atlantis lay in the midst of a\nmountain-girdled plain, and yet, like Sacramento, had access to the\nsea, in this case by a ship canal perhaps connecting with a river.\nIf one can imagine the buildings and grounds of the Panama-Pacific\nExposition of 1915 with the wharves and commerce of San Francisco\nremoved to Sacramento, one may glimpse the legendary metropolis. In\nthe center of the city, on an artificial island, were temples and\npalaces like those of the exposition, but of a barbaric splendor.\nGreatest of these was the temple to Poseidon, a structure about as\nlarge as one of the palaces surrounding the Court of the Universe at\nthe exposition, and doubtless of no greater height, for this was a\nregion of earthquake, and within the temple was one statue that reached\nquite to the roof. Its walls were silvered, with gilded pinnacles,\nand under the ivory roof the interior blazed with gold and silver and\n\u201corichalcum\u201d--copper, or an alloy of it, and esteemed next to gold.\n\nThe wall that encircled this inner island or citadel \u201cflashed with the\nred light of orichalcum.\u201d There was a broad canal around it, and then\nan encircling zone of land, about which was a wall sheeted with tin.\nAround this was still another canal encircled by another land zone, and\nhere was a wall coated with brass, beside which ran a racecourse two\nhundred yards wide where horses contended. Encircling this again was\nthe outermost canal. Beyond it lay the city.\n\nThe buildings of the outer city, as well as those of its sacred\ncitadel, were of stones in three colors--white, black and red--which,\nwith all the minerals useful to man, were taken from the bosom of the\nisland. There were hot and cold springs, with baths and with pools\nfor horses and cattle; the surplus water was conveyed by aqueducts to\nthe grove of Poseidon. Around the harbor front were docks, triremes,\nand naval stores. Back of them the plain was densely crowded with\nhabitations. The harbors were full of vessels, and merchants coming\nfrom all parts who from their numbers kept up \u201ca multitudinous sound of\nhuman voices and din of all sorts night and day.\u201d\n\nA copper column stood in the temple of Poseidon, on which the laws of\nthe land were graven. The chief of these were that the people should\nnot take up arms against one another, and that they should all come\nto the rescue if anyone in any city attempted to overthrow the royal\nhouse. On the plain and in the populous mountain valleys there was\na system of military service by districts and chiefs of districts,\nsomewhat like that of ancient Peru; and when Atlantis went to war ten\nthousand chariots moved in front of its armies, and twelve hundred\nvessels swept the sea lanes east and west. It was a powerful nation and\na happy--so long as the divine nature of their founder retained its\nforce among the people. Says Plato:\n\n\u201cThey despised everything but virtue, not caring for their present\nstate of life and thinking lightly on the possession of gold and\nother property which seemed only a burden to them; neither were\nthey intoxicated by luxury; nor did wealth deprive them of their\nself-control; but they were sober and saw clearly that all these goods\nare increased by virtuous friendship with one another, and that by\nexcessive zeal for them, and honor of them, the good of them is lost\nand friendship perishes with them.\u201d\n\nAt length, however, the divine nature in the Atlantines became diluted\nby mortal admixture. They were filled with avarice, pride, the lusts\nof the flesh; and \u201cthe fairest of their precious gifts\u201d departed from\nthem. Base to men of insight, they still appeared to others as glorious\nand blessed. In order to effect their chastisement and correction,\nsays Plato, returning to the mythological vein, a council of the gods\nwas called, and Zeus \u201cspoke as follows.\u201d What the Olympian said will\nnever be known, for here the _Critias_ ends, and for the fate of the\nAtlantines one must recur to the _Tim\u00e6us_.\n\nThe mythical prologue and epilogue excepted, the whole account\nreads as if the author believed it himself. It is singularly free\nfrom fantasy--this is no Cloud-Cuckoo Land of an Aristophanes. The\ntranscriber of the legend was perhaps the largest mind of antiquity\nand a man of unblemished character; and \u201cstrange but altogether true\u201d\nhe calls his own story. He was, however, a constructive dreamer, and\nin his _Republic_ he has given a detailed sketch of an ideal state.\nWas this another essay of a like nature? Might not the narrative\ncarry further if it came from a man of less imaginative sweep--from\nthe contemporary Xenophon, or from Plutarch, both of them vivacious\nchroniclers with their eyes on facts? Ph\u00e6drus had said to Socrates,\n\u201cYou can easily invent a tale of Egypt.\u201d Has the great disciple of\nSocrates done this?\n\nThese questions are asked still, and antiquity asked them. Proclus in\nhis commentary on the _Tim\u00e6us_ assumed that the legend was a symbol\nof the contest between the primeval forces and the spirit of art and\nscience; he recites that Crantor, the first commentator, accepted it\nas literal history and was ridiculed for it. Strabo and Pliny barely\nmention the story. Thus Plutarch sets down the circumstances of its\nrelation: \u201cSolon attempted in verse a large description, or rather\nfabulous account of the Atlantic Island, which he had learned from the\nwise men of Sais; but by reason of his age he did not go through with\nit. Plato laid out magnificent courts and inclosures, and erected a\ngrand entrance to it, such as no other story, fable, or poem ever had.\nBut he began it late, he ended his life before the work, so that the\nmore the reader is delighted with the part that is written, the more\nregret he has to find it unfinished.\u201d\n\nThere is evidence that at any rate the legend is not an invention\nof Plato. It was claimed by Plato himself that the victory of the\nAthenians over the Atlantines was depicted on one of the ceremonial\ntunics which were borne in the midsummer festival of the Panathen\u00e6a.\nDiodorus has a reference to this war. \u00c6lian says that Theopompus heard\na similar story in Phrygia, in which, however, the island was called\nMeropis. Proclus quotes from the _\u00c6thiopica_ of Marcellus a tale of ten\nislands in the outer sea, the inhabitants of which preserved the memory\nof a large island that had ruled over the archipelago and was sacred to\nPoseidon.\n\nThe following are the main explanations, ancient and modern, of the\nlegend: 1. Atlantis was no island, but a part of either Europe or\nAfrica--the Iberian peninsula, or Senegal, for example--so remote from\nEgypt as to seem an island to mariners who reached it after beating\nabout beyond the Straits. 2. Atlantis was Minoan Crete, resembling\nPlato\u2019s island in its configuration if not in its site; the ancient\nCretan civilization was destroyed about B.C. 1500, almost as completely\nas if by a submergence in the sea. 3. \u201cAtlantis is too obviously an\nearlier and equally colossal Persia, western instead of eastern.\u201d\n4. Atlantis is pure fiction, arising, like the tales of Homer and\nHesiod, in the belief that the abodes of the heroes were in the extreme\nwest. 5. Atlantis is a variant of the old tradition of a Golden Age.\n6. Atlantis and the Fortunate Islands and the Azores are one, but\ntradition placed them too near the Straits, and the legend of a great\nsunken island arose when no land was found where people thought land\nshould be. 7. Atlantis is another form of the solar myth--the setting\nof the sun in the red ruin of evening, and the coming of dark upon the\ndeep. 8. Atlantis and the Republic are companion realms, the one no\nless imaginary than the other, and each intended to illustrate Plato\u2019s\nconception of ideal polity.\n\nThese are the conjectures of a skepticism which properly refuses to\nbelieve that so great a thing has happened and left such slight traces\nin monuments or in tradition. Yet there are some details in Plato\u2019s\nstory not so easily disposed of, and they appear more distinctly when\nAtlantis itself is erased from it. These are the islands on both sides\nof the legendary continent, the impassable sea that covers its site,\nthe great ocean beyond it, and the continent in the west which hems in\nthat ocean. None of these things the men of Plato\u2019s time knew of, but,\nto give them their modern names, they seem to be Madeira, the Canaries,\nthe Cape Verde Islands and the Azores on the one side of the Sargasso\nSea, the West Indies on the other, the Sargasso Sea itself, the open\nAtlantic, and the American continent.\n\nIf the classic world had few and faint traditions of a sunken\ncontinent and ignored them or dismissed them as idle tales, it had one\novermastering feeling that could not be called a superstition because\nit never took a tangible form. The feeling was a blind terror of the\nAtlantic Ocean, as if something dreadful had happened there, but so\nlong before that nobody knew what it was.\n\nNothing has developed in Europe itself that makes Plato\u2019s story of a\nlost continent a whit more probable or less plausible than it was when\nhe wrote it; but there have been contributions to the legend from the\nocean floor and from the New World. The variations, and in a measure\nthe shifts, of opinion on the Atlantis story in the last hundred years\nare represented by three names--Humboldt, Ignatius Donnelly, and\nPierre Termier. Writing in 1826, the German savant noted evidences\nof an external influence in the historical monuments of Central\nAmerica. In his book, _Atlantis: The Antediluvian World_, Donnelly\nboldly contended that a continent had disappeared in the mid-Atlantic,\nthat this sunken domain had been the cradle of civilization, and\nthat the widespread traditions of a deluge were race memories of its\ndisappearance. This writer\u2019s identification with the Baconian cipher\ntheory, and his espousal of fanciful beliefs and lost causes, political\nor other, together with his credulity and his snap judgments, obscured\nthe industry, the wide range of information, and the real gift of\ngeneralization to which his book bore witness. It came with something\nlike a shock to the scientific world when the French scholar, Prof.\nPierre Termier, Director of the Geological Survey of France, read his\npaper on Atlantis before the Oceanographic Institute of France in\n1912. This was published at Monaco in the Bulletin of the Institute of\nOceanography in 1913, and a translation, included in the annual report\nof the Smithsonian Institution for 1915, provoked a discussion among\ngeographers in America that continued for several years.\n\n\u201cIt seems more and more evident,\u201d concluded Termier, \u201cthat a vast\nregion, continental or made up of great islands, has collapsed west\nof the Pillars of Hercules, and that its collapse occurred in the not\ndistant past.\u201d\n\nIn support of this inference Termier arrays the evidence of the\nAtlantic\u2019s surface and of the floor which its waters conceal. A ship\nsailing due west from the Straits of Gibraltar four thousand miles\nto Cape Hatteras would meet with no land. But if it lengthened its\ncourse a little by making a detour, first toward the southwest, then\ntoward the northwest, then again toward the southwest, it would bring\nin view Madeira, the more southern Azores, and the Bermudas. And if it\ntook soundings it would discover that, the marine depths over which it\nwas passing were strangely unequal. If the ocean were drained dry,\nwhat would be seen would be a long elevated region lying between the\nOld and New Worlds, separated from both by two enormous valleys, the\nwider and deeper one on the American side. This is the revelation of\noceanography--a hidden continent in the Atlantic basin with the islands\nnamed above as its mountain peaks.\n\nGeology adds that the eastern region of the Atlantic over all its\nlength and probably from pole to pole is a great volcanic zone.\n\u201cEverywhere,\u201d says the French geologist, \u201cearthquakes are frequent,\nhere and there islets may spring up abruptly from the sea, or rocks\nlong known may disappear.\u201d The ocean may conceal the continuity of\nthese changes, but to geological science they are incontestable and\nthey affect a zone which reaches from Iceland to the Cape Verde Islands\nand is about 1,875 miles broad.\n\nWhen a ship was laying the cable between Brest and Cape Cod in 1898,\nthe cable broke and was recovered by grappling. The grappling irons\nencountered various submerged rocks with hard points and sharp edges,\nand brought to the surface fragments of the vitreous lava called\ntachylyte. These \u201cprecious fragments,\u201d as Termier calls them, are\nin the Museum of the School of Mines in Paris. The significance of\ntheir structure is that if they had solidified under water they would\nhave been composed of confused crystals. In the form in which they\nwere found they must have cooled when they were still above the sea\u2019s\nsurface. The sharp edges of the marine rocks, whence these fragments\ncame, argue that the region collapsed suddenly and recently. Had they\nremained after the volcanic disturbance a long time above the sea, they\nwould have been smoothed by atmospheric erosion. Had they been a long\ntime under the sea, they would have been smoothed by marine abrasion.\nThe inference is that \u201cthe entire region north of the Azores and\nperhaps the very region of the Azores, of which they may be only the\nvisible ruins, was very recently submerged, probably during the epoch\nwhich the geologists call the present, because it is so recent, and\nwhich for us, the living beings of to-day, is the same as yesterday.\u201d\n\nThe evidence of zo\u00f6logy has been arrayed by another French scholar, M.\nLouis Germain, briefly as follows: The present fauna of the Azores,\nMadeira, the Canaries, and Cape Verde Islands originated in Africa; the\nQuaternary formations of the Canaries resemble those of Mauretania and\ninclose the same species of mollusca. Therefore these archipelagoes\nwere connected with Africa up to an epoch near our own, at the very\nleast until toward the end of the Tertiary. Among the present mollusca\nof the archipelagoes are some species which seem to be survivors of the\nEuropean Tertiary. Therefore there was a bond between the islands and\nSpain which was severed during the Pliocene. The _Pulmonata mollusca_,\ncalled oleacinid\u00e6, are found only in Central America, the West Indies,\nthe Mediterranean Basin, and the Canaries, Madeira, and the Azores,\nand are larger in America than in these other regions. Therefore the\ncontinent which included these islands had extended to the West Indies\nat the beginning of the Miocene, but had been separated from them\nduring the Miocene. Fifteen species of marine mollusca lived at the\nsame time both in the West Indies and on the coast of Senegal, and\nnowhere else. Therefore until very near the present time a maritime\nshore extended from the West Indies to Senegal.\n\nThe arguments of geology and zo\u00f6logy may be combined. Termier is of\nthose geologists who believe the ancient alignment of continents was\neast and west instead of north and south. There was a North Atlantic\ncontinent comprising Russia, Scandinavia, Great Britain, Greenland and\nCanada, and later a large part of central and western Europe and of the\nUnited States. There was also a South Atlantic or African-Brazilian\ncontinent extending northward to the Atlas, eastward to the Persian\nGulf, westward to the Andes. Between the two continents was the\nMediterranean depression, the ancient maritime furrow still marked in\nthe present Mediterranean and Caribbean seas. These continents were\nbroken up by foldings and collapses and a new design appeared, the\ngeneral direction of which is from north to south.\n\nM. Germain, confining himself mainly to the middle region between these\ntwo supposed continental areas, infers the existence of an Atlantic\ncontinent connected with Spain and Morocco and prolonging itself so far\nsouth as to take in regions of desert climate. During the Miocene this\ncontinent reaches the West Indies. It is then broken up and portioned\noff, at first in the direction of the West Indies; then in the south,\nby the establishment of a marine shore which reaches Senegal; then in\nthe east, probably during the Pliocene, along the coast of Africa. \u201cThe\nlast great fragment, finally engulfed and no longer having left any\nfurther vestiges than the four archipelagoes, would be the Atlantis of\nPlato,\u201d says Termier, himself reviewing the conclusions of Germain.\n\nThus the geological and zo\u00f6logical arguments correspond very closely.\nTo Termier there is no doubt at all that until an epoch near our own\nthere was a continental domain in the Atlantic west of the Pillars\nof Hercules, and that it was sunk in a cataclysm. There is only one\nquestion left: \u201cDid men then live who could withstand the reaction\nand transmit the memory of it?\u201d Geology and zo\u00f6logy have perhaps told\nall they could tell by way of answer. \u201cIt is from anthropology, from\nethnography, and lastly from oceanography,\u201d says Termier, \u201cthat I am\nnow awaiting the final answer.\u201d\n\nAnthropology and ethnography have provided some hints, such as they\nare. Men of scientific or of speculative cast have noted cranial and\nother correspondences in the subtropics on both sides of the Atlantic,\nand what seemed to be African influences in the civilizations of\nCentral and South America. Quatrefages named five races of American\nIndians which seemed to him \u201ctrue negroes.\u201d Le Plongeon remarked the\nthick lips and woolly hair of certain sculptured figures at Chichen\nItza. Retzius thought there were the same form of skull and the same\nreddish-brown complexion in the Carib Islands and in the Canaries.\nElephant heads with trunk and tusks have been discovered in the friezes\nof ruined temples in Yucatan. Wiener contends, on the evidence of\nphilology, that yams, manioc, peanuts and tobacco came to America from\nAfrica before Columbus rather than went out from America afterward.\n\nIn ancient times the people of the Old World and the New were in\ncontact. The belief has been that this was across the Pacific, but the\ntraditions of Mexico and its neighbors point in a different direction.\n\nTwo dominant notes are struck in the legends of the races fronting on\nthe Caribbean. One is the belief that civilization was brought to them\nby white, bearded strangers who came over the sea from the east. The\nother is the tradition of a deluge or related cataclysm. And sometimes\nthe two stories are grouped; the beneficent strangers are refugees from\nthe disastrous something that had happened upon the sea. Cataclysm has\nbeen called the pivot of Central American myth and the basis of the\nMexican calendar.\n\nThe legendary founder of the oldest Mexican civilization, the Toltec,\nwas Quetzalcoatl, who was worshiped as a god, but was reputed to\nhave been a bearded white man who came from the east with a band\nof colonists and instructed the natives in the arts and sciences;\nhis symbol was a boat. The story was that he was driven out by the\nwitch doctors, but promised to return. Aztec belief that the Cortes\nexpedition was the return visit made easier the Spanish conquest. Among\nthe Mayas the divine stranger was known as Kukulcan, and his title\nwas Lord of the Hollow Tree (the ark?). Coming from \u201cValum Chvim,\u201d he\nfounded the ancient city of Palenque. His company was described as\nwearing black mantles with short sleeves; the Mayas called them \u201cmen\nwith petticoats.\u201d\n\nNative legends of tropic America, some of which Spence has marshaled,\npresent a panorama of flood, fire, hilltops of refuge, arks, survivors.\nAccording to the Arawaks of Guiana the world was smitten by fire, from\nwhich men hid themselves in caverns; and then by flood, from which\na leader and his followers saved themselves in canoes. In the Carib\ndeluge myth men escaped to the mountain tops. In the Tupi-Guarani myth\nthe Creator scourged the world with fire but a great magician put it\nout with a rainstorm and men took to trees (boats?). In the Karaya\nmyth an evil spirit invoked the deluge and sent fish to pull the\nsurvivors down from the hill Tupimare. Various hills in Mexico and the\nAmerican southwest are pointed out as the Ararats of flood refugees.\nThere is even an account in the Nahuatl language of the building of an\nark. According to early Spanish writers there were similar stories of\noceanic upheaval among the natives of the Antilles.\n\nAll the New World flood myths, the Chaldean, Aram\u00e6an, and Iranian, the\nHebrew story of Noah, and the Greek story of Deucalion, as well as the\nindicated ending of Plato\u2019s tale of Atlantis, agree in their main\nlines--that a malevolent spirit sought to drown all men, or that an\nangered divinity sought by a deluge to punish their lusts and pride,\nand that a few righteous or lucky men escaped. One of these stories,\nrecited in the sacred book of the Quiche Indians of Guatemala, was\nbelieved by the Abb\u00e9 Brasseur de Bourbourg to be an account of the\ndisaster to Atlantis. As the briefest of the flood myths, and not the\nworst, it may be repeated:\n\n\u201cThey did not think or speak of the Creator who had created them, and\nwho had caused their birth. They were drowned, and thick resin fell\nfrom heaven.\n\n\u201cThe bird Xecotcovach tore out their eyes; the bird Camulatz cut\noff their heads; the bird Cotzbalam devoured their flesh; the bird\nTecumbalam broke their bones and sinews and ground them into powder.\n\n\u201cBecause they had not thought of their mother and father, the Heart of\nHeaven whose name is Hurakan, therefore the face of the earth grew dark\nand a pouring rain commenced, raining by day, raining by night.\n\n\u201cThen all sorts of beings, little and great, gathered together to abuse\nthe men to their faces; and all spoke, their millstones, their plates,\ntheir cups, their dogs, their hens,\u201d denouncing them and railing at\nthem.\n\nThese traditions of disaster, survival, and immigration are the\ncollateral support of native American myth to Plato\u2019s narrative of\nAtlantis. The monumental ruins of Central America yield some evidence\nwhich in no wise confirms the traditions, but into which they fit.\nThe Maya civilization has been described as immigrant from a region\nunknown. Its palaces and temples and columns, and the figures and\ninscriptions upon them, represent an art that seemingly had reached\nits maturity when the earliest of them was made. There are no local\nevidences of the slow evolution of skill and taste, such as would be\nexpected in an indigenous culture. The resemblances to the monuments of\nBurmah and Siam are superficial. The evidences of a European influence\nare practically _nil_. The indications of a civilization remarkable\nalong certain lines are convincing; the Mexican calendar, the Maya\nastronomy, betray a knowledge of the movements of the heavenly bodies\nwhich was equal to that of Europe in the Columbian period, and yet\nindependent of it.\n\nThe Maya monuments have one singularity which has challenged\nspeculation. \u201cIt has been found,\u201d says Spence, \u201cthat the starting\npoint of all the dates found on the monuments, save two, is the same.\nThus all Maya reckoning dates from one definite day in the past, a\nday 3,000 years prior to the first date in Maya history which can be\ndescribed as contemporary with the monument upon which it is found.\nUpon this practically all Maya scholars of repute are agreed.\u201d It has\nbeen conjectured that this normal date of the Mayas is the date of a\ncataclysm, somewhat as the people of San Francisco, with the memory of\ntheir earthquake and conflagration strong in them, date many events in\ntheir conversation as since the Fire. It has also been conjectured that\nthis date, and a developed civilization, were brought to the Mayas by\nthe survivors of the cataclysm.\n\nSuch is the case for Atlantis as it has been made up by men with some\nrank as students or specialists. The bold guesses of Donnelly, from\nwhose work several of these citations have been taken, must be added.\nHis most interesting contention, perhaps, is that the Bronze Age in\nEurope must have been preceded by a Copper Age, since bronze is an\nalloy of copper and tin; but that there is no evidence of a Copper Age\nin Europe. There was, however, a Copper Age in America, from Bolivia to\nLake Superior, and therefore Atlantis was the bridge between the Copper\nAge of America and the Bronze Age of Europe.\n\nWith a characteristic sweep of statement Donnelly announces his\nconclusions. The people of Atlantis \u201cwere the founders of nearly\nall our arts and sciences; they were the parents of our fundamental\nbeliefs; they were the first civilizers, the first navigators, the\nfirst merchants, the first colonizers of the earth; their civilization\nwas old when Egypt was young, and they had passed away thousands of\nyears before Babylon, Rome, or London was dreamed of. This lost people\nwere our ancestors, their blood flows in our veins; the words we use\nevery day were heard, in the primitive form, in their cities, courts,\ntemples. Every line of race and thought, of blood and belief, leads\nback to them.\u201d\n\nFor every fact, tradition, or coincidence which seems to point toward\nthe disappearance of a continent in the Atlantic sea, there are other\nexplanations with authoritative names behind them. The old dread of the\nWestern Ocean is attributed to the teaching of primitive religions that\nthere was the land of shades, and to the colossal trickery of Ph\u0153nician\nmariners who wanted no competitors beyond the Pillars. The American\nlegends of bright-faced strangers coming over the water from the east\nare declared to be still another form of the sun myth. The world-wide\ntradition of a deluge may represent the independent thinking of various\nraces of men who found fossil shells on their hillsides and reasoned\nthat at some time a sea had covered them. It is asserted that Termier\nassumed too much for his specific evidence of a recent submersion--the\nfragments of tachylyte dredged from the ocean floor--when he declared\nthat vitreous lava could not form under the sea. Accepting, as many\ngeographers do, that a great land domain has sunk near the coast of\nAfrica, they say that this was not a historic, nor a prehistoric, but a\ngeologic event.\n\nThe controversy reduces itself, at last, to a question of time: Did\nthe large island which Plato called Atlantis disappear after men came\nupon the earth? Termier does not assert this, but thinks it possible,\nand in some measure the wish is father to the thought. As an American\ngeographer puts it, \u201cIt is well known that Professor Termier is not\nonly a good geologist, but also a great lover of the beautiful and\nmuch given to the poetic in speaking and writing.\u201d This passage in the\nTermier address is in point:\n\n\u201cMeanwhile not only will science, most modern science, not make it a\ncrime for all lovers of beautiful legends to believe in Plato\u2019s story\nof Atlantis, but science herself through my voice calls their attention\nto it. Science herself, taking them by the hand and leading them\nalong the wreck-strewn ocean shores, spreads before their eyes, with\nthousands of disabled ships, the continents submerged or reduced to\nremnants, and the isles without number enshrouded in the abyss.\u201d\n\nBeyond the appeal to poetry the Atlantis legend has another--an appeal\nwhich is also a temptation. It explains much, perhaps too much. There\nare gaps in the story of human origins, and in the history of the arts\nand sciences, that are as wide as the black voids the astronomer sees\nin the skies. Atlantis fills them all. Science has sought to fill\nthem by assumptions--the origin of man in a drowned continent of the\nPacific called Lemuria, of which Australia is a fragment; the origin of\ncivilization on the Mediterranean floor when it was dry land. These are\nassumptions without a tradition behind them. Paradoxically enough, the\npoint of attack upon the Atlantis theory is that a legend supports it,\nand other legends fit into it. The whole matches into an ingenious and\nsimple design, and are the affairs of nature and man ever so simple?\n\nIt is not for anyone to answer yet, perhaps ever. But one has license\nfrom Termier to speculate, and, if one will, to dream. If in substance\nPlato\u2019s tale was true, it needs no effort of imagination to picture the\nempire of Atlantis as it was eleven thousand years ago, for all its\ndrama save the dreadful end has been repeated. The British Isles, with\ntheir sea-borne commerce, their Mediterranean and Caribbean garrisons,\ntheir mines and metal workings, their ancient Druidical religion\nand costume, even their addiction to horse-racing, reproduce in the\nnorthern seas the story of this vanished island dominion south and west\nof Gibraltar.\n\nThe outlines of the crowning calamity of history--if history it\nwas--have already been drawn by legend, and there are authentic human\nexperiences on a lesser scale, and in other times and places, to\nfill in the canvas. In the European port nearest the supposed site\nof Atlantis, on the first day of November, 1775, a sound of thunder\nwas heard underground, and in an earthquake that shook twelve million\nmiles of sea and land the city of Lisbon fell in ruins, burying sixty\nthousand persons beneath it.\n\n\u201cAbout one o\u2019clock in the afternoon\u201d--it is Pliny the Younger speaking,\nthe place is near Pompeii, and the time August 24th, A.D. 79--\u201ca vast\nand singular cloud was seen to elevate itself in the atmosphere.\nIt spread horizontally, in form like the branches of the pine, and\nprecipitated the burning materials with which it was charged upon the\nmany lovely but ill-fated villages which stood upon this delightful\ncoast.... Multitudes crowded toward the beach, but the boisterous\nagitation of the sea, alternately rolling on the shore and thrown back\nby the convulsive motion of the earth, precluded every possibility of\nescape.... Now were heard the shrieks of women, screams of children,\nclamors of men, all accursing their fate and imploring death, the\ndeliverance they feared, with outstretched hands to the gods whom many\nthought about to be involved together with themselves in the last\neternal night.\u201d\n\nLet the biblical account of the deluge speak the closing word upon\nAtlantis: \u201cAnd all the high hills that were under the whole heaven were\ncovered, and the waters prevailed upon the earth.\u201d\n\nOne turns from the convulsion and welter of the deep, and the beautiful\nand dreadful thing that lay beneath it, and fixes the gaze on archaic\nships, laden with strangely robed men and women, riding the long\nbillows of the Caribbean toward a quiet shore. There--if the dreamers\nare right--they built another civilization, which flourished and in\nturn vanished, with its temples and palaces, beneath the green mantle\nof the tropic forest. If the dreamers are right.\n\n\n\n\nChapter XXI. The Gilded Man\n\n\nThe high plateau of Cundinamarca in the interior of Colombia was once\nan inland sea. Its vestiges remain in small lakes which the Indians\nheld sacred, and into which they cast offerings of emeralds and golden\nornaments. There was a special ceremony at Lake Guatavit\u00e1. When a\ncacique died and another was chosen, a long procession moved down to\nthe shore. At the head went mourners, nude and wailing, their bodies\nstained with red ochre. Behind them were other groups in jaguar skins,\ntheir hair dressed with feathers, their limbs agleam with barbaric\njewelwork. Amid the joyful tumult of horns and pipes followed the\npriests in tall black caps and long black robes. In the rear came high\npriests and nobles carrying a barrow hung with disks of gold. Upon the\nbarrow rode El Dorado--the Gilded Man--newly chosen chief of an obscure\nnative tribe, and destined to become, through no quality of his own,\nthe elusive central figure in the most singular chapter in exploration,\nabove all others the figure of fate in South America.\n\nHe was well named, with the poetry wherewith Spain had invested the\nvery headlands and harbors that her sons had found in the west. Like\nthe mourners, the Gilded Man was naked, and yet he was clad. His body\nhad been rubbed with fragrant gums, and priests with tubes had blown\ngold dust over him, until he gleamed like the god of day incarnate.\nArrived at the shore, the enameled chief went upon a raft with his\ncort\u00e8ge and was ferried to the middle of the lake. There he plunged\nin and laved himself while the people shouted and the trumpets brayed\non the beach. The golden dust that had covered him glimmered down\nthrough the water as an offering to its deity. In its wake followed the\nbracelets and brooches which the attendant lords flung into the pool.\nSo the ceremony ended.\n\nThis rite, beautiful and significant, is history, and not baseless\nlegend. Golden ornaments have been uncovered in the lake, which was\ndrained by modern treasure-seekers; among them was a piece wrought with\nsome art which seems to be a representation of the sacred raft and its\npassengers. Humboldt thinks that the rite came from warmer regions and\nthat the nude figures and coronation bath are alien to the climate of\nthe tableland. But the fatal feature of the ceremony is that it was\nalready history when the Spaniards heard of it. The Muysca Indians of\nthe Bogota region subjugated the Muysca Indians of the Guatavit\u00e1 region\nabout the time of the discovery of America. The custom of bathing a\ngilded cacique passed with this small tribal conquest. The memory of it\nremained. Unique among the customs of the continent, it was talked of\nalong the coasts of the Caribbean when the Spaniards came. There were\nrumors of it in Peru, and even farther south.\n\n\u201cLet us go in search of that gilded Indian,\u201d said Belalcazar when a\nnative of the north brought the first news of him to Quito, which had\nfallen to Pizarro a few years before. The Spaniards went, and found\nall there was to find--the deep waters of Guatavit\u00e1. But this did not\ncontent them. The Gilded Man was a symbol. He stood for something\nlarger than a rite that might take place once in a generation. He stood\nfor the very arrogance and folly of a royal and a priestly wealth that\nmust be beyond measure. Every sunrise the body of the haughty savage\nwas covered afresh with glittering dust. Every sunset, so the Spaniards\nfabled, he cleansed himself in a pool, the bottom of which had slowly\npaved itself with gold, as generation after generation of his dynasty\nperformed their ablutions. Only a mighty nation and a rich could have\nso prodigal a king; and so El Dorado came to mean not so much a man as\na golden city in a gilded land. The altars and ewers and basins of its\ntemples, the furnishings and plate of its palaces, the jewels and table\nservice of its nobles--here was promise of a booty to match the loot of\nMexico and Peru.\n\nIn seeking it Spain spent more lives and sank more treasure than in all\nits conquests in the New World.\n\nSomehow the land that held it seemed to recede as the exploring columns\nadvanced. It was sought in Colombia, in Venezuela, in eastern Peru,\nin northwestern Brazil, in Bolivia, and from Paraguay. Over a great\ninverted triangle the base of which was a line nearly a thousand\nmiles long drawn east from the Cordilleras of Colombia nearly to\nthe mouth of the Orinoco, and the apex of which was in Paraguay two\nthousand miles to the south, ceaselessly marched the expeditions. The\nEl Dorado country of the exploring parties--the region which knew\ntheir tread--was thus a territory of about a million square miles.\nIt repeated the general lines of the continent itself, an enclave of\nillusion surrounded by the realities of mountain and coast.\n\nInto this triangle from all sides struck the Spanish columns. They\nmoved east, north, and south from Quito, south from the Caribbean,\nsouth and west from Trinidad, north from Asuncion. They climbed\nmountains, forded rivers, penetrated deserts. They froze in the passes\nof the Andes, sickened in the flooded, fever-haunted valley of the\nAmazon, died of hunger in the pathless plains; and everywhere the\npoisoned Indian arrows found their targets. Three of the columns, one\nof which had been on the road for five years, entered the plateau\nof Cundinamarca at the same time--a coincidence without parallel in\nhistory. Germans and Englishmen also essayed the adventure. As for\nSpain, when de Silva appealed for funds and followers, the country\ncould have been depopulated, says Padre Simon, so strong was the belief\nin the Gilded Land.\n\nUnder the fable of the Gilded King ran other delusions. It was thought\nthat the northern part of South America was rich in the precious\nmetals. It was thought that the auriferous steeps of Peru and New\nGranada swept eastward almost to the mouth of the Orinoco. There was\nno comprehension of the continental extent of intertribal trade, and\nthe presence of gold among Indian tribes was thought to be proof that\nit could be had in their country, even when this was flat prairie or\ninundated forest. Native traders followed their own path from the Andes\nto the Caribbean; it is significant that the site of the legendary city\nmoved along it through successive generations almost from end to end.\n\nThe search for it falls into four chapters--the quest of El Dorado of\nCundinamarca; the quest of El Dorado of Canelas; the quest of El Dorado\nof the Omaguas; the quest of El Dorado of Manoa.\n\nBy the chance meeting of three expeditions, already noted, the end of\nthe quest for El Dorado of Cundinamarca is sheer pageantry. Belalcazar,\nlieutenant of Pizarro and governor of Quito, had sent his captains in\n1535 to discover what he conceived to be a golden valley between Pasto\nand Popayan in the Cordilleras of southern Colombia, not far from the\nSouth Sea. The following year he undertook the search in person and\npushed it farther north to the plateau of Bogota. There he found two\nother expeditions already in contact. Quesada had started from Santa\nMarta with eight hundred men and a hundred horses. With this command\nhe had subjugated the Chibcha nation, numbering a million persons if\nthe chroniclers are right, and dispersed an army of twenty thousand men\nwhich they had put in the field. After difficult marching and fighting\nhe brought a handful of men--a hundred foot and sixty horse--to the\nneighborhood of Bogota. Soon he saw approach the remnants of an\nexpedition which had left the coast of Venezuela five years before. The\nGerman, Federmann, brought to the plateau a hundred ragged men out of\nthe four hundred well-equipped soldiers with whom he had started.\n\nThe three commands bivouacked almost within striking distance of each\nother. They presented a spectacular contrast, for the men from Peru\nwere in Spanish steel and scarlet, those from Santa Marta wore Indian\nfabrics, while the men from Venezuela were clad in the skins of wild\nanimals. The clergy labored feverishly to avert the expected appeal to\narms, and for once in the history of New World exploration resolute men\nof the Iberian strain settled their differences without fighting. The\nthree captains went back to Spain together where each laid his claim\nto the governorship of New Granada before the throne. Only Belalcazar\nwas recognized and he only with the post of Adelantado in the Popayan\nregion.\n\nThe quest of El Dorado of Canelas is the story of the expedition\nof Gonzalo Pizarro and the secession therefrom of his lieutenant,\nOrellana. Across all the history of Spanish exploration flashes the\ntreacherous and brilliant deed of Orellana, somewhat as the \u201cmoving\nequator\u201d--the Amazon--which he discovered, cuts across the meridians\nof longitude between the Andes and the Atlantic. Canelas was the Land\nof Cinnamon, and here, and here only upon the soil of America, the\ntwo leading motives of exploration--the search for gold, the search\nfor spices--were interwoven. Pizarro had heard of a fabled spiceland\nhard by the territories of the Gilded King, and this was his avowed\nobjective. But his imagination roved further. In the valley of the\nNapo, a stream which for a space forms the boundary between Ecuador and\nmodern Colombia, there were plains where the inhabitants wore armor of\n\u201cmassy gold.\u201d Gonzalo would have a look at this armor. He set forth\nwith 500 Spaniards, 4,000 Indians, 150 horses, 1,000 dogs, and 5,000\nswine and \u201cPeruvian sheep.\u201d\n\nWhile threading the passes at the very threshold of the journey a\ntremendous earthquake rocked the mountains under his feet, and an\nIndian village with hundreds of houses sank out of sight. Followed\nthe tempests, and for six weeks tropical rainstorms with incessant\nthunder and lightning beat upon the men. It was a prelude in keeping\nwith the disasters to come. The Land of Cinnamon was found, and left\nbehind as too remote to offer present profit. A brigantine was built\non the Napo, and Orellana was sent ahead with it to gather supplies in\nthe Indian settlements. The party never came back, but swept down the\nAmazon in a wild adventure to the Atlantic sea, whence their tales of\nthe mighty river, its warrior women, its still stranger peoples, and\nits temples roofed with gold, set Spain on fire. Gonzalo waited for\nmonths, but he was of the strain of the Pizarros--all hero as well as\nall scoundrel--and did not succumb when he knew he had been betrayed.\nIn a march of over a year he led the remnant of his command back to\nQuito. All his Indians had died or deserted, and only eighty Spaniards\nremained. When they entered the City of the Line in June 1542, it\nseemed, says Prescott, as if the charnel-house had given up its dead.\n\nEl Dorado of the Omaguas had many seekers, and in some measure unveiled\nitself before the eyes of Philip Von Hutten. After him, the Gilded\nLand had for a time a place certain on the map. It was the region\nbetween the Guaviare and Caqueta rivers in southeastern Colombia and\nnorthwestern Brazil--the territory of the Omaguas, a rich and numerous\nIndian nation.\n\nVon Hutten was a relative of the Welsers, the Augsburg bankers to whom\nCharles V had ceded a large tract in Tierra-firma, and who had already\nsent out Federmann for the adventure of Cundinamarca. The second German\nexpedition began almost humbly. Von Hutten had only 130 men, and when\nhe found that Quesada was ahead of him with 250 men, he was content to\nfollow in his tracks, hoping to share the rewards of discovery. But\nwhen Quesada reached the headwaters of the Caqueta, he had seen enough,\nand Von Hutten pushed ahead into the unknown.\n\nHis Indian guide told him of a populous city called Macatoa in a\ncountry rich with gold, and he even displayed small golden apples which\ncame from there. The winter rains overtook the command on its road to\nthis halfway house to El Dorado, and, marooned on high ground, the men\nsubsisted on maize and ants, and on grubs, beetles, and roots. Their\nvery hair and beards fell off, but at length they reached Macatoa, and\nwent on to the land of the Omaguas.\n\nFrom a hill they saw at last the city they sought. It stretched beyond\nthe utmost range of the vision--long streets and densely clustered\nhouses, and a temple. In the temple, the guide said, were idols of\ngold as tall as small children, and one golden statue as tall as a\nwoman, with other treasures above price. Beyond, he assured them, lay\nstill richer cities. What they saw and what they heard were enough\nfor Von Hutten and his band. There were only forty left of them, and\nwithin the city, they were told, was a large force of native warriors.\nThe adventurers clapt spurs to their horses and dashed in--and then\ndashed out again, their leader wounded and fifteen thousand Indians\nin pursuit. The figures are their own, as well as the statement that\nthey beat off the attacking force and retired. Afterward Von Hutten was\nmurdered by his men.\n\nTo die on the march, to be stabbed by one\u2019s companions, or to be\nbeheaded by one\u2019s king, seemed the lot predestined for captains who\nsought the Gilded Devil.\n\nAs was proved again when the Spaniards quested for Cibola, an Indian\ntown is a deceptive thing when seen at a distance. What Von Hutten\nreally saw was probably a collection of closely grouped villages, and\namong them a council house or temple, larger than the others but no\nmore imposing than the bark communal houses under which at that time\nAlgonquins were living upon Manhattan Island. Yet the bruit of his\ndiscovery launched expedition after expedition from New World and Old.\nMartin de Proveda, starting from Peru, reached the country of the\nOmaguas and went on to Bogota. Pedro de Silva brought a party of six\nhundred out of Spain, and in a six months\u2019 journey across the llanos of\nVenezuela saw all but thirty die or desert. He tried again with another\nparty of 170 Spaniards going up the Orinoco. Famine, disease, and\nIndian arrows accounted for every member of his party save one.\n\nThere is evidence that unruly spirits were encouraged to seek El\nDorado in order to rid the settled places of the New World of their\nturbulence. Such was the expedition which Pedro de Ursua led out of\nPeru in 1559. A rabble of lawless adventurers had been attracted\nthither by the civil wars which followed the conquest. The viceroy was\nglad to commission this young officer and see him depart with these\n\u201cGentlemen and old souldiers of Peru\u201d as Lopez Vaz called them. When\nthey reached the Indian villages of Omagua the expected happened.\nThe men murdered their leader, and the command fell to Aguirre, who\ntold them that whoever spoke further of El Dorado should die. With\nhis followers he set forth to reach the Atlantic and return by way of\nPanama to Peru, where he purposed to seize \u201criches, bread, wine, flesh,\nand faire women also.\u201d His men murdered him in turn, but not until he\nhad done an amazing thing. Starting down the Amazon, his boats won the\nsea by way of the Orinoco, having used the Cassiquiare to cross from\none river system to the other.\n\nThe Omagua chapter ends with the great and tragic expedition of\nGonsalo Ximenes de Quesada, conqueror of New Granada, and one of the\nlargest figures among the conquistadors, brother of the Quesada who\nhad sunk his means in a like search eighteen years before. With 350\nSpanish soldiers, 1,500 Indians, a number of negro slaves, and a train\nof cattle and swine, Ximenes left Bogota in 1579. Torrential rains,\ninundated lands, prairie fires, mosquitoes, Indian warfare, disease,\nfamine--the disastrous routine of other expeditions--were repeated on a\nlarger canvas. Quesada got as far as the confluence of the Guaviare and\nOrinoco, and then had to return. He brought back seventy-four Spaniards\nand four Indians, and he left behind with his dead a fortune of two\nmillion dollars scattered along the trails of the wilderness.\n\nThe quest of El Dorado of Manoa lowers a curtain, rich and somber\nand yet of fantastic design, upon the career of the most remarkable\nEnglishman of the Elizabethan age. In this last phase of a long\ndelusion other explorers led their thousands to die in the jungles\nof the Orinoco, but their endeavor does not so engage attention as\nthat of Raleigh, who lost little save his own fortune and head. There\nare two names, and then the Elizabethan. Antonio de Berreo, married\nto Quesada\u2019s niece, came from New Granada down the Meta and part way\ndown the Orinoco for three years of dark futility. He came again and\nfounded towns at the confluence of the Caroni and the Orinoco, and in\nthe island of Trinidad at the Orinoco\u2019s mouth. His lieutenant, Domingo\nde Vera, went on to Spain and came back with a fleet and two thousand\nmen. These perished, all but a few, in the two towns de Berreo had\nfounded, or in the leagues of turbulent river that rolled between them,\nor in the fever-wasted jungles into which they set forth to find Manoa.\nDe Berreo himself fell a prisoner to Raleigh, who had set sail from\nEngland about the same time that de Vera embarked from Spain.\n\nThis time the Gilded Phantom, in order to make sure of victims in an\nage about to grow weary of long quests and wary of far horizons, had\ncome almost across the continent to entrap them. Not in the eastern\nfoothills of the Andes, but along the lower reaches of the Orinoco\nwhere the Atlantic tides still throbbed, the snare was spread. In the\nmighty empire of Guiana, it was said there was a lake of salt water\nalmost as great as the Caspian Sea, and upon it the largest, the\nfairest, and the richest city of the world. A fugitive Inca had come\ndown from the Andes, and the nobles and merchants had followed him,\nand long trains of llamas had borne their possessions through the\nwilderness, and an armed host went before. They \u201cconquered, reedified\nand inlarged\u201d Manoa, says Raleigh.\n\nSo vast was the city that when the Spaniard, Juan Martinez, was brought\ninto it blindfold at noon, and his face then uncovered, he moved\nthrough it all that afternoon and night, and the next day from sun\nrising to sun setting, before he came to the palace of the emigrant\nInca. At the feasts of this emperor, so de Berreo told his captor,\nwhen he \u201ccarouseth with his captaines, tributaries and governours,\u201d\nthe company stripped and were anointed with balsam and dusted off with\nfinely powdered gold, blown through hollow canes. So they sat, in\nradiant drunkenness, for six or seven days together.\n\nThus the striking inaugural ceremony of a vanquished Indian tribe\non the tableland of Bogota had become in the lowlands of Venezuela\nthe symbol of a luxurious and sensual court, and of an intolerable\nsplendor. Not one man, once in a lifetime, but a host of drunken\nsybarites, carousing in repeated revels, wore the golden coat; the raft\non a tarn of the western plateau had become a palace and a city greater\nthan any other, and seated in the eastern wilderness on a lake that was\nan inland sea. Upon the mythical estate and possessions of the Gilded\nKing had been piled the fugitive prestige and riches of the Incas.\nThe magnificent and yet sordid culmination of a century of splendid\ndreams and desperate endeavor, with cupidities, basenesses and heroisms\nuncounted, it needed for its final victim one who embodied in signal\nfashion the strength and the weaknesses of the age. It found him in Sir\nWalter Raleigh.\n\nRaleigh was the most accomplished man of his time, and every fiber of\nhim was Elizabethan. On the scaffold he said, \u201cI have been a soldier,\na sailor, and a courtier, all of them courses of wickedness and vice.\u201d\nLet it be added that in them he excelled most other men. He learned\nsoldiering under Coligny, fighting the battles of the Huguenots. As a\nsailor he took prizes of Spanish treasure ships, captured Fayal, led\nthe attack on the Spanish fleet at Cadiz, contributed to the strategy\nthat threw back the Armada; with him, as with Drake and his companions,\nthe ruling passion was to singe the beard of the king of Spain. As a\ncourtier he had his place among the vivacious friendships of the Virgin\nQueen, and he was rewarded and rebuked in turn with honors, monopolies,\nrustication, exile.\n\nRaleigh introduced the use of tobacco in England and the culture of\nthe potato in Ireland. He founded two short-lived colonies in North\nCarolina, which has honored his memory in the name of the state\ncapital. He aided the colonizing ventures of his stepbrother, Sir\nHumphrey Gilbert, and came to North America with him. He encouraged\nand aided the poet Spenser. He assisted Richard Hakluyt in bringing\nout his remarkable collection of explorers\u2019 manuscripts. It falls in\nwith the picture that Raleigh was skilled in brewing new drinks, one of\nwhich bore his name; in the Tower of London he divided the time between\nhis library and a small distillery he had set up in a hen-house.\n\nLike his great contemporaries, Raleigh was both a man of action\nand a man of affairs--compound of statesman, _condottiere_, and\nmerchant-adventurer. He was also a writer of noble gifts. Instead of\nmoping in his long years of confinement in the Tower, he wrote there\nhis _History of the World_. And he made beautiful poems. \u201cIf all the\nworld and love were young\u201d is his line. His is the epigram, \u201cThe\nshallow murmur, but the deep are dumb.\u201d In one mood he could pen the\ninvocation beginning, \u201cO eloquent, just and mightie Death,\u201d and in\nanother carol,\n\n If she undervalue me,\n What care I how fair she be?\n\nHis best-known line, \u201cFain would I climb, yet fear I to fall,\u201d\ngraven by him on a windowpane for the eye of Elizabeth, was least\ncharacteristic of Raleigh. If always he sought to climb the heights\nof adventure, he had little fear to fall. This record concerns his\nstrangest adventure and his final fall. In most part it is the\nstory as recounted in his book, _The discoverie of the large, rich,\nand beautiful Empire of Guiana, with a relation of the great and\ngolden citie of Manoa, which the Spaniards call El Dorado_. It is a\nfascinating book, for seldom before or since has pen so gifted set\ndown a travel tale; but there is tragedy in the very title, which is\nthe memorial of a vain dream. Let the historian Bancroft recite the\njustification, or the excuse, for the illusion of a worldly-wise man\nwho was also an Elizabethan: \u201cIf Elizabeth had hoped for a hyperborean\nPeru in the arctic seas of America, why might not Raleigh expect to\nfind the city of gold on the banks of the Orinoco?\u201d\n\nThe bare narrative of Raleigh\u2019s first quest of El Dorado of Manoa\nneed not long detain, for this skillful administrator, intrepid\nexplorer, and subtle diplomat found no golden city, lost no men in\nthe wilderness, and had no trouble with the Indians, whom his engaging\nbearing and politic address won to his side. He had sent a ship to\nreconnoiter in 1594, and after his own expedition came and went in\n1595, he sent another ship in 1596 to continue the exploration, while\nhe himself took command of the squadron that dashed in upon the Spanish\nshipping at Cadiz. Raleigh\u2019s Guiana flotilla of the year before\nconsisted of five ships, one of them from the British Admiralty. That\nthere might be no enemy behind him, he seized the Spanish settlement at\nTrinidad, capturing de Berreo; anchoring his ships there, he set off in\nbarges with a hundred men up the stubborn current of the Orinoco. Six\nmonths after he sailed from England, he was back again with some Indian\nhostages, some pieces of golden ore, and the marvelous stories with\nwhich his _Discovery_ is adorned.\n\nHis travel narrative lays its scenes in \u201cthe insular regions and broken\nworld\u201d of Guiana, which then included a good part of Venezuela. Through\nits pages flows \u201cthe great rage and increase\u201d of the swollen Orinoco.\nThrough them flit \u201cbirds of all colours, some carnation, some crimson,\norange-tawny, and purple,\u201d so that \u201cit was unto us a great good passing\nof the time to behold them.\u201d \u201cI never saw a more beautifull countrey,\nnor more lively prospects,\u201d exclaims Raleigh. From afar off he gazed on\na \u201cmountaine of Christall.\u201d \u201cThere falleth over it,\u201d he says, \u201ca mighty\nriver which toucheth no part of the side of the mountaine, but rusheth\nover the toppe of it, and falleth to the ground with so terrible a\nnoyse and clamour, as if a thousand great bels were knockt one against\nanother.\u201d Enters the note of gold and of politics: In Guiana, it\nseemed, \u201cevery stone that we stouped to take up, promised either golde\nor silver by his complexion.\u201d For \u201chealth, good ayre, pleasure and\nriches,\u201d he concludes, \u201cthis country hath no equal, East or West.\u201d It\nwould be easy for the English to defend it, for the woods are so thick\nalong the rivers that \u201ca mouse cannot sit in a boat unhit from the\nbanke.\u201d\n\nThe book holds also the statement of the large national aims of\nRaleigh, into which, as he assured himself, the gold hunt fitted. Not\nfor him were mere \u201cjourneys of picory,\u201d nor \u201cto go long voyages, to lie\nhard, to fare worse, to be parched and withered,\u201d solely to \u201ccozen\nmyselfe.\u201d Here was \u201ca better Indies for her Majestie than the King of\nSpaine hath any.\u201d With the gold of western America Spain bade fair\nto dominate the world. Only by tapping the Indian treasure-house of\neastern America could the balance of power be restored. In a notable\npassage Raleigh enunciates a theory of international politics that\nwould sound familiar to modern ears, if for the gold lust there were\nsubstituted the lust of markets.\n\n\u201cIf we consider,\u201d he says, \u201cthe affaires of the Spanish king, what\nterritories he hath purchased, what he hath added to the acts of his\npredecessors, how many kingdoms he hath indangered, how many armies,\ngarrisons & navies he hath and doth mainteine, the great losses\nwhich he hath repaired, as in 88 above 100 saile of great ships with\ntheir artillery, & that no yeere is lesse unfortunate but that many\nvessels, treasures, and people are devoured, and yet notwithstanding\nhe beginneth againe like a storme to threaten shipwrack to us all: we\nshall find that these abilities rise not from the trades of sacks, and\nSivil oringes, nor from ought else that either Spaine, Portugal, or any\nof his other provinces produce: it is his Indian gold that indangereth\nand disturbeth all the nations of Europe, it purchaseth intelligence,\ncreepeth into counsels, and setteth bound loyaltie at libertie, in the\ngreatest Monarchies of Europe.\u201d\n\nThis enterprise of matching gold with gold, Guiana against Peru,\nRaleigh hoped would be intrusted to him, and he must have pictured\nhimself as viceroy, under England, of such another India as Englishmen\nof later centuries were to attain. Yet the _Discovery_ is a defense,\nas well as a political tract and a collection of mirabilia. Raleigh\u2019s\nreturn, empty-handed, had aroused the resentment of some who had put\nmoney into his venture, and the ridicule and censure of more. It was\nalleged that he had procured his golden ore in Barbary, and naught\nbetter than marcasite from Guiana. It was even noised abroad that he\nhad not been with the fleet at all, but had been concealed in Cornwall\nwhile his ships were away. The dreaming adventurer had his enemies.\n\nAfter his second voyage to Guiana they were able to destroy him.\nTwenty-one years had elapsed since the first expedition. Twelve of\nthese Raleigh had spent in the Tower, imprisoned on one of the\ncharges of treason which in those days meant little save that a man\nwas disliked by the royal favorites of the moment. At sixty-four years\nof age he was paroled and went to Guiana with a squadron of fourteen\nvessels and the coveted commission of governor of the country. He spoke\nnow of a wonderful mine and little of a thing that was in the back of\nhis head, for still he dreamed of Manoa\u2019s golden towers, which, as many\nmen would have it, were nowhere on earth.\n\nThe expedition turned out disastrously. King James had submitted to\nSpain through its ambassador at London a detailed copy of Raleigh\u2019s\nplans and had received what was represented to Raleigh to be a pledge\nof unmolested passage to the up-river country claimed by him by right\nof discovery. He found the Spaniards fortified against him. There were\nclashes in which his own son lost his life and also the governor of a\nriver town, kinsman of the Spanish ambassador.\n\nRaleigh returned to face his fate, and in effect it was Spain\u2019s\nown hand that wrote the decree of death, for the two royal houses\nwere about to be united by marriage, and the Stuart was studiously\ncomplaisant to the Hapsburg. Sir Walter was tried on a charge of\nmasking, under a project to discover a mine, a piratical raid on the\nSpanish settlements--a charge which the national contacts of a hundred\nyears invested with a grim humor. But he was executed on a more\nserviceable pretext, the long-suspended sentence for treason; nor did\nit avail him to urge that the king\u2019s commission for his voyage was in\nitself a grant of pardon. The night before his death on the scaffold he\nwrote these lines:\n\n E\u2019en such is Time, who takes in trust\n Our youth and joys and all we have,\n And pays us but with age and dust.\n\nThus the great Elizabethan faced and dismissed two vanities. Equally\nso he had found life itself and the mocking parable of his New World\nquest--for hopes, frustration; dross for gold.\n\nWith Raleigh ended the larger expeditions to find El Dorado. There is\na little more to say. Some years before, two parties had sought the\nGilded City, starting from far south. One came from Buenos Aires in\n1537, all the colonists leaving that ill-fated city, and passing up\nthe river in the hope either of finding El Dorado or of reaching the\nSpanish settlements on Lake Titicaca. A detachment of this party halted\non the Paraguay and founded Asuncion. Another detachment, numbering two\nhundred persons, pushed on into Bolivia, where the Indians ambushed and\nkilled them all. A later party which was led by De Chaves left Asuncion\nin 1560, wandered northwest into Bolivia and there disbanded.\n\nThe imaginary lake of Manoa, sometimes called Mar Eldorado or the\nGolden Sea, was delineated on maps of South America for nearly three\ncenturies after the time of Columbus. Periodical overflows of the\nOrinoco tributaries, which cover wide regions with standing water,\nserve to explain the origin and persistence of the lake legend. For the\nshift of the basic legend from Colombia to Guiana, Humboldt suggests an\nexplanation in a custom of native tribes in the latter country. Instead\nof tattooing themselves, the Indians anointed their bodies with turtle\nfat and stuck spangles of mica with a metallic luster, white as silver\nand red as copper, upon their skins, so that at a distance they seemed\nto wear laced clothes.\n\nIn 1740 Don Manuel Centurion, the Spanish governor of Santa Thome del\nAgostina, made further search for the fabled lake of Manoa and the\ncity washed by its waters. The popular imagination was inflamed by the\nreports of an Indian who came down the river Caroni. In the southern\nsky he showed the natives the dim radiance of the Clouds of Magellan.\nThis he said was the reflection of golden ore on an island in the lake\nof legend. So may one leave the city of illusion where it belongs, in\ncloudland.\n\n\n\n\nChapter XXII. The Dream Quests of Spain\n\n\nThe search for El Dorado was the greatest of the dream quests of Spain.\nIt was not the first, it was not the last. Along with lesser ventures\nwithout number Spain sought certain grand objects. These included the\nFountain of Youth, the Earthly Paradise, the Temple of the Sun, the\nCradle of Gold, the Country of Cinnamon, the Enchanted City of the\nC\u00e6sars, the Islands of Solomon, El Gran Moxo, El Gran Paititi, the\nSepulchres of Zenu, the Temple of Dobayba, the Seven Cities of Cibola,\nQuivera the prairie capital. And Spain sought also buried cities and\nphantom lakes and craters abrim with liquid gold.\n\nThrough most of these quests is the flow of delusive water. It sparkles\nin the youth-conferring spring which De Leon failed to find. It moves\nin the River Jordan, for which red man and white hunted in Florida.\nIt sweeps past the mythical Quivera, bearing huge canoes with prows\nof gold. It shines on the far horizon of Cibola, and on it there are\nbarks of Cathay. It glimmers in the tarn of Guatavit\u00e1. In the legendary\nsea of Manoa it reflects the fugitive gold of El Dorado. It laves the\nenchanted City of the C\u00e6sars hard by the lake of Nahuelhuapi. In the\nLaguna de los Xarayes it ripples around the island home of El Gran\nMoxo. It flashes on the beaches of fabled islands west of the southern\ncontinent.\n\nThere were reasons for the illusory lakes of Spanish adventure. The\nCity of Mexico was seated in a lake with causeways crossing it and\ncanals reaching the heart of the city. The Empire of Peru held Lake\nTiticaca as sacred. The scarcely less remarkable civilization of the\nChibchas of Colombia rendered homage to the lakes of the central\nplateau. So the Spaniards thought that when they sought other golden\ncities in the wilderness they would find them on the shores of inland\nseas.\n\nThe periodic inundations of the Orinoco, the Amazon, the Paraguay,\nand the tributaries of these streams deceived and disturbed men with\nappearances which they could not understand. One explorer would come\nupon a vast sheet of still water, and in due time it would get upon the\nmaps. Another would lead his column dry shod over the same place, and\nmen were slow to realize that each had made correct report of what he\nsaw. For example, the legendary lake of Xarayas, long supposed to be\nthe source of the Paraguay, is merely a seasonal inundation; but during\nhigh water this transitory sea extends three hundred and fifty miles\nnorth and south and one hundred and fifty miles east and west.\n\nThe things of the spirit--religion, romance, pure fantasy--animated\nSpain in some of the quests it followed beside the still waters of the\nlakes of dream. Its rude chivalry could serve the ideal with a whole\nheart. But for the most part cavalier and muleteer sought gold alone.\nGems, spices, pepper, dyewoods, grain fields, raw materials, rubber,\nbananas, coffee--these are objects of ancient or modern enterprise in\nstrange lands. They meant little to the Spaniard. Nor was his deepest\ninterest in metal that was still underground. He was looking for the\ngold that for generation after generation Indian civilizations had\nbrought to the surface and stored in their capital cities. The rewards\nof savage toil he would seize for himself who better knew their value,\nor thought he did.\n\nThat is why the visionary expeditions of Spain are in the main a search\nfor cities, or, failing these, projects to loot temples and rifle\ngraves. Neither the digging nor the assembling of the golden treasure\nwas in the scheme. The purpose was to take the central treasure houses.\nSo Spain had already done in Peru. The captive Inca Atahuallpa had\nhimself suggested a kindred thing. For ransom he offered to fill his\nprison chamber, a room seventeen feet wide and twenty-two feet long,\nwith gold to the depth of nine feet, or as high as the reach of the\ntallest cavalier. When the bargain was made, gold began to pour in from\nall corners of the empire--statues, vases, vessels, utensils, plaques,\ndisks, chains, temple ornaments, nuggets, and golden dust. Of course\nhis captors killed the Inca, and rushed on to seek the sources whence\nflowed the maddening stream; and what they found did not satisfy. Much\nof the treasure of the Incas had disappeared. Nor has it been uncovered\nsince.\n\nThose vain enterprises of Spain, with which a great part of the New\nWorld\u2019s sixteenth century was filled, were attempts of adventurers to\nlay hold of the gold which had escaped the conquistadors in Mexico and\nPeru, or which it was imagined had escaped them. It was supposed that\nthe descendants of the Montezumas, taking rich treasures with them, had\nretreated northward to Cibola or to Quivera, and there renewed their\nstate. It was reported, and with some basis of fact, that princes of\nthe Inca blood had gone north, south, or east from Cuzco and set up new\ncities in the wilderness. The basis of fact was the flight of Manco\nCapac, called the Last of the Incas. This prince raised the country\nagainst its conquerors, flung an army of two hundred thousand warriors\nagainst the Spanish garrison in Cuzco, and before night settled on the\nempire of the Andes gave proof on the battlefield that there was valor\nin the Quichua blood. At the mountain fortress of Choquequirau, the\nCradle of Gold, six thousand feet above the valley of the Apurimac,\nPeruvian geographers believe the Last of the Incas made his seat.\n\n\n_The Fountain of Youth_\n\nIt is best to begin the recital of the dream quests of Spain with the\ndream of all ages--the search for lost youth. It was the first of those\nadventures in the New World in which the sons of Spain were to show\nthey were different from other men, in that when they imagined a vain\nthing their imagination rushed on to action.\n\nIn an unfinished poem Heine sketches the beginning of this quest. Ponce\nde Leon, the veteran ex-governor of Porto Rico, lies in his hammock\nand an old Indian servant sings to him of the Bahama island of Bimini\nwith its bird song and undying flowers, and of its interesting tenants.\nThese were old men restored by a magic spring to riotous youth and\nbeldames who had drunk of its waters and regained girlhood\u2019s bloom;\nthey were afraid to return home because of the scandal their shamefully\nyouthful appearance would work among their friends. Poetic license\ncarries this sketch only a little beyond the credulity of the period,\nfor Peter Martyr had written at length to the bishop of Rome of an\nisland with a youth-restoring spring some three hundred leagues north\nof Hispaniola.\n\n[Illustration: _The Things of the Spirit Animated Spain in Some of the\nQuests It Followed Beside the Still Waters of the Lakes of Dream_]\n\nThe Spanish cavalier set sail with three ships in 1512, in search of\nBimini. There were nearly seven hundred islands and islets in the\nBahamas and his journey was through a labyrinth. For a part of the\nvoyage he had the strangest, and perhaps the most fitting, of pilots.\nTo a clump of islands near the Lucayos he gave the name of La Vieja\nor the Old Woman group because he found them without inhabitants save\none ancient woman. Her he took aboard to help guide him through the\nsea passages. He found Florida, but he did not find Bimini, which was\ndiscovered later by his captain, Juan Perez de Ortubia, the sagacious\nold woman directing him to its shore. The water there was like any\nother water. Ponce de Leon, however, escaped the disabilities of age. A\npoisoned Indian arrow launched from a Florida bow did for him when he\nwas about sixty-one.\n\nBefore his death, the quest for a fountain from which one might quaff\nthe draught of youth had been broadened to include a River Jordan of\nrejuvenating baths. This was somewhere on the peninsula of Florida,\nwhere for half a century red men and white searched for it, bathing\nin every stream, lagoon, and swamp they found, in the hope that the\nmagic water, in some sudden transformation scene, might betray its\nwhereabouts.\n\nThough they did not know it, the Spaniards themselves brought to the\nNew World the legend of the fountain of youth and the name of Bimini,\nas well as that of the River Jordan. Wiener has traced each step. In\n1493, a year before the Pope made the line of demarcation between the\nSpanish and Portuguese discoveries, he had given to Spain the newly\ndiscovered lands on condition that the natives should be baptized\nin the Catholic faith. Amerigo Vespucci falsely reported that, in\ncompliance therewith, a fountain of baptism had been placed on an\nisland in the Gulf of Mexico. Peter Martyr in his _Decade of 1511_\ncalled this the _fonte perenni_, but the cartographer misread his\nLatin, and on the map attached to his work a coast line north of Cuba\nis called _isla de beimeni parte_. Thus the perennial fountain became\nBimini, and the fiction of a Christian baptismal font revived a pagan\nmyth.\n\n\n_The Enchanted City of the C\u00e6sars_\n\nThe quest of the Enchanted City of the C\u00e6sars was the southernmost\nadventure of the dreaming mind of Spain. It was prosecuted along the\nslopes of the southern Andes and the Patagonian plains beyond--that\nmysterious and desolate region which made so deep an impression upon\nDarwin. Over the remote prairies, peopled only by huanacos and roving\nbands of tall savages, Spanish commands hunted for a capital which the\nnatives called Trapalanda, and which, according to the oath of those\nwho said they had seen it, was as great as ancient Nineveh and as\npopulous as Peking.\n\nOutbound to the Moluccas, the story ran, a vessel belonging to the\nbishop of Palancia was shipwrecked in the Straits of Magellan. The\ncaptain of the stranded craft, Sebastian de Arguello, found himself on\nthe Patagonian coast with three thousand miles of mountain and plain\nbetween his little band and the outpost of Spanish power at Cuzco.\nFollowed by about two hundred soldiers and sailors, thirty adventurers,\ntwenty-three married women, and three priests, he struck boldly into\nthe heart of the pampas, moving northward. When the company reached\na region of lakes and meadows rimmed by snowy summits resolution was\ntaken to found there an independent state aloof from the perturbations\nof the world. Other fugitives had reached this inviting spot before the\nSpaniards--a numerous native people flying from the wreck of Peru.\n\nIt would seem from the rapid growth of the city which was said to\nhave arisen upon the shore of Lake Nahuelhuapi that red men and white\nmingled their blood. The first report of the austral capital reached\nConcepcion in Chile, in 1557.\n\nThe Spanish settlements were led to picture a great, rich city in the\nsouth. A strong wall ran around it, and over it the roving Indians\nof the prairies could see reddish roofs that gleamed as with gold.\nThe houses were of cut stone and those who had been within them\nspoke of beds, chairs, and table service made of precious ores. The\ncentral edifice in the capital was a noble church roofed with silver,\nand from it were decreed and regulated the pompous festivals of the\necclesiastical year.\n\nWishing to keep their isolation inviolate, its inhabitants had an\nunderstanding with the Indians that the secret of the city should be\ntold to none. But when it received the name of _La Ciudad encantada\nde los C\u00e6sares_ (the enchanted City of the C\u00e6sars), it was a presage\nthat from all the Spanish settlements of the south, expeditions should\ngo forth to seek it out, for the very words were a challenge to the\nimagination.\n\nIt was called the city of the C\u00e6sars because the men who founded it had\nbeen subjects of Charles V of Spain, whom men had styled the C\u00e6sar in\nrecognition of his world-wide dominion. It was called enchanted because\nof the beauty of its lake setting and the splendors within its walls.\nSoon its people became known as the C\u00e6sars, and the men who conducted\nexpeditions to reach them as the C\u00e6saristas.\n\nThere were other motives for the quest beside the golden treasure\nto be found there and the wish to visit a clime so fair that none\ndied save of old age. Here were a kindred people, cut off from their\nfellows, and, it might be, lapsing decade after decade into a splendid\nbarbarism. The purity of their Christian faith was in danger of\ncorruption from every sort of heathen error. Civilization and religion\nwere both concerned in the rescue of this fascinating creole capital,\nwhich had done so well by itself and yet needed to renew its contacts\nwith the world. So said the Spaniard wherever fortune had placed\nhim--in the homeland, in Mexico, in the Philippines, and most of all in\nthe colonies of the southern Cordilleras and the eastern plains.\n\nThere were a number of small expeditions to seek the legendary city,\nand three of importance. Diego Flores de Leon reached Lake Nahuelhuapi\nfrom the Pacific side, heard of savage armies massed on his front, and\nwent no further. Half a century later came the Jesuit father, Nicolas\nMascardi. Fearing that the southern capital might have forgotten the\nmother tongue of Spain, he collaborated with another churchman in\na letter which was translated into seven languages--Greek, Latin,\nSpanish, Italian, Chilean, Puelche, and Poya. The letter was sent\nahead by an Indian courier after he reached the shores of Nahuelhuapi.\nHearing a report that the site of the city was near the Atlantic, he\ncrossed the continent, and then turned southward toward the Straits of\nMagellan, falling at last to an Indian arrow. This was in 1673. More\nthan a century afterward the Franciscan friar, Menendez, was sent out\nby the viceroy of Peru, but found no city beside Nahuelhuapi.\n\nThereafter faith in the fable died, save among the imaginative and the\ncredulous. Of the former was Charles III of Spain, who died believing\nit in 1788. Of the latter are the common people of Chile and Argentina,\nwho see in the streams of lava and volcanic sand at the foot of Osorno\nthe roads of a hidden people, and who still hear in the noise of the\navalanches upon Tronador the thunder of artillery along enchanted\nbattlements.\n\n\n_The Seven Cities of Cibola_\n\nIn the quest of the Seven Cities of Cibola Spain dreamed northward,\nand again deluded itself by the magic and sonority of a name. When\nthe fable was full blown it was of a city as great as the capital of\nthe Montezumas and ruled by a fugitive prince of that house. Lesser\ncities surrounded it, as they surrounded Tenochtitlan on the plateau\nof Anahuac. It stood beside a great inland sea out of which flowed the\nColorado, and on the coasts of this land were ships from China.\n\nThe inhabitants of the plains were cattle of deformed shape and\nferocious aspect, which the Spaniards called the kine of Cibola. The\ninhabitants of the seven cities, says Friar Marcos, who saw them at a\ndistance, were a people \u201csomewhat white,\u201d clad in cotton garments and\ndwelling in stone houses with flat roofs. The Franciscan continues:\n\u201cThey have emeralds and other jewels, although they esteem none as much\nas turquoises, wherewith they adorn the walls and porches of their\nhouses, and their apparel and vessels, and they use them instead of\nmoney through all the country. They use vessels of gold and silver,\nfor they have no other metal, whereof there is greater avail and more\nabundance than in Peru.\u201d\n\nThis capital of the buffalo country was located within the limits of\nthe present United States. Somewhat shrunken from the dimensions of\nlegend, it is still in existence and the descendants of the men fabled\nto traffic with Cathay go about its streets. Their skins are darker\nthan Marcos reported them, but they have the features and expression of\nwhite men.\n\nHere is another myth of a gilded land and a refugee king, but overlaid\nwith material of a strange texture brought from afar. Its scene is\ninland where buffalo are feeding; yet one of its windows commands the\nPacific with slanting Chinese sails upon it, and into the other comes\nan old tale of the open Atlantic. The Seven Cities of Cibola are the\nlegendary seven cities of Antilia, founded by seven Spanish bishops\nwho fled the Moor, and they are the seven caves out of which came the\nAztecs. But they are also seven towns, the remains of which, waste or\ntenanted, are to be found in New Mexico near the Arizona line. The vice\nof the legend is that they are small towns, and poor.\n\nThere are names of consequence in the quest of the Seven Cities of\nCibola, but a broad blotch of buffoonery is smeared across it. Alone of\nall the visionary searches of Spain, it invites the treatment of ironic\nburlesque. Yet there is heroism in the story and a great chapter of\ngeography.\n\nThe first of these names is that of the luckless but stout-hearted\nCabeza de Vaca who left a trail of wandering mishap clear across the\ncontinent of North America, and who was yet to break new paths through\nthe forests and savannas of South America where he founded the capital\nof the Silver Republic. In 1536 the outposts of Melchior Diaz, who\ncommanded in the northern Mexican district of Culiacan, came upon a\nstrange party--a white man, nearly naked, with matted hair and beard,\na negro, and eleven Indians. The white man spoke in Spanish and with\nsuch joyful agitation as to arouse a momentary suspicion. It was Cabeza\nde Vaca. His negro companion was named Estivanico. There were three\nother Spaniards a day\u2019s march behind. In what was to follow, singularly\nenough, the negro is the central figure; in what had gone before the\nstory is the Spanish captain\u2019s.\n\nIn 1527 he had sailed for Florida as treasurer of an expedition with\nfive vessels and six hundred men, in search of the Golden Apalache, one\nof the minor dream quests of Spain. Quitting the fleet in a Florida\nbay, three hundred men marched inland to their objective. What they\nfound was a collection of forty wigwams on the Suwanee River and a\nrude people that engaged them in daily skirmishes at arms. So they\nmarched on, became entangled in the swamps and bayous along the coasts\nof Alabama and Louisiana, made one fatal attempt to build rafts and\ncross the Gulf to the Mexican coast, and then succumbed by degrees\nto the wilderness. All but four of the Spaniards perished and these\nwere buffeted from tribe to tribe in an aimless drift westward. They\nhad almost reached the Gulf of California when they met the Spanish\noutpost, and in eight years they had wandered from Atlantic to Pacific.\n\nWhat they told launched the search for the Seven Cities of Cibola.\nFarther north they had found tribes of sedentary Indians living in\nstone houses, wearing cotton garments and turquoise ornaments, and\nwith indications of stores of gold to draw upon. Francisco Vasquez\nCoronado, governor of Northwest Mexico, was commissioned by Mendoza,\nViceroy of New Spain, to explore in that direction. Distrusting\nthe reports of Cabeza de Vaca, his first step was a reconnaissance\nunder the Franciscan, Fray Marcos. As guide and attendant the negro\nEstevanico went with him, and a party of Pima Indians accompanied them.\nThey started northward from Culiacan in 1539, following the coast. In\nSonora the friar committed the folly of sending the negro ahead with\ninstructions to report to him at intervals by messenger. If he found\na mean thing he was to send a cross a hand\u2019s length long; if a larger\nmatter, a cross two hands\u2019 long; if the negro found a country better\nthan New Spain he was to send back a great cross.\n\nThat was the last Fray Marcos saw of the negro, but he heard from him,\nand from time to time he heard about him. Four days after his departure\nan Indian came back bearing a wooden cross as high as a man and the\nword of Estevanico that thirty days\u2019 march ahead were seven cities\nabounding in pearls and gold, and all subject to one lord. The houses\nwere of stone and mortar, one, two, and three stories high, and the\nchief\u2019s house was of four stories. One of the cities was named Cibola.\nAs the friar proceeded, the natives brought tales which seemed to\nconfirm the reports, and used place names that suggested grandeur. He\nheard of a province called Totoneac, of the city of Ahacus, and of the\nkingdoms of Hacus and Marata.\n\nMeanwhile Africa was blazing a trail far ahead into Darkest America.\nIt was broad, dusty with the feet of an accumulating multitude, and\nfinger-posted by avarice and imposture. The negro had taken the\nadventure out of the hands of the too-trusting monk. In his wanderings\nwith Cabeza de Vaca he had won assurance, some knowledge of the\nIndian nature, and a gourd rattle. He moved with the state and tumult\nof a medicine-man, this clapper his potent emblem of authority. The\nsuperstitious natives met all his demands, and he demanded much--more\nfood than he could use, gold, green stones, women. The monk followed,\nseveral journeys behind, in a sort of anti-climax.\n\nThe procession of the black Bacchus had its inevitable ending. Marcos\nlearned it while he was still some days from his goal. He met a number\nof the Indians who had been with Estevanico, and they were flying\ntoward Mexico. They told of entering Cibola with the negro, where his\narrogance and folly mounted to new levels. Noting the lowering looks\nof the sedentary Indians, several of these plains Indians went outside\nand, hiding themselves, awaited the finish they foresaw. One day they\nbeheld their companions running from the town with men in pursuit. The\nnegro was not with them. His hosts had killed him.\n\nWith two of the Indians Marcos went on to a hill from which he looked\ndown upon a valley dotted with villages. The nearest of these and not\nthe largest was Cibola. To Marcos it seemed \u201cas large as the City of\nMexico.\u201d It is situate, he says, \u201con a plain at the foot of a round\nhill, and maketh shew to be a fair city, and is better seated than any\nthat I have seen in these parts. The houses are builded in order, all\nmade of stone with divers storeys and flat roofs.\u201d Then he adds from\nhearsay details of golden vessels and turquoise-studded porches.\n\nSetting up a wooden cross, Marcos hastened back, rejoicing, to make his\nreport to the viceroy. Out of what he told, and the far-sounding names\nof provinces and kingdoms which he had heard, the Spanish mind made a\nthing too rich for the haggard realities of the American southwest. It\nseemed to call for a well-appointed expedition, and Coronado urged this\non the viceroy.\n\nWith Marcos as his guide he was dispatched with a land force of\nthree hundred and twenty Spaniards, three hundred native allies,\nand a thousand Indian and negro camp followers. He left San Miguel\nin February, 1540, and in May a fleet under Alarcon was sent from\nAcapulco to act in concert with him along the coast of the Gulf of\nCalifornia. Alarcon went to the head of the gulf with his ships, and up\nthe Colorado, but, learning from natives that white men had already\nentered Cibola, he returned with his fleet to Acapulco.\n\nWhat Coronado had entered was the Indian pueblo of Zu\u00f1i and its\nattendant villages in northwestern New Mexico. As soon as his soldiers\nbeheld these little settlements, writes Castaneda, who went with the\nexpedition, they \u201cbroke out in curses against Fray Marcos.\u201d They\naccused him of deceiving them, and in fear of his life he was glad\nto go back with the courier who bore to the viceroy the report of\nCoronado. \u201cI can assure your honour,\u201d says the report, \u201cthe friar said\nthe truth in nothing that he reported, saving only the names of the\ncities and great houses of stone; for although they be not wrought with\nturquoises, nor with lime nor brick, yet are they very excellent houses\nof three or four or five lofts high, wherein are good lodgings and fair\nchambers. The seven cities are seven small towns, and they stand all\nwithin four leagues together, and none of them is called Cibola, but\naltogether they are called Cibola.\u201d\n\nIn his scholarly account of this expedition Bandelier defends the\ncredulous monk, and urges that the Spaniards had tricked out his story\nwith their own imaginings. He argues that the comparison with the City\nof Mexico was not with the old Aztec capital, but with the new Spanish\ntown which, as Fray Marcos knew it in 1539, may not have had as many\nas a thousand inhabitants. As to the statement that the citizens of\nCibola embellished their houses with green stones or turquoises, it\nhas been learned that it was an old custom in Zu\u00f1i to decorate the\nroof hatches by which the people descended to their chambers with\nturquoise, malachite, phosphate of copper and other stones or ores\nof green and blue. This was truthful detail, although lending itself\nto exaggeration. But the golden vessels, which most concerned the\nSpaniard, were fable, and the Coronado expedition had cost $250,000.\n\nDespite the forthright words of Coronado, one conquistador who would\nlook facts in the face, his countrymen were unwilling to surrender the\nvision all at once. The English merchant, Henry Hawks, spent five years\nin Mexico and in 1572 made this report: \u201cThe Spanyards have notice of\nseven cities which old men of the Indians shew them should lie towards\nthe northwest from Mexico. They have used and use dayly much diligence\nin seeking of them, but they cannot find any one of them. They say that\nthe witchcraft of the Indians is such, that when they come by these\ntownes they cast a mist upon them, so that they cannot see them.\u201d\n\nZu\u00f1i lies south of the great Navaho reservation, and is a pueblo\nof the same type as Taos, Acoma, Laguna, and the Hopi towns. Its\nidentification with the Seven Cities of Cibola rests on the reports\nof the explorers themselves, on an examination of their routes, and\nespecially on the researches of Frank H. Cushing, commissioner of the\nAmerican Bureau of Ethnology, who became a member of this Indian tribe\nin 1880 and lived with it four years while he studied its traditions.\nAt that time Zu\u00f1i had sixteen hundred inhabitants.\n\nThese people called their home Shivano (Spanish, Civano). Cushing\nfound that the sonorous Marata and Tontoneac were not kingdoms or\nprovinces, but directions, and that one of the distant \u201ccities\u201d named\nby the natives was Acoma, which lies near the Mesa Encantada. While the\nSpaniards had denied that Marcos and Estevanico really made a journey\nto the north, Cushing heard from the Zu\u00f1i story-tellers that a \u201cblack\nMexican\u201d had come among them and had been killed for his rudeness to\ntheir women. Soon afterwards the first \u201cwhite Mexicans\u201d they had seen\nentered their land as conquerors.\n\n\n_Quivera_\n\nCoronado was not content to bring back his costly expedition,\nempty-handed, from the fiasco of Cibola. Again he dreamed northward,\nand the name of his dream is Quivera. Between this city of illusion in\nthe Mississippi Valley, and the city of enchantment which the C\u00e6sars\nhad reared on the edge of the Patagonian plain, it is six thousand\nmiles in a straight line. These two capitals of the mirage are the\nfarthest north and farthest south of Spanish fantasy.\n\nThe conqueror of Cibola drifted into the Quivera adventure by degrees.\nThere must be richer pueblos east of the seven towns, he thought, and\nwent in search of them, discovering and occupying many. But he found\nNew Mexico a sterile land. He became interested in the great buffalo\nherds that roamed the plains to the north and sent his lieutenant,\nAlvarado, on a hunt to secure meat. Alvarado took with him as a guide\nan Indian from somewhere far to the east whom he found living with\nthe Pecos tribe and who figures in Spanish writings as El Turco, \u201cthe\nTurk,\u201d which was what he looked like. The Spaniard did not stay long\namong the buffalos, for the homesick Turk had an exciting tale to tell.\nWith it, Alvarado hastened back to his chief, and soon, with El Turco\nas pathfinder, the columns started toward the northeast and Quivera.\n\nThis was another golden city in a prosperous land. Through the land ran\na river two leagues wide in which swam fish as large as horses. There\nwere great canoes upon the river, with as many as forty men to drive\nthem, and these had golden eagles for figureheads. The native sovereign\nslumbered in the afternoons beneath a tree the branches of which were\nhung with golden bells, where the wind made music. The houses of\nQuivera were built of stone and were like those of the pueblos of New\nMexico, but larger and fairer. The meats and drinks of its citizens\nwere served in vessels of precious metals.\n\nOf this land the Turk himself was a native. But there was another\nIndian exile with the party. His name was Ysopete, and he, too, spoke\nof Quivera. It seemed to be a different place farther north.\n\nWith one guide bent on leading him northward and the other eastward,\nthe expedition which Coronado conducted toward Quivera moved like a man\nlost in the wilderness. It traveled to the right for thirty-seven days\nand partly returned on its tracks. Soon the Spaniards became confused\nand ill at ease. In the vast monotony of the staked plains they saw\nno marks by which they could guide themselves forward or find the way\nback. A sense of helplessness stole over them. The very bison that\ngrazed around them excited a sort of fear. Their horses went wild with\nterror when for the first time they saw these huge, misshapen beasts,\nwhose glowing eyes and hollow bellowing were calculated to inspire awe\neven in men.\n\nThe wanderers were in latitudes less kindly to illusion than those\nwhere other men were seeking the Gilded King, and a glimmer of the\nscientific and reasoning spirit which weighs motives and scrutinizes\nfacts was born in them. Was not this story of Quivera the Golden just\na tale told by the settled Indians in order to get rid of them? Had\nnot El Turco been instigated to lure them by confused trails into the\nwilderness and leave them to perish there? Had not one of them detected\nhim talking to the devil in a pitcher of water?\n\nWhile they harbored these distrustful forebodings the Spaniards fell\nin with a party of plains Indians who knew Quivera. It was forty days\u2019\nmarch ahead, they said, and the columns would die for lack of food\nand water upon the way. Stone buildings and plentiful provisions in\nprecious vessels at the end of the way? The prairie nomads knew of none\nof these things. They spoke of an encampment where the houses were\nmade of straw and skins, and a little maize in them, naught else. The\nshifty Turk changed his story. He had not told the truth, he admitted,\nas to the houses of Quivera, but it had a numerous population and a\nstore of precious metals. In anger the Spaniards put shackles upon\nhim. They were ready to go back, but Coronado was determined, without\nrisking too many lives, at least to see for himself what lay at the end\nof the trail. He took twenty-nine horsemen, the manacled El Turco, and\nYsopete, and rode northward with the plains Indians.\n\nAfter thirty days of hard riding through a great treeless plain dotted\nwith buffalo herds and watered by a number of small streams, Coronado\nreached Quivera, where he stayed twenty-five days. He describes the\nregion about it as a rich land in which grew plums like those of Spain,\nmulberries, and well-flavored grapes. But the settlement itself was\nmerely the summer camp of an Indian horde that followed the buffalo and\nsupplemented a beef diet with corn cakes, made from maize grown in the\nriver bottoms.\n\nThe explorer tells the story with rough candor. \u201cI had been told,\u201d he\nsays, \u201cthat the houses were made of stone and were several stories;\nthey are only of straw, and the inhabitants are as savage as any that I\nhave seen. They have no clothes, nor cotton to make them out of; they\nsimply tan the hides of the cows which they hunt, and which pasture\naround their village and in the neighborhood of a large river. They\neat their meat raw, and are enemies to one another and war among one\nanother. All these men look alike.\u201d\n\nAs Estevanico had met his fate at Cibola, so the Turk met his at\nQuivera. Its people did not know him, but they welcomed Ysopete, and\nfor his sake the Spaniards. El Turco sought to lay the blame on the New\nMexican Indians, who, he said, had engaged him to lead the Spaniards to\ntheir fate on the prairies. This tale failing to help his credit, he\ntried to raise Quivera against his masters, who incontinently hanged\nhim.\n\nBefore turning southward to rejoin his command and take it back\nto Mexico, Coronado set up a wooden cross which bore a soldierly\ninscription, \u201cFrancisco Vasquez de Coronado, leader of a campaign, came\nto this place.\u201d\n\nFour states claim Quivera, and the blind wanderings of the Spaniards\ngive conjecture a broad field to work in. One thing certain is that\nLa Gran Quivera, the new Mexican mission, established after the\nsuppression of the Indian uprisings in 1580, does not stand on its\nsite. Bandelier thinks the site was in central Kansas about a hundred\nmiles north of the Arkansas River. It has severally been contended that\nQuivera was a camp of the Wichita Indians; that it was in Nebraska not\nfar from the state capital; and that the place the Spaniards reached\nwas in the southwest corner of Missouri. Cyrus Thomas, who supports\nthe latter view, holds that El Turco came from some tribe near the\nconfluence of the Arkansas and Mississippi, that the great stream of\nwhich he spoke was the latter river and Quivera a town on its banks,\nwhile the place seen by Coronado was simply the homeland of Ysopete.\nWhatever the region, it would be as vain to seek the site as to look\nfor the camping ground in the desert where some forgotten Arab tribe\npitched its tents for a night, and struck them at sunrise.\n\n\n_The Islands of Solomon_\n\nThere came a time when the New World was too small to hold the visions\nof Spain. North and south the conquistadors had marched, seeking what\nthey did not find. So they dreamed westward over the sea. They had\nplunged their hands in gold. They might yet bathe in it at the Baths of\nSunset.\n\nAs always, there were stories of islands in near-by waters where the\nsuperstition or simplicity of the natives had heaped up treasure\nthat more deserving men might seize. The Spaniards went after it, at\nfirst from Mexico. Then from the harbors of Peru ships began to sail\nwestward, and fantasies spread over the deep.\n\nThese voyages add two titles to the dream quests of Spain--the\nEnchanted Islands and the Isles of Solomon--and the names may stand\nfor one reality. About six hundred miles west of the mainland of South\nAmerica, and on the line of the equator, lie the Galapagos, comprising\nfive large and ten smaller islands. From the Peruvians the Spaniards\nlearned of them, but for a while they could not find them. They were\nvaguely called the Islas Encantadas because they seemed to elude the\nsearch. The buccaneers used them later as sallyports from which to\nattack the Peruvian plate fleet. Still later whalers resorted thither,\nbut not until 1832 did Ecuador occupy the group.\n\nThis archipelago of the west may have been the basis of the legend that\ngrew up among the seafaring folk of Peru. It was told that the Inca\nTupac Yupanqui had made a voyage and come upon two islands which were\ncalled Nina-chumpi and Hahua-chumpi, or Fire Island and Outer Island.\nHe brought back gold and silver, a throne of copper, black slaves, and\nthe skin of an animal like a horse. Another account said the islands\nwere distant a journey of two months, and one was so large it might be\na continent. There were sheep, llamas and deer upon it and a bareheaded\npeople who wore cotton and woolen garments. Although their king dwelt\nin a palace with mud walls, a frieze of gold ran around it.\n\nA later legend, purporting to tell of a Spanish discovery, is very\ndefinite: A long time before, a ship from Chile had been driven out\nof its course to a large island, which it coasted for fifty days. One\nof the seamen, Juan Montanes, went ashore and found a race of tall,\nbearded Indians and women whose braided hair reached to their ankles.\nThey lived in communal houses four hundred feet long by one hundred\nfeet wide. Numerous rafts and sumptuously decorated canoes thronged\nwith people plied along the coasts. Because of his beard, the natives\ntreated the Spaniard kindly and pressed a gold plate and emeralds upon\nhim.\n\nThe account continues with the exactness of a seaman\u2019s chart: \u201cThese\nislands must be reached from Puerto de Arica, taking the volcano in the\nbay as a landmark, such being the custom of the Indians who come and\ngo thither. As soon as the said volcano disappears, the desert islands\nare reached. Going in among them, after two days the large island which\nseems to be a continent is sighted, and what lies to the west is still\nto be discovered.\u201d\n\nThere are elements in this story, such as the communal houses and the\nornate canoes, borrowed from actual expeditions to the South Seas which\nthe earlier legend itself had launched. What these expeditions had\nset out to find was a continent about two thousand miles to the west,\nwhich stretched northward for three thousand miles from the latitude\nof Tierra del Fuego to 15 degrees south, or almost on a line with\nCallao; a domain about the size of that afterward discovered and named\nAustralia, but lying on the near side of the Pacific. Rumors of such a\ncontinent passed from tavern gossip to palace conferences. Sarmiento\nde Gamboa had gathered and analyzed Inca traditions of Pacific islands\nand the learned men of the colony assumed that a continental mass lay\nbehind them. So in 1567 the governor of Peru dispatched two small ships\nwith one hundred and fifty men and put his youthful nephew, Alvarado de\nMendana, in command.\n\nAn incredible thing happened. These frail vessels, provisioned for a\nvoyage of two thousand miles, drove westward without sighting land\nfor seven thousand miles. In two months they crossed the width of the\nPacific, making their land-fall in the East Indies. For six months the\ncrews explored the capes, creeks, and jungles of a group of islands\nflanking New Guinea on the east. Then the ships started back and were\noff Callao twenty months after they had left it. They brought no\ngold, but stories of \u201ca naked, cheerful people of a bright reddish\ncolour\u201d--in reality, head-hunting cannibals, to this day the most\nsavage of men.\n\nNearly thirty years went by before another expedition was undertaken,\nand meanwhile legend was at work. It gave the distant group the name\nit bears upon the map. These were called the Isles of Solomon, says\nLopez Vaz, \u201cto the ende that the Spaniards, supposing them to bee\nthose Isles from whence Solomon fetched gold to adorne the temple at\nJerusalem, might bee the more desirous to goe and inhabit the same.\u201d\nBut the Portuguese writer adds that because Drake and other raiders\nhad entered the South Seas, it was determined not to settle them, so\nthat interloping vessels Molucca-bound might have no succor on the way.\n\nIn 1595 Mendana, now middle aged, undertook to colonize the islands,\ngoing out with four ships and 368 emigrants--men, women and children,\nhis own wife among them. Then another amazing thing happened. The\nSpaniards could not find the Solomons. They discovered the Marquesas,\nand in the island of Santa Cruz founded a short-lived colony where\nMendana died and whence the expedition went forth again to disaster.\nQuiros, Mendana\u2019s great lieutenant, returning to Peru, represented to\nthe viceroy that the islands come upon by his chief must screen an\nunknown continent, as in fact they did. In 1605 he was sent out to find\nthem. He discovered the Society Islands, the Duff group and the New\nHebrides, but nowhere was there trace of the Isles of Solomon.\n\nDissolved into fable, for two centuries they were lost to geography. In\nthe waterside taverns of Peru, people still talked of them. But it had\nbecome a maxim of the viceroys to treat the discovery as a romance, and\nlearned men concurred. The group was erased from the maps of the world.\nAlthough it includes ten great islands stretching for six hundred\nmiles in an almost unbroken barrier across the track of navigators,\nand although the first Spanish expedition brought back information\nso detailed that every headland and harbor which Mendana passed has\nsince been identified, yet for two hundred years nobody could find the\narchipelago. When it was rediscovered it was from the other direction.\nCarteret and Bougainville, rounding Africa and entering the South Seas\nin the latter part of the eighteenth century, came upon islands which\nwere found to be the lost lands of Spain.\n\n\n_The Sepulchers of Zenu_\n\nThere are significant words in Raleigh\u2019s _Discovery of Guiana_. Here,\nhe says, \u201ccommanders that shoot at honour and abundance shall find\nmore temples adorned with golden images, more sepulchres filled with\ntreasure, than either Cortez found in Mexico or Pizarro in Peru.\u201d\nMoreover, it is virgin soil: \u201cthe graves have not bene opened for\ngolde, nor the Images puld downe out of their temples.\u201d Spain\u2019s hunger\nfor gold pursued the Indians into their sanctuaries, and even into\ntheir graves.\n\nThe Bachelor Enciso and Balboa, each in turn commander of Darien,\nsought golden treasures, which, as report ran, Indian piety had heaped\nin the wilderness.\n\nEnciso went forth to sack the Sepulchers of Zenu. This province lay\nsome twenty leagues west of Cartagena. From its steeps the rains washed\ngold down in such profusion that the natives caught in nets nuggets\nas big as eggs. Zenu was also the cemetery for all the tribes of the\ncountry. For ages they had brought their dead thither for burial, and\ndeposited golden ornaments with the bodies in the tombs. The soil, the\nSpanish lawyer thought, must have become incredibly rich from this long\naccumulation. It was no sacrilege to plunder the dead, for were these\nnot pagans, buried according to the rites of an idolatrous faith?\n\nLanding on the coast of Zenu, Enciso found an army under two caciques\ndrawn up to oppose him. The lawyer in him prompted him to put his\nopponents in the wrong before appealing to arms. So he had a formal\nstatement read to the two chiefs. The colloquy which followed, and\nwhich he reports himself, is one of the most interesting incidents in\nall the contacts of white men with savages. The statement recited that\nthere was one God who ruled in heaven, that in the Pope He had a vicar\nwho ruled on earth, and that the latter had awarded Zenu to the King of\nSpain. The Indians replied that they accepted the sovereignty of God in\nheaven, but nothing further. The Pope, they said, must have been drunk,\nto give away what did not belong to him, and the King somewhat mad, to\nask of him what was not his to give. If the King came to take it, they\nwould cut off his head and set it on a stake; and they pointed to other\nstakes on which heads were set.\n\nWhereupon there was fighting, in which, Enciso says, the Indians had\nthe worse of it. But two of his men, slightly wounded by poisoned\narrows, died raving; the country was hostile beyond what he had\nanticipated, and his force small. He went away without rifling the\nsepulchers.\n\n\n_The Temple of Dobayba_\n\nBalboa, succeeding Enciso at Darien, heard of a province called Dobayba\nforty leagues away on the banks of the Atrato. It was named either\nfrom a goddess or from an Indian princess to whom, after death, divine\nhonors were paid. Her worship was conducted in a great temple, whither\nnatives came with their offerings. At stated times the caciques of\nremote provinces sent a golden tribute, together with slaves for\nsacrifice.\n\nSuperstition and fear piled up treasure at this shrine. At one time its\nworship had been neglected. Then a great drought fell upon the land,\nthe springs and rivers dried up, and a scourge of death was visited\nupon the neglectful nations. The survivors renewed their zeal and\nredoubled their offerings of slaves and gold. Thus from generation to\ngeneration the wealth of many peoples drained into the blood-stained\ntemple. The prospect of spoiling a heathen shrine profaned by human\nsacrifice and piled high with idolatrous gold presented itself not as a\ndesecration but as a duty.\n\nOn his first journey Balboa mistook a deserted frontier village for the\ntemple town. When he went again, it was at the behest of Pedrarias,\nwho had been made governor of the colony, and whose jealousy prompted\nhim to set Balboa a task that might bring disgrace. The quest of\nDobayba was now deemed an enterprise of romantic promise but of high\nhazard. The way thither led through tribes of bold and crafty savages.\nIn the dreary fens lurked animals to be dreaded, including monstrous\nimportations from classic myth. Clouds of mosquitoes swarmed above\nthe stagnant water, sinister lizards crawled on the banks, crocodiles\nhaunted the ooze. Dragons couched there, so said report, and huge bats\nflitted by on vampire errands. Peter Martyr even mentions two harpies.\nA later age was to discover the enigmatic White Indians. Rather than\nenter this accursed region, the coast natives were wont to shun the\ndirect routes and travel the steep paths of the mountains.\n\nBalboa was to win neither gold nor glory upon his forbidding mission.\nPassing up the Gulf of Oraba and into the river Atrato with a fleet\nof canoes, the expedition was ambushed by Indian canoes, losing half\nits number. Its leader, wounded, made shore with the remainder and at\nsunset began a crestfallen retreat to Darien.\n\nThe temple of Dobayba--if there was a temple--was left inviolate, to\nreceive the gold and shed the blood of heathen until the tropical\nforest swept in and buried it in a green oblivion.\n\n\n_Other Quests_\n\nOf certain other Spanish quests less has been recorded, because they\nwere incidental to larger undertakings or were conducted by small\nparties of adventurers, monks, or treasure-seekers, rather than by\ncolumns of troops sent out by provincial governments. Pious men sought\nthe Terrestrial Paradise toward the headwaters of the Orinoco. From\nall points of the compass explorers hunted for the Kingdom of Women.\nSometimes the conquistadors reiterated their own exploits, as when\nFedermann looked for the House of the Sun in the Colombian Andes,\nalthough under the name of the Temple of the Sun it had already fallen\nto Pizarro. The adventure of the Golden Chain was attempted on several\noccasions, parties of Spaniards undertaking to drain the crater lake of\nUrcos, into which, tradition said, had been flung a massive chain of\ngold long enough to encircle the great square at Cuzco.\n\nThe quest of the Cradle of Gold is of the last century, and here the\nmagic of a name again wrought its spell, two hundred years after the\nfeet of the conquistadors had passed. Bingham, who climbed to this\nruined mountain fortress a dozen years ago, believes that Choquequirau\nis just a name of Indian poetry, misunderstood. Seen from a distance,\nthe ridge on which it lies resembles a hammock, and its only gold may\nbe that which the setting sun flings upon it. But the name itself, and\nthe vagueness of knowledge as to its last defenders, led to various\nattempts to reach the ruin from the valley below. One party brought\nback reports of rock-built \u201cpalaces, paved squares, temples, prisons\nand baths.\u201d The prefect of the Peruvian department of Apurimac, using\na company of soldiers and Indian carriers, built a way across the\nrocky gorges and up the steep mountain side to Choquequirau. This, it\nis thought, was the eyrie of the last Inca--neither temple town nor\ntreasure house, but a frontier fortress of the long ago.\n\nThe legendary Laguna de los Xarayes was indicated on the early maps\nof South America as lying at the sources of the Paraguay. In it was\nthe splendid island home of El Gran Moxo. The imagery of the Hebrew\nprophets was borrowed to describe his palace with its golden and\nsilvern vessels, its doors of bronze where living lions in chains of\ngold kept guard, its cloud-like tower where a disk of silver, in shape\nlike the moon, shed light over the waters.\n\nExplorers sought this island magnificence in vain. When they came in\nthe dry season, they could not find even the lake in which it swam, for\nwhat seemed to be a vast lagoon was merely high water on the Paraguay.\n\nOne of the golden visions of Spain recoiled upon its head. The\nSpaniards would not have it that with a single blow they had struck\ndown the power of the Incas and laid hold of all their riches. It\nseemed to them they had merely precipitated a dispersal and an\nexodus--the going out of Indian princes and property to found new seats\nelsewhere. One of these was the great city of Paytiti, also called\nthe White House, which had risen near the confluence of the Huallaga\nand Mara\u00f1on in the forests of Peru. The legend which the conqueror\npropagated of a fugitive dynasty grown strong in exile was cherished by\nthe humbled Quichuas, and twice it roused them to arms.\n\nIn 1740 Juan Santos assumed the name of Atahuallpa, raised an army from\nthe uncivilized members of various tribes, drove out the missionaries,\nand for a space made the name and power of Paytiti a fact on the\nborders of Peru. Again, in 1780, Tupac-Amaru, a descendant of the\nIncas, appealed to the legend, aroused the country, abolished enforced\nmine service and ecclesiastical dues, and became master of most of\nthe Peruvian plateau. The insurrection was put down and its leader\nexecuted, but the injustices he had fought were never restored in full\nvigor, and passed altogether when Peru rose against Spain in the War of\nIndependence. The dream of Paytiti had become a vision of liberation.\n\n\n\n\nChapter XXIII. The Fabric of Illusion\n\n\nThe traditional world, like the modern world, is a fabric woven of many\nstuffs and colors, and patched with strange materials, some old, some\nalmost new. If one wonders how it was all thrown together, one must\nconsider that the type of mind which collects and analyzes facts, which\nexperiments in order to discard error, which defines terms and reasons\nfrom them, did not appear until late in the world\u2019s history and even\nnow is not common. Aristotle, the chief scientist of antiquity, debated\nwhy a dead kingfisher, suspended from a string, should foretell the\ndirection of the winds by turning its bill toward that corner of the\nheavens whence they were to come. Sir Thomas Browne hung a kingfisher\non a string, and found that it did not do this thing.\n\nExcept when directed to its immediate problems of food and shelter,\nthe antique mind thought in images, rather than in definite terms. Its\nprocesses were akin to dreams, in which one takes strange things for\ngranted, nor seeks to verify anything. Save when they drove a bargain,\nmen took one another\u2019s statements for granted. Much the same thing is\ntrue of the savage to-day.\n\nThe realms and races of prodigy form the main burden of travel tale.\nExcept when travels took the form of commercial voyagings, or military\nexpeditions, and with a few other exceptions, such as the journeys\nof Pytheas the Massilian and Marco the Venetian, their theme, almost\nuntil modern times, was wonder. Home-keeping folks wanted to hear, as\nstill they do, of countries and customs, and men and animals, that were\ndifferent. The myths of geography have come out of the contacts of the\ndreaming mind of savagery and early civilization with the unknown. They\nrepresent men in the process of getting acquainted with the world about\nthem.\n\nFor primitive man they began at the very boundary of his district.\nMystery was there, and forbidding things were suspected; and if waste\nlands lay beyond, these got themselves uncouth populations. The\nstranger that crossed the boundary was dreaded and hated as something\nnot quite human, or at least as wielder of a magic that might work\nharm. It is said of wild tribesmen in Borneo that when they meet a\nstranger they turn their backs and hide their faces because the sight\nof him makes them dizzy. \u201cThe stranger is for the wolf,\u201d is an Arab\nsaying, and the early rule of the world was that he must die in the\ninterest of those upon whom he had thrust himself. \u201cHe had salt water\nin his eyes,\u201d was the Fiji formula when castaways were clubbed to\ndeath. Many tribes call themselves by names which mean simply \u201cmen,\u201d\nas distinguished from all other peoples, whose human nature is not\nconceded.\n\nBut the cruel host of to-day might be the helpless guest of to-morrow.\nThere came a time of toleration, the limited toleration recorded in\nthe Slavic proverb, \u201cA guest and a fish smell on the third day.\u201d As\nmen crossed and recrossed the tribal boundary its weird legends were\nshifted to remoter horizons, became things to gossip about rather than\nact upon, and might mellow into genial report. Even historical peoples\nliving at a distance were swathed in horizon haze. The justice of the\nIndians, their freedom from bodily ailments, and their contempt of\ndeath are favorite themes of Ctesias. Herodotus spoke of the Egyptians\nas later ages have spoken of the Chinese. Adam of Bremen gave a\nfantastic picture of the peoples of the far north--small, sinister\nFinns, whose magic could wreck passing ships and draw the very fish\nout of the sea; cruel islanders colored bluish green by salt water,\nand the \u201cmost noble\u201d Northmen, bravest, most loyal, most temperate of\nmen. Above all other races in consideration, so the west agreed for\nsome centuries of unwonted humility, were the Chinese. Among them, says\nPurchas, \u201cis reported to be neither Thiefe nor Whore, nor Murtherer,\nnor Hailes, nor Pestilence, nor such like Plagues.\u201d And they live to be\ntwo hundred years old.\n\nTravelers were the agents of distance, bringing the woof which the\nstay-at-home worked into the warp of his fancy. Until very recent times\nthey were the world\u2019s telegraph, mails and newspapers, all in one.\nTheir coming was an event, and their going was remarked upon. Over\nrough ways, through countries where inns were not, among peoples who\nhad instinctive dislike of a stranger and deemed it no fault to despoil\nor enslave him, the wanderer pursued his uncertain fates as merchant,\npilgrim or mendicant. He paid his fare by the stories he took with\nhim--winning a precarious hospitality in strange lands and an eager\nwelcome when he reached home. The more curious the tale he told, the\nmore kindly he was entreated--Ulysses repaid royal hospitality with\nroyal guerdon--and in the ancient world so little was known that one\nmight tell almost any tale he pleased. There was no means of checking\nup a report. Of course there were skeptics here and there, and there\nwas, and is, a suspicion that old men and wanderers use rather more\nthan the truth. The Ancient Mariner, being both old and traveled, had a\ngreat tale to tell.\n\nWhole races wandered as well as single individuals. The migrations of\npeoples, and most if not all of them have had a nomad period, have\nhad something to do with bringing the more beautiful of their legends\ninto being--the tales of ideal lands, abodes of the blest where their\ndead are, or whither their heroes are translated without dying. The\njourneys of the sun are tracked upon them and human wistfulness has\nbuilded there, but so has memory. The homeland which the ancestors of\na people abandoned long before, driven out, it may be, by an invading\nhost, lives in its legends as a region desirable above all others. The\nhardships of the exodus are remembered also, and tradition magnifies\nthe cruel height of the mountains, the swiftness of deep, unfordable\nrivers, the terror of moonless trails and all the heavinesses of the\nway. When the dead go home, or the heroes pass to rest, the path of\nsouls which they travel back is the path their forefathers followed\nand the one journey ends where the other began, in a land that is a\nprovince of the Golden Age.\n\nThis hypothesis, which is Herbert Spencer\u2019s, may not explain all the\nelysiums that a yearning fancy has created. Yet in the South Seas they\nlie in the direction whence the islanders came; the Hindu legend of\nthe blissful Uttarakarus of the north is thought to hold the memory of\na migration southward from some Himalayan valley; while the curious\nPersian legend of the enclosed garden of Yima, where was neither\ndeformity nor iniquity, may be a note on the early movement of the\nIranians from their cold ancestral home to the Azerbaijan region, and a\nhalt there before renewing their march toward the sun and the sea.\n\nThough seldom we may follow the process, religion, and symbolism,\nwhich is its handmaiden, and magic, which is its elder brother,\ntraced the outlines of most of the fabulous animals and peculiar\npeoples; human forgetfulness, savage logic and hearsay have filled\nthem in. The natural history of the traditional world was in good\npart the contribution of the religions of Egypt, Assyria, Persia, and\nIndia. The tribes of grotesque peoples, the dog-faced generations,\nthe satyrs, the demons of the waste, the fowls with woman faces, the\nwomen with fish-tails, the winged quadrupeds, all seem more like the\ncarven creatures which populate the walls and towers of medi\u00e6val\ncathedrals than breathing tenants of fields and waters. The seeming\nis significant. When the hunchback, Quasimodo, was on the roof of\nNotre Dame at night, \u201cthen said the women of the neighborhood, the\nwhole church took on something fantastic, supernatural, horrible;\neyes and mouths were opened here and there; one heard the dogs, the\nmonsters, and the gargoyles of stone, which keep watch night and day,\nwith outstretched necks and open jaws, around the monstrous cathedral,\nbarking.\u201d When the edifice took fire, continues Hugo, \u201cthere were\ngriffins which had the air of laughing, gargoyles which one fancied one\nheard yelping, salamanders which puffed at the fire, tarasques which\nsneezed in the smoke.\u201d\n\nIn the temples of the Middle Ages the fabulous birds of the traditional\nworld came home to their roosts, and the fabulous animals to their\ndens. They had been taken from the temples of earlier religions and\nthey found their way back through the medium of an art which did not\nknow where these creatures came from. Nor did ancient travelers and\ngeographers. These, they supposed, were real races of men, real beasts\nand birds. They had never seen them, for they roamed the outer spaces,\nbut everywhere they saw their effigies--in the porches of palaces, upon\nthe columns of imperial courts, and on the monuments of princes, as\nwell as within the shrines of strange gods.\n\nCreatures of allegory these were, religious symbols, survivals of\ntotemistic worship of beasts. Yet the entablatures on which their\noutlines were graven were mistaken for illustrated natural history,\naccepted as literal records of fact, like the columns which companioned\nthem and which kings set up along the highways of the east to proclaim\nthat hither they had come and here they had prevailed in battle.\n\nThe imagery of all religions musters them. Eskimo mythology is a\nwitch-haunted shore, Aztec mythology a charnel-house, Chilean mythology\na forbidding menagerie. The Chiriqui of Panama have an alligator, a\njaguar, and a parrot god, all with human bodies. In Egyptian myth one\nreads of the watch-dog of Osiris in the underworld--the Swallower\nof the West, mixture of crocodile, lion, and hippopotamus. On a\nman\u2019s shoulders Anubis carried a jackal head; and half human were\nthe bull-gods, hawk-gods, goat-gods, vulture-gods, cat-gods. The\n\u00c6gean pantheon shows human figures with the heads of asses, lions,\nbulls, and birds. The god Brhaspati of Hindu myth was seven-mouthed\nand seven-rayed, beautiful-tongued, sharp-horned, blue-backed, and\nhundred-winged. Hanuman was a monkey-god. The goddess Kali was a\ndark-blue female with four arms and three eyes. Siva himself had four\nfaces, which appeared in turn when a ravishing nymph created by Brahma\nwalked quite around him to tempt him.\n\nThe evolution of these divine beast-men, ancestors of the fabulous\nraces of geography, begins with the annual sacrifice of a sacred animal\nand the preservation of its skin for the ensuing year. At first this\nwas stored, then stuffed, then drawn over a wooden or stone image,\nto which, as worship lost its primal grossness, the human form was\nimparted. The result might be an ass- or goat-god, a centaur or satyr.\nYet, with religious symbolism shaping it, evolution has operated also\nin reverse, dowering anthropomorphic deities with animal parts to\nsignify typical qualities. This is seen even in Christian story. On\nthe choir stalls of a Rhine church begging friars were depicted with\nthe cowled head of a monk, but with a pig\u2019s body and fox tail, while\na Bible of the tenth century shows the evangelists as beast-headed\nmen, and the four gospels as a four-headed composite animal called the\ntetramorph.\n\n[Illustration: THE GARGOYLES OF STONE WHICH KEPT WATCH DAY AND NIGHT]\n\nOut of the magic dances of men, as out of their temples, the races of\nfable have come trooping. By donning the heads and perhaps the tails\nof horses, bulls, asses, and goats, and treading certain measures,\nritual mummers became, in the thought of the time, horse-demons,\nox-demons, ass-demons, and goat-demons, and as such semidivine. They\ndanced to bring fertility to the flocks and herds, while the god--it\nis Pindar speaking--\u201claughed aloud to see the romping license of the\nmonstrous beasts.\u201d The masks of wild animals and of reptiles and birds\nwere worn also, and the motions of these creatures were repeated in\nother dances, as they are to-day, in order to propitiate dangerous\nbeasts, or bring luck in the chase, or constrain heat and cold, sun\nand rain, through animals that were their symbols. Possibly the First\nPeople of Indian myth, equally with the satyrs of the classics, derive\nfrom rites in which dancers simulated beasts, and seemed, therefore,\nboth human and bestial. Belief that ritual dancers donned the animal\nnature with their masks; travelers\u2019 reports; the ambiguous records\nof pictograph and frieze, and tribal forgetfulness of the meaning of\nlong-abandoned rites--all were avenues by which the mummers passed out\nof the atmosphere of a na\u00efve township magic into the spacious precincts\nof marvel. Greek tragedy and Greek comedy grew up in their steps,\nflourished for some splendid moments, and died out. But the ritual\nmime, whence these came, is still danced by peasants clad in skins.\n\nIf, as pragmatism claims, the intellectual world is \u201cpervaded and\nperverted by errors, lies, fictions, and illusions\u201d--things real only\nin the sense that they can be talked about--it could not be otherwise\nthan that the folk-mind would throng the galleries of fable with its\ncruder creations. Was it not a slighter thing to picture \u201cgorgons,\nhydras, and chim\u00e6ras dire\u201d than to give the wood its guardian deity, or\nto reach the poetry of Indian belief that the echo is the Lizard-Man\ntelling back? The night terrors of the savage, the dream figures of an\nage when dreams were very real, the hallucinations of medicine-men,\nthe deep reactions of the imagination to what seems abnormal but\nis merely strange, even the easy success of the alarming masks and\ndeforming paraphernalia of tribesmen on the warpath--all contributed\nto the fabulous populations. In the house of the mind, one chamber is\na museum where it strives to improve on nature\u2019s handiwork. It invents\nno new thing, but it shifts familiar combinations, exaggerating,\ndeforming, recombining. The product is either a caricature or a\ncomposite, a grotesque or a chim\u00e6ra. Nature itself has set a pattern\nin the bat, which the Persians say is compounded of bird, dog, and\nmuskrat, since it flies like a bird, has dog teeth and lives in holes\nlike a muskrat.\n\nBy his own handiwork has man been misled, or led away into curious\nvalleys of vision. Savage art seems constrained by some obscure law\nof the mind to give its subjects, be they god, man, or beast, a\ngrotesque delineation. It may be that primitive drawing was evolved\ninversely from the drawing of children, whose first animals are usually\nhorizontal human beings; the first men pictured by the cave artists\nwere more like erect animals. Paleolithic man, so Luquet thinks,\nlearned how to represent animals before he did men, and gave the latter\nbeast countenances and misshapen members in his early attempts to\nrepresent them. The stuff of myth is in the rock drawings. In sculpture\nitself its influence is clearly marked.\n\nOn the evidence of broken statues, desert peoples based tales of\nforgotten races that had been turned into stone. On the evidence\nof wooden idols, snow-mantled in the land of the Samoyeds, their\nneighbors based tales of a northern nation frozen into immobility with\neach recurring winter and thawed out by the sun\u2019s return. There were\nsculptures and bas-reliefs in Egypt which ministered to the pride of\nkings by picturing them several times as large as their subjects and\nvassals; and these were evidence to the stranger that he had come\ninto a country which held both giants and dwarfs. Primitive drawings\nbetray ignorance of perspective, and this archaic style was retained by\nreligious conservatism after art had found itself. The sculptures that\nshow Egyptian countenances in profile, with eyes as long as in the full\nface, also show profiles of quadrupeds having but two legs and a single\nhorn. Here, and not in \u201cthe wild, white, fierce, chaste moon, whose\ntwo horns are indissolubly twisted into one,\u201d may be the secret of the\nunicorn.\n\nThe power to evoke myths of the living has been in marble statues and\nwooden images from the beginning, for in the beginning they were\nwrought in the thought that life would enter them. A passage in _The\nFlame of Life_ reveals the creative quality in D\u2019Annunzio reacting\nto their spell: \u201cIn the fruit orchards, in the vineyards, among the\nvegetables, among the pastures, rose the surviving statues. They\nwere numberless like a dispersed people. Some still white, some gray\nor yellow with lichens or greenish with moss, or spotted; in all\nattitudes, with all gestures, goddesses, heroes, nymphs, seasons,\nhours, with their bows, with their arrows, their garlands, their\ncornucopias, their torches, with all the emblems of their riches,\npower, and pleasure, exiled from fountains, grottos, labyrinths,\nharbors, porticos; friends of the evergreen, box, and myrtle,\nprotectors of passing loves, witnesses of eternal vows, figures of a\ndream far older than the hands that had formed them and the eyes that\nhad seen them in the ravaged gardens.\u201d\n\nSovereign reason itself has sent emissaries to the courts of fable.\nScience is tolerant and until it knows it speaks the language of\nMontaigne, \u201cIt is a sottish presumption to disdaine and condemne that\nfor false, which unto us seemeth to beare no show of likelihood or\ntruth.\u201d Empedocles, precursor of physical scientists, and perhaps first\nto glimpse the doctrine of evolution, provided the classic world with\na working explanation of the prodigious animals and peoples and gave\na law to the menageries of myth. He thought that the various parts of\nmen and animals were separately created by the elements, which were\nhis deities. There were heads without necks, arms without shoulders,\neyes without sockets; and as they wandered about in space these members\nunited, forming man-headed beasts, beast-headed men, and various\nbizarre beings which because of their maladjustment did not survive in\ncompetition with normal men and animals. The doctrine has been echoed\nin modern times in the contention that the composite creatures of\nfable--part reptile, part bird, and part beast--represent intermediate\nforms, experiments which nature inaugurated and abandoned in evolving\nhigher types of life. The marsupial kangaroo, the duck-billed platypus,\nand the flying lizard are surviving testimony to such experiment.\n\nA kindred philosophy may be discerned here and there in the folklore\nof aboriginal Americans. In the deluge legend of the Pimas, Fox and\nSister, escaping in two arks, set to work to fashion a new world of\nmen out of mud; Fox molds manikins with one arm, one leg, one eye, but\nSister derides these and tells him to put his journeyman\u2019s product\naway behind the ocean in another world; then she breathes into her own\nbetter handiwork the breath of life; these deformed folk are still\nliving somewhere, the Pimas think. The haunting Indian myth of a First\nPeople, who had the human form but the beast nature, and from whom\nthe animals derive, and the companion myth of a First People who had\nthe brute form, but discarded it for the human, are things with the\nEmpedoclean quality, but reach deeper; and a true note of observation\nis in them. Somewhere in every man one catches a glimpse of some\nanimal. All created things are reflected in his form, his gait, his\nface. \u201cSomewhat of me down there?\u201d was the question of Emerson when he\ncaught a dog\u2019s understanding glance; and in men\u2019s countenances he had\nseen, he thought, \u201cthe features of the mink, of the bull, of the rat,\nand the barnyard fowl.\u201d\n\nThus the _Metamorphoses_ of Ovid take on a tinge of plausibility.\n\u201cWhat keeps these wild tales in circulation for thousands of years?\u201d\nasks Emerson. \u201cWhat but the wild fact to which they suggest some\napproximation of theory!\u201d In lighter vein in _Penguin Island_ Anatole\nFrance sketches the metamorphosis of birds into men: \u201cImmediately the\npenguins were transformed. Their foreheads enlarged and their heads\ngrew round like the dome of St. Maria Rotunda in Rome. Their oval eyes\nopened more widely on the universe; a fleshy nose clothed the two\nclefts of their nostrils; their beaks were changed into mouths, and\nfrom their mouths went forth speech; their necks grew short and thick;\ntheir wings became arms and their claws legs; a restless soul dwelt\nwithin the breast of each of them. However, there remained with them\nsome traces of their first nature. They were inclined to look sideways;\nthey balanced themselves on their short thighs; their bodies were\ncovered with fine down.\u201d\n\nThere is good terrestrial history as well as the dreams and guesses of\nthe mind hidden in travel tales, and in them are embalmed some of the\noldest memories of mankind. Paleolithic man found various subraces of\nmen in Europe when he came there, savage prowlers from whose skeletal\nremains modern science has restored the outlines of squat, ape-necked,\nbeetle-browed human beings, crudely formed as a heathen idol. Against\nthese he waged the relentless war of one species against another--a\nwar of extermination. The memory of their odious appearance would\nsurvive longest in the stories told to entertain or frighten children.\nAs Sir Harry Johnston has suggested, \u201cthe dim racial remembrance of\nsuch gorilla-like monsters, with cunning brains, shambling gait, hairy\nbodies, strong teeth, and possibly cannibalistic tendencies, may be the\ngerm of the ogre in folklore.\u201d\n\nIt is certain that folklore shows the traces of other and less\nfrightful races of men who in turn were driven off the European\nscene. The giants of nursery tales are identified by Tylor with Stone\nAge heathen, shy of the conquering tribes of men, loathing their\nagriculture and the sound of their church bells. When the Scandinavian\nsagas speak of dwarfs, furtive and cunning, garbed in reindeer kirtle\nand colored cap, hiding in caves, and armed with bone-tipped arrows,\nthey are picturing the persecuted and once widely spread Lapp race.\n\nIt may be that a vague recollection of now extinct animals has survived\nin legend. There is an Iroquois story recorded by Father Charlevoix of\na great elk which stood so high that eight feet of snow did not impede\nhis movements, and with \u201ca sort of arm which comes out of his shoulder\nand which he uses as we do ours.\u201d Kaska tribesmen speak of a large,\nhairy, tusked animal which roamed their land long ago. The Indians\nof North America must at some time have seen living members of the\nelephant family. It has been suggested that the tortoises of Hindu myth\nwhich bear the world on their backs are a memory of the huge Himalayan\ntortoise.\n\nThere are legends that are true myths of observation, exercises not\nof memory, but of primitive logic. They disclose man pondering the\nruinous records of the past and satisfying the necessity for a theory\nthat shall explain them. The diminutive burial cysts and dolmens made\nby departed races and scattered over the world were thought to be the\ngraves of dwarfs, or their houses, or their treasure places. Fossil\nbones have produced a veritable cycle of these philosophic myths. The\nfrozen mammoths and fossil bones of Siberia have been known to man\nfrom earliest times and have produced a stock of legends as well as\nan immemorial trade in ivory. Some of these, reciting the battles of\nprehistoric animals with one another and with men, have almost the\ndignity of epics.\n\nThe mistaken logic that produced the creatures of legend has had\nat various points a sort of whimsical confirmation. Save for his\nfiery breath, the dragon of fable mirrors the leathern-winged,\nserpent-tailed, crocodile-bellied saurians that haunted the marshes of\nthe ancient world and passed from the scene ages before man is supposed\nto have come upon it. There are living things as weird of aspect as\nany created by the unbridled imagination of man, but most of them are\nsmall. Such are the vampire bat, the dragon fly, and the so-called\nfiend fly, the black face and curved horns of which gave it in the\nMiddle Ages a diabolic name. Seas and fresh-water streams and marshes\nall contain creatures which so much resemble, and so much differ from,\nthe familiar land animals as to seem the product of a conscious venture\ninto the grotesque. With a fish net and microscope one might bring to\nview an array of animals that in everything save size would rival the\nexhibits of fable. The wildest dream of man has not pictured anything\nso beautiful and strange as the life-drama of the little creature that\nis first a larva, then a chrysalis, and then the butterfly of a single\nsummer.\n\nThere are words in which the germinal idea has been so enveloped in\nwrappers of metaphor and inference, so incased in concentric shells of\nrationalization, so burdened with borrowed significances, so freighted\nby sentiment and reflection, and so enriched by art and historical\naccretion that they may be called microcosms of the world of fable; the\nproper noun, Babylon, is one of these. In large measure the peoples of\nprodigy and in some measure the lands of legend owe their being to a\nsearch for causes confined within the domain of etymology. They may be\ncalled a literary phenomenon, a product of words and the ways of words,\nand a by-product of libraries. Words breed myths. Given a Rome, people\nwill invent a Romulus. Given the ancient Britons and Celts, people will\ninvent a Britannus and a Celtus, their eponymous chiefs. The theory of\ntotemism--supposed descent from an animal ancestor--arose, as Spencer\nthinks, from the efforts of savages to explain the animal names which\nthey bore.\n\nWhen the meaning of words becomes forgotten or their form corrupted, a\nmyth follows. Medi\u00e6val Spain, for example, believed that Jews were born\nwith tails, confusing the word rabbi with rubo (a tail). Ch\u00e2teau Vert\nin England has become Shotover, and peasants have it that Little John\nshot over a high hill near by. Maid Marian of the Robin Hood ballad\ncycle is the Mad Morion of the Morris dance, a boy who whirled through\nits measures wearing a morion or helmet.\n\nHow names can become corrupted the public-house signs of England will\nattest. The Bag O\u2019Nails should be the Bacchanals; the Bully Ruffian\nshould be the ship Bellerophon; the Cat and Wheel should be St.\nCatherine\u2019s wheel; the Goat and Compasses should be God Encompasses Us;\nthe Iron Devil should be Hirondelle (the swallow), and the Queer Door\nshould be the C\u0153ur Dor\u00e9 (the golden heart). The effigies of bags of\nnails, cats, goats, and doors under these uncouth names are pictorial\nfables based upon bad etymology.\n\nIn like fashion Pliny confused the name of the Canaries with the Latin\n_canis_ (dog) and says these islanders are called thus because, like\ndogs, they devour the entrails of wild beasts. Similar confusions\nof words have brought legendary islands upon the maps. Avalon, the\nCeltic paradise in the west, whither Arthur was ferried unto peace, is\nApple Island of the classics, the place of the golden, dragon-guarded\napples of the Hesperides. Antilia, mystic medi\u00e6val island of the\nremote Atlantic, is perhaps Ante-ilya, or island off the Portuguese\ncoast. Milton\u2019s \u201ccold Estotiland\u201d and Estland, islands which held\ntheir place for centuries on the maps of the northern seas, are\nprobably misreadings for Scotland and Iceland, transferred from faded\nsketch-maps to a Venetian chart of the sixteenth century.\n\n\u201cNot Angles, but angels,\u201d said a punning ecclesiastic when he saw\nfair-haired Saxon captives in the slave markets of the Mediterranean.\nSo the Greeks and Romans gave to savage tribes the names that in their\nown tongues sounded most like what these tribes called themselves. A\nmyth might result--a record of some deformity, or some inhuman custom.\nA larger number of myths arose from men\u2019s giving a literal meaning\nto figurative terms in their own language. To speak in riddles was\nmore than a social game with the ancients, is more than a social game\nnow with various peoples. There were certain things which must not be\nnamed, but only referred to indirectly. There were times when riddles\nmust be propounded and times when they must not; and riddle-time, says\nFrazer, was usually in the presence of a dead body or at a sacrifice.\n\nWhat might follow, a glance at a few Finnish riddles will show. One\nof them runs, \u201cBeyond the great water a large old man shouts,\u201d and\nanother, \u201cA cry from the forest and light from the hill.\u201d In each case\nthunder is the answer. The sky is described as a blue field strewn with\nsilver. \u201cA child looks through the hedge\u201d means the sunrise. \u201cA red\ncock springs from house to house\u201d means fire. \u201cA small white man was\nsowing, he became very mischievous,\u201d means snow. As M\u00fcller remarks,\nhere are elements which in the mind of a poet or a grandmother would\nsoon create a number of delightful myths.\n\nIn its contacts with enigmatic language the end of literalism is\nfable. Speak of fleet horses as children of the wind, and you have the\nstory of Iberian mares impregnated by the west wind. Speak of swift\nrunners as shadow-footed, and there appears on the canvas of Ind the\nsilhouettes of natives asleep under the shade of their gigantic feet.\n\u201cWe are a people without a head,\u201d said the kingless Turkomans, and the\nHeadless People shouldered their way into the map of fable. \u201cTheir\nshoulders are where our heads are,\u201d Indians of Guiana told Raleigh,\ndescribing a tall neighbor race, and artists delineated them with eyes,\nnoses, and mouths where their breasts ought to be. Sometimes savage\ntribes stretch their ears by attaching weights to them; hence, perhaps,\nthe tale of folk who used one ear as mattress, the other as coverlet.\nAs to the people whose feet were turned backward, may these not be,\nTylor asks, the Antipodes on the other side of the globe, whose feet,\nsurely enough, are planted \u201cthe opposite way\u201d every time they set them\ndown?\n\nThe method explains much, although care must be taken that it be\nnot made to explain too much. The germ of fable is found in such\nfigurative epithets as bull-browed, long-headed, horse-faced, ox-eyed,\nlion-hearted, bird-witted. But for these phrases to fructify in\nmarvel, it would need that in a time more na\u00efve and among a people who\nknew neither the ends of the world nor the ways of speech, men of one\nrace should use them in telling another the manners and customs of\na third. For cultivated minds these conditions cannot be reproduced\nexcept in the magic and make-believe of poetry. For the unlettered,\nalike in lands of culture and of barbarism, they still exist.\n\nThe power of wish and the power of words are chief gods in the world of\nfable.\n\n\n\n\nChapter XXIV. The Travel Tales of Mankind\n\n\nWhen the travel stories of mankind were first set down in writing the\nlist was already nearly complete. Little was added afterward until the\nmodern age began the systematic collection of a mass of folklore which,\nwith all its significance, had scant literary backgrounds and less than\nthe old geographical quality. This is a strange thing. From generation\nto generation men increased their stores of knowledge, but from century\nto century they neither greatly increased nor greatly reduced their\nstock of fables. There were periods when men forgot the wisdom of the\nancient world, but they remembered and repeated its pleasant marvels.\n\nThese have had a long journey down the ages. The Greek had them from\nthe Persian, Indian, and Egyptian; the Roman had them from the Greek;\nthe Arab merchant and Christian pilgrim had them from the Roman;\nthe Celtic monk and the viking had them alike from Roman, Arab, and\nChristian; and the Spanish explorer had them from every medi\u00e6val\nsource. In the Spanish Americas of the sixteenth century the Age of\nFable blazed forth again and then grew dark.\n\nThe things added in this journey to the original stock of travel\ntales were mainly local legends and variations on older themes. The\ngrasshoppers in one province chirped or were silent in obedience to\nprovincial ordinance, the fountains of another had curative properties,\nthere was an enchanted forest in a third. Celtic glamour passed a wand\nover familiar material and it yielded the veiled or sunken islands of\nthe western ocean. The quest of El Dorado came out of a Spanish dream.\nNearly all other travel tales are found in the earliest literature. It\nmust be that men told them to one another ages before writing was known.\n\nVarious of the older books record them. They are interwoven with myths\nof the supernatural in epic poetry. They are included in accounts of\ncountries and peoples in histories, encyclop\u00e6dias, and guide-books.\nThey decorate the narratives of ancient and medi\u00e6val travelers. They\nare compiled in volumes of mirabilia. Instances of these several\nrecords are the Odyssey of Homer, the _History_ of Herodotus, the\n_Travels_ of Marco Polo, and the _Collecteanea_ of Solinus.\n\nThe special type of letters which travel tales have developed is\nthe collections of mirabilia. Most, perhaps all, of these have been\nlibrary pilferings and borrowings. Photios culled from the _Indika_\nof Ctesias everything that was difficult to believe, and the rest of\nthis survey of ancient India is lost. Solinus won the name of Pliny\u2019s\nApe by extracting the curious things from the writings of the Roman\nencyclop\u00e6dist and combining them in a work which was standard for a\nthousand years.\n\nThe very skepticism of other writers evidences the industry of the\nhistorians of marvel. In his _Attic Nights_, Gellius, a Roman of\nthe second century A.D., tells of a bundle of musty books which he\nbought for a few coppers in Brundusium. \u201cThey were all in Greek,\u201d\nhe says, \u201cand full of wonders and fables, containing relations of\nthings unheard of and incredible, but written by authors of no small\nauthority--Aristeas of Proconnesos and Isogonos of Nic\u00e6a, and Ctesias\nand Onesikritos and Polystephanos and Hegesias.\u201d Swiftly he lists their\nraces of dog-headed, one-legged, headless, and feathered mortals.\n\u201cAs we perused them,\u201d says the practical but too-scornful Roman, \u201cwe\nfelt how wearisome a task it is to read worthless books which conduce\nneither to adorn nor to improve life.\u201d\n\nWhen Huc was ascending a Chinese river in the middle of the last\ncentury his native servant used to go ashore at every stopping place\nand bring aboard a stock of pamphlets to read. These products of the\nready pens of the literary class included fantastic stories of various\nkinds, some of them very coarsely written. Says Huc: \u201cThe Greeks fixed\nthe abode of their monsters and ephemeral creatures in the east, and\nthe Chinese have returned the compliment by placing theirs in the west,\nbeyond the great seas. There dwell their dog-men, their ears long\nenough to trail on the ground as they walk; there is the Kingdom of\nWomen, and of the people with a hole right through them at the breast.\u201d\n\nBest of all skeptical discussions of prodigy is the _Enquiries into\nVulgar and Common Errors_ (1646), which bears the high name of Sir\nThomas Browne. Its author challenges the entire array of travel\ntales, closes his eyes to the truth hidden in many of them, recites\nthe means by which impostors fabricate imaginary animals, denounces\n\u201csaltimbancoes, quacksalvers, charlatans, astrologers, fortune tellers,\njugglers, geomancers and the like incantatory impostors,\u201d and sounds\na warning against Herodotus, Ctesias, Maundeville, Pliny, \u00c6lian,\nSolinus, Athen\u00e6us, Philes, Tzetzes, and \u201ceven holy writers such as\nBasil and Ambrose and Isidore, Bishop of Seville, and Albertus, Bishop\nof Ratisbone.\u201d Preachers and moralists, he says, have made occasion for\nerror by using for illustration the fables of the ph\u0153nix, salamander,\npelican and basilisk. The root of the matter, he concludes, is the\n\u201cdeceptible condition\u201d of men, of which Satan took advantage in the\nbeginning.\n\nIn whatever books one finds these pictures of strange lands and races\nthey have the effect of cameos, in that they are miniatures, and the\noutlines are not subject to change. The description is always brief,\nand next to nothing is added to it from age to age. The griffin has\nno new habits, the dog-faced men lived under the old law, the pygmies\nof the Middle Ages have not yet won the battles with the cranes which\nthey were waging in the time of Homer. If a traveler sees these strange\ncreatures he has nothing fresh to say of them. The main thing that\nhappens is that they shift their places on the map, retiring always\nbefore the advance of knowledge. \u00c6thicus of Istria contributes almost\nthe only really novel touch in a thousand years. He saw, so he says,\nthe Amazons in the region north of the Caspian suckling the centaurs\nand minotaurs.\n\nThat these fables came down through the centuries unchanged is a\ntribute to the hold of tradition, to men\u2019s reverence for the written\nword. It is also a revelation of the way natural histories and\nencyclop\u00e6dias were compiled until about the time of Buffon and Cuvier.\nWhen a thing got itself said, it had a good chance of surviving,\nprovided it was interesting. Other men copied it out of a book without\ndemanding proofs, authority taking the place of research. The ancient\ngeographers cited the very poets as authorities.\n\nBecause they passed through endless compilations the fables remained\nbrief, or became so. Despite its vigor and penetrating quality, even\nthe _Geography_ of Strabo rests for its main facts on a multitude of\ntravel books whose statements it abridged. What the Greek writers could\nnot wholly avoid was too much for the Roman encyclop\u00e6dists. They were\nnote-takers, compilers, abridgers, and they tried to make all learning\ntheir province. The encyclop\u00e6dias of Varro, Verrius, Flaccus, Pliny,\nSuetonius, Pompeius Festus, and Nonius Marcellus were the product\nnot of a staff of experts, but in each case of a single mind. The\neditors epitomized everything. They made extracts from books, extracts\nfrom extracts, abridgments of abridgments. The original works they\nconsulted were lost, and only fragments of the mental inheritance of\nthe Roman world were transmitted from age to age. Under the modern\nsystem of specialized inquiry the frontiers of knowledge press ever\noutward. Under the old encyclop\u00e6dists they drew inward and the body of\nknown facts shrank continually. This tendency culminated in Isidore,\nBishop of Seville in the seventh century, last of the Roman, first of\nthe Christian, encyclop\u00e6dists. He devotes two sentences to the small\nisland of Thanet, now a part of Kent. He gives three sentences to Great\nBritain; \u201cjet is very common there, and pearls,\u201d he says.\n\nFrom works prepared under such conditions one must be content with a\ntreatise as brief as this in Isidore\u2019s _Etymologies_: \u201cThe Cynocephali\nare so called because they have dogs\u2019 heads and their very barking\nbetrays them as beasts rather than men. They are born in India.\u201d\n\nThe ideal lands, the prodigious races, and the fabulous animals were\nfirst made known to the world by the Greeks. Few of the classic travel\ntales, however, originated with them. Most of them trace back to Egypt\nand India; if their sources are still more remote, the track has been\nlost. The mythical peoples and animals dwelt in the deserts of Africa\nand the deserts and mountains of Asia. India, even more than Egypt, was\ntheir home. The mighty mountains that bordered it, the multitude of\npeoples that inhabited it, the strong touch of the grotesque in their\nart and ritual, and their curious sense of kinship with the elephant,\nthe tiger, the snake, and the jackal made theirs the native soil of\nmarvel. Many of the singular creatures that peopled the hinterlands of\nAfrica seem to be emigrants from India and beyond.\n\nThe earliest travel tales in Greek literature are found in Homer\u2019s\nOdyssey commingled with accounts of places and peoples that are not\nof the earth. These stories of the tenth century before Christ look\nwestward from Greece. In the poems of Pindar the strange outlines of\neastern marvel appear on the Mediterranean scene and a new aspect\nof reality animates them. With the history of Herodotus, written in\nthe fifth century before Christ, the invasion is well-nigh complete.\nImbedded in the greatest of all histories, passages about the griffin,\nthe ph\u0153nix and kindred creatures are scattered through volumes that\ncontain the high story of the Persian attempt upon Greece, and the best\naccounts which the Mediterranean world had of the back lands of the\nearth. Herodotus had heard of so many wonderful things which were true\nthat he made it a rule to report what he heard even where he doubted\nits truth; and to this rule the world owes much. The Halicarnassian\ndoubted the existence of a sea north of Europe, or of the Tin Islands,\nbut he gave them a place in his pages. He could not believe that\nthe Ph\u0153nicians had circumnavigated Africa, but his record of their\nincredible assertion that as they sailed they \u201chad the sun on their\nright\u201d is evidence that the thing was done.\n\nHerodotus was attacked as untruthful by Ctesias and the\nPseudo-Plutarch, and his monument at Thurium in Italy recites that\nhe removed thither to escape ridicule; but in the main this was the\nridicule of men who accepted his pleasant stories and doubted his\nhistory, and who were offended because with too candid a pen he\nsketched faction and faint-heartedness in the Greek states when Xerxes\nled his host across the Hellespont.\n\nAfter Herodotus the chief sponsor for antique marvel is Ctesias the\nCnidian, whose work falls in the following generation. If the one\nhistory was the product of travel, the other was the product of\nprolonged residence abroad, Ctesias having been stationed as physician\nfor seventeen years at the Persian court. He gave the Greeks their\nfirst special treatise on India, introduced the Deformed Folk to the\nwest, and pictured the peninsula as a preserve of curious peoples\nand animals. So he made a notable book of his _Indika_, but among\nthe learned it had small credit. \u201cA writer not to be depended on,\u201d\nAristotle calls the author, and where Herodotus was accused of\ncredulity, Ctesias was assailed for mendacity. Modern criticism,\nhowever, has identified several of his monstrous races with tribes\nstill inhabiting Hindostan and partly excused other fables on the\nground that he never saw India and put in his book only what the\nPersians told him of their neighbors to the east. When one people tells\nanother the ways of a third, the theme is marvel.\n\nWhat was denied to Ctesias was vouchsafed to Alexander in the next\ngeneration. With his own eyes he saw India. The European race before\nwhich the east unveiled was the most gifted, curious, and imaginative\nof all peoples, and the east beheld it personified in the captivating\nfigure of Alexander. The expedition brought legends back with it, and\nleft other legends behind. Indian and Afghan and Turkoman and Arab\nnever forgot the great Macedonian, while the whole literature of the\nwest was colored by this eastern contact.\n\nA few other Greek names are linked with the travel tale. Scylax of\nCaryanda taxed credulity with his fabric of wonder. Aristotle examined\nreports of fabulous creatures, and fables as to actual species, and\nrejected most, but not all, of them. The study of anthropology,\ndeveloped at Alexandria, found its harvest in the geography of Strabo\nand in the survey of the Erythr\u00e6an Sea by Agatharcides. Both works\ncontain curious accounts of curious tribes of men.\n\nPausanias the Lydian, who lived in the second century of the Christian\nera, is better remembered than men with better title to remembrance,\nbecause his work happened to survive. His _Description of Greece_ has\nbeen compared to an old shoe flung high on the beach of time. An old\nman wrote it, interested in old things. Pausanias has much to say\nof the wonders of sacred grottos, trees, and springs. His method of\ntaking a road and describing everything along it was copied by pilgrim\nwriters, who clogged the paths of Palestine with their marvels. Modern\ncriticism has discovered that he repeats as interviews with natives\nstatements he had read in local handbooks, and that, betrayed thereby,\nhe tells of seeing cities as flourishing places which had been in\nruins for centuries. Yet Pausanias was a real traveler, although at\ntimes a luckless compiler.\n\nLucian the Samosatan was his contemporary, but his contribution to\nmarvel is a satire on the credulity of all travelers, among whom he\narraigns Homer, Herodotus, and Ctesias. His _True History_ relates an\nimaginary voyage to the moon, and thence to the Fortunate Isles, where\nUlysses entrusts him with a letter to Calypso. In the belly of a whale\nnearly two hundred miles long, which had swallowed his ship, he finds\nlakes, woods, and strange races of living men. It was the singular\nfortune of this travesty to provide material for epics which the Celts\naccepted as history and for adventures which were foisted on the\nnarrative of Baron Munchausen.\n\nThe Latin mind was inferior to the Greek chiefly in that it was\ndeficient in curiosity. The Romans were content to rule the world\nrather than to understand it. It was enough that amber and silk and\nincense and spice should come to them from the four corners of the\nearth without their following the trade routes back to find what manner\nof people sent these things. Yet legend was active among the mariners\nand camel-drivers and porters of the races that served the Roman on the\nfringes of his empire. The fables of these porter-nations were passed\non to the Arab and are preserved in the _Thousand and One Nights_.\n\nRome, however, performed a service to the traditional world by\nproducing the elder Pliny and his amazing _Natural History_. Pliny has\nnot the charm, narrative gifts, or historical genius of Herodotus,\nbut he comes half a millennium afterward and has more to report. He\nlacks the comprehensive and penetrating intelligence of Aristotle, but\nhe knows more--of things that are so, and of things that are not so.\nHis great work is perhaps the most impressive monument to industry\nraised by a single mind. The entire body of learning of the ancient\nworld passed through his mind and came out again in the volumes which\nhe calls a natural history but which are in fact an encyclop\u00e6dia.\nThese thirty-seven books record twenty thousand matters of importance\ncollected from about two thousand volumes, only a few of which have\nsurvived. As his nephew, the younger Pliny, recites, it was his maxim\nthat \u201cthere is no book so bad but some good may be got out of it.\u201d\n\nTo get it Pliny made notes, even in the bath. When he traveled, his\nsecretary was by his side with a book and tablets, and if it was winter\nthe scribe took dictation with his gloves on. In Rome Pliny never moved\nabout except in a litter, reading while he was being carried through\nthe streets. Once he rebuked his nephew for walking and \u201closing all\nthose hours.\u201d\n\nWhile tracing the courses of the stars, the description of countries,\nplants and animals, the anatomy of man, the properties of drugs, the\nnature of gems, the uses of metals, the science of farming and the\nfine arts, Pliny contrives also to sketch the geography of marvel. \u201cIt\nis really wonderful,\u201d he declares, \u201cto what a length the credulity of\nthe Greeks will go.\u201d Yet he draws most of his material from them, and\nwhatever his own attitude toward the things he recites, the result of\nthe recital was to give credulity its own text-book for a thousand\nyears. Cynical as was his point of view, Pliny was yet a lover of\nmarvel and searched it out and set it forth in his pages whether he\nbelieved it or not. It was enough that it was interesting.\n\nHis was the journalistic angle. The _Natural History_ is in effect\na vast newspaper report of the world of about A.D. 77. The columns\nof curious miscellany which newspapers print sometimes under such\nheadings as \u201cOddities in the Day\u2019s News\u201d are legacies of his spirit.\nThe monument to his immense industry and reportorial instinct is a\nwork which fabulists of all succeeding ages used as a quarry for their\nown building materials. Had his been the questing mind of the Greek,\ninstead of the drag-net intelligence of the journalist of an incurious\nbut marvel-loving world, the view of the central countries of culture\nand of the horizon lands presented in the _Natural History_ would have\nless the aspect of a main circus tent surrounded by side shows.\n\nSolinus, surnamed Polyhistor or the Varied Narrator, distilled the\nmarvels from Pliny, making some seven hundred extracts, adding to them\nfrom other sources, and producing a work which supplanted the older\nwriter in the affections of the multitude throughout the Middle Ages.\nHis _Collecteanea_ appeared in the third or fourth century of the\nChristian Era, and although he seems to have been a pagan grammarian,\nhe had mainly Christian readers. St. Augustine quotes him four times\nin his _City of God_, and Isidore uses no less than two hundred\nextracts in his _Etymologies_. The pagan\u2019s work was both a symptom and\na cause of the intellectual decline in the Middle Ages. Other men did\nas he did, or accepted the results of his labors as sparing them its\npains. What he did, and what Europe did after the breakdown of the old\norder of things, was to forget ancient wisdom and hold fast to ancient\nwonder. Solinus was spiritual father of the Christian fabulists, mentor\nof the Christian pilgrims.\n\nWhat Pliny wrote, perhaps with his tongue in his cheek, Solinus copies\nwith mouth agape. The world is become a playhouse, a curio hall, a\nprovince of faerie. One learns that, like man, the quail suffers from\nthe falling sickness and that the cranes of Thrace travel southward\nin ballast, stuffing their craws with sand and pebbles. In the\nMediterranean islands there is a \u201csardonic\u201d plant, on eating which\none grins horribly and dies of lockjaw. In Germany are the Hercynian\nbirds whose feathers give light in the dark. Here also is a mule-like\npastoral beast with so long an upper lip that he \u201ccannot feed except\nwalking backward.\u201d In Africa are jovial apes which rejoice in the new\nof the moon and lament in its wane, and sphinxes and satyrs \u201ceasily\ntaught to forget their wildness, very sweet faced, and full of toying\ncontinually.\u201d There are no snakes in Ireland--and no sense of right and\nwrong.\n\nThe _Physiologus_, an Alexandrian compilation, companions the\n_Collecteanea_, but introduces a moralizing note and thereby\nushers a rabble of real and fabulous animals into the symbolism of\necclesiastical architecture. Isidore of Seville is a desiccated\nSolinus, dried out by theology and the specialized pursuits of the\ngrammarian. He wrote at the opening of the seventh century. His\n_Etymologies_ has already been cited as that irreducible minimum of\nknowledge to which the epitomizing habit of Roman encyclop\u00e6dists tended\nalways. It shows also the Roman dependence on authority as a substitute\nfor research, and the Roman worship of words. Easy it was for early\nChristian writers to take up the tradition of the encyclop\u00e6dists, for\nit needed only that the authority of the pagan be replaced by that of a\npurer faith. The pagan marvels were accepted almost in a body and many\nof them are briefly recited by Isidore.\n\nHow words breed legend is disclosed in the very title of the\n_Etymologies_. Carrying a little further the tradition of the Romans,\nwith whom philology was almost as old as poetry and more important than\nnatural science, Isidore seemed to think that when he had given the\nderivation of a term he had accomplished a complete description of the\nthing that bore its name. Words themselves were things transcendental.\nThus he defines Barbarism as \u201cthe uttering of a word with an error\nin a letter or in a quantity.\u201d _Nox_, the Latin word for night, \u201cis\nderived from _nocere_ (to injure) because it injures the eyes.\u201d \u201c_Homo_\nis so named because he is made of _humus_ (earth), as it is told in\n_Genesis_.\u201d \u201c_Corpus_ (the body) is so called because being corrupted\nit perishes.\u201d\n\nIsidore writes the texts for the chapter in the history of marvel that\ndeals with Christian fabulism, pilgriming, and cosmography. It is\nChristian only in the sense that Christians of the earlier centuries\ntell the tales, make the journeys, and construct the world theories.\nIts subject matter is Jewish and pagan, with the two elements sometimes\nin an artless, sometimes in a forced, combination; it presents one\nside of that contact and conflict between Aryan and Semitic cultures\nwhich is the history of the last nineteen centuries. For the first part\nof the period the result of the conflict in the field of geography,\ntravel, and tradition was what might be expected where simple-witted\npeoples, lately emerged from barbarism and not yet nationally minded,\nmeet a race of ancient culture and intense national spirit. Jewish\nconceptions prevailed. It was thought that children, if taught no other\ntongue, would naturally speak Hebrew. Europe accepted as a literal\nrecital of fact the Sumerian legend preserved in Hebrew Scriptures\nthat the human race began with Adam--\u201cthe mean, toolless and frivolous\nAdam,\u201d as Andrew Lang calls him--and his consort in the Garden of Eden;\nand from Hebrew chronology it figured that the earth must be about\nfour thousand years old. It made over its geography to conform to Old\nTestament texts, and, discarding the world-knowledge of the classic\ncivilizations, it made over its maps to show Jerusalem in the center of\na flat earth.\n\nWhen pilgrims to Palestine had visited the scenes of the birth and\npassion of Christ they proceeded to explore the Jewish background for\nmemorials of Old Testament history, with side trips into the realm of\npagan marvel. All of them looked for the pillar of salt by the Dead\nSea in which Lot\u2019s wife was entombed; for centuries this column comes\nand goes in their narratives. Silvia of Aquitaine, whose journey falls\nin the fourth century, says there was no pillar there--the sea had\nengulfed it--but others saw it later. Theodosius says it waxed and\nwaned with the phases of the moon. Antoninus denies the report that\npasturing sheep had diminished its size by licking it. A fragment of\nthis marvel is in the Library of Congress at Washington, together with\nthe report of an American traveler who measured the pillar and found it\nsixty feet high and forty feet around, larger than he believed Lot\u2019s\nwife could have been.\n\nOther of the earlier pilgrims are said to have gone into Arabia to see\nthe dunghill where Job contended with his comforters. The pyramids,\nsome thought, were the barns of Joseph. The Apples of Adam still showed\nthe marks of his teeth. The Jordan halted its waters at the time of\nthe Epiphany. Devils were seen on Mount Gilboa. The torments of hell\nlay under the Sea of Sodom and Abbott Daniel had a whiff of them from\nits surface. In Samaria, Paula, friend of Saint Jerome, saw \u201cdevils\nwrithing and yelling in different kinds of torture, and men before the\ntombs of the saints, howling like wolves, barking like dogs, roaring\nlike lions, hissing like serpents, bellowing like bulls.\u201d One pilgrim\nwriter copied another, few took any note of the natural features of\nPalestine, most of them were of primitive culture, and the women had a\nwider outlook than the men.\n\nThe Jew, Rabbi Moses Petachia, made a pilgrimage, reporting among other\nthings that the wind which blew from the shallow parts of the Sea of\nAzov, the Stagnant Sea of old geography, was fatal to passers-by; he\nsaw on the Euphrates a flying camel which could go a mile in a second.\nRabbi Benjamin of Tudela undertook a remarkable journey in the twelfth\ncentury to learn the condition of the Jewish communities of the east.\nHe brought back valuable information, but said he could not approach\nthe vast ruins of Babylon because of the scorpions and serpents that\nhaunted them, located mythical Jewish states in the deserts of Arabia,\nand repeated numerous fables on hearsay. If he ever took this journey,\nsays the elder Disraeli, it must have been with his nightcap on.\n\nHow the new peoples of the west lost the sense of historical\nperspective under the Jewish impact is shown in the long speculation\nover the whereabouts of the Ten Lost Tribes of Israel. Classic learning\nwas dismissed as \u201cwindy babble.\u201d The fate of the peoples of the\ngreat monarchies of antiquity aroused no curiosity. But everywhere\nwere sought the footsteps of the vanished Israelites. They were\nimprisoned in the Caucasus, they had become Afghan mountaineers, they\nwere privileged subjects of Prester John, they were settled in the\nCanaries, they had reached China, they had colonized Peru, they were\nthe progenitors of the British and American peoples, they were the\nancestors of the North American Indian, and the first Mormons.\n\nWhile Europe was curious about the shrines, landmarks, and legends of\nAsia, and held it to be the continent of wonder, Asia did not return\nthe interest. It had few travel tales to tell of the peoples of the\nwest, few reports of any kind. The Chinese saw little of note in\nthe Roman Empire, \u201cGreat China,\u201d save that it had good jugglers and\nasbestos cloth and that the eastern gate of Constantinople was covered\nwith shining gold leaf and was two hundred feet high. India ignored the\nsea, and was self-contained in its life and legends; the fabulous and\nfelicitous peoples of the Puranas dwell in trans-Himalayan valleys.\nArab sailors were carriers of Indian fables and may have taught them to\nthe Chinese; a large part of Chinese marvel has a quality suggesting\nimportation. Yet the superior historical sense of the Chinese,\npreserving almost intact marvel tales that were brought to them, made\nthe rest of the world their debtor. Their encyclop\u00e6dias and classics\nare quite in the style of Pliny, as, for example, the _Shan Hai King_,\nor _Wonders by Land and Sea_, to which the dates of B.C. 2700, 2205,\nand 222 have been severally ascribed, and which is also alleged to be a\nTaoist forgery of the fourth century A.D. Monster peoples and animals\nare in this work, and one of its early prefaces relates the journey of\na king to the Halls of the Giants in the east, to the mansions of the\nFairy Queen in the west, across a bridge of tortoises in the south and\nover streets made of feathers in the north. It is also recited that by\nimperial decree nine urns were set up in various parts of China on\nwhich, to the fear of the people, the common and the strange animals of\neach region were pictured.\n\nReligious fervor at length set the feet of Chinese upon paths along\nwhich wonder grew. Buddhist priests and scholars went east to teach and\nwest to learn. If the annals of the Middle Kingdom are to be credited,\na fair interpretation of the record is that the Chinese reached the\ncoast of North America in A.D. 499 and again in 502 and 556. They\nfound countries which they described as the Land of Marked Bodies and\nthe Great Han country. The natives of the former had horses and draft\ndeer with great horns (reindeer) and esteemed copper more than gold. A\nthousand furlongs east was the Kingdom of Women--erect, white-skinned,\nhairy, timorous, subsisting on a salt plant like wormwood. The\nresidents of the Land of Marked Bodies, supposed to be the Aleutian\nIslands, were tattooed, joyous, rich in gold and silver. Eastward was\nGreat Han, possibly British Columbia, the wild beasts of which devoured\nguilty criminals, but spared persons falsely accused. There was also a\ncountry of dog-headed men.\n\nThese lands have been identified with regions of northeastern Asia,\nand because of their climate and products with American regions as far\nsouth as California and Mexico.\n\nThe westward journeys of Buddhist scholars are historical and\nimportant. They went to India at various periods from the beginning of\nthe fifth to the latter part of the seventh century of our era to study\nthe Law of Buddha, to visit the sites associated with Sakya Muni and\nto collect sacred books and relics. One Chinese work has a record of\nfifty-six of these worthies. The Buddhist pilgrims were men of higher\nintelligence and still greater credulity than those who at about the\nsame time were journeying out of Europe to the shrines of Palestine.\nTheir largest figure, and one of the world\u2019s greatest travelers, is\nHiouen Thsang, who left China in A.D. 629 and returned seventeen years\nlater.\n\nIn the desert of Gobi, Hiouen saw spectral armies charging down upon\nhim and at night the flare of spectral torches, but at a word of\nscripture the glamour faded. In the T\u2019sung-ling mountains Fa-hien found\npoison dragons that spat the storm and avalanche; here, says Hiouen,\none should not wear red garments nor carry loud-sounding calabashes.\nThe pass of Varasena was so high that birds could not fly over it,\nbut crossed the summit afoot. Report had it that in the deserts of\nTurkestan a sandstorm covered in a single day as many cities as there\nwere days in the year.\n\nThe India that Hiouen traversed was a land of ruins and marvels.\nHe tells of demon women and miracle gold and wonder-working Buddha\nteeth; of a shepherd that became a dragon; of a roe that brought forth\na beautiful girl with deer feet; of a risha that could fly until a\nprincess touched him, and thereafter he merely walked; of a holy man\nwhose sanctity made light in a dark wood. There are elephants in his\npages that tend shrines with flowers and perfumes, and wild asses\nthat protect an altar, and desert ants as large as hedgehogs. There\nare dragon domains and serpent palaces underground, and aboveground a\nBuddhist tower made of cows\u2019 dung. There is a City of Hump-backed Women\nand on a distant island the Kingdom of Western Women who traffic in\ngems with Byzantium and accept lovers from there.\n\nMost of these things of Chinese report the west knows also from\nHerodotus and Pliny and Polo. Out of India, marvel.\n\nThe Nestorian chapter in the joint history of religion and wonder bears\na twelfth-century date, but deals with the inheritance of classic\nfable. Although the medi\u00e6val legend of a powerful Christian monarch\nnamed Prester John, who reigned amid pagan enemies somewhere in the\nheart of Asia, was based on rumors of the eastward spread of the\nNestorian faith, the Christian element in it is weighted with all the\npagan wonders of an earlier time. The realm of Presbyter John is the\nrange of strange animals and stranger men. Thus the apocryphal letter\nbearing his signature which reached the west declares: \u201cOur land is the\nhome of elephants, dromedaries, camels, crocodiles, meta-collinarum,\ncametennus, tensevetes, wild asses, white and red lions, white bears,\nwhite merles, crickets, griffins, tigers, lamias, hyenas, wild horses,\nwild oxen, and wild men, men with horns, one-eyed men, men with eyes\nbefore and behind, centaurs, fauns, satyrs, pygmies, forty-ell high\ngiants, cyclopes, and similar women; it is the home, too, of the\nph\u0153nix, and of nearly all living animals.\u201d\n\nHere, continues the royal letter writer, are the accursed Gog and\nMagog, and the Lost Israelites, and the worm Salamander, and Amazons\nand Brahmans, and paradise and pearls and pepper. And when John goes\nto war a million and a half soldiers follow him. The epistle is pagan\nmarvel\u2019s broadest gesture over lands unknown.\n\nWith differences of Oriental temperament and cast of thought, Arab\ngeography and travel parallel every phase of the west except the Age of\nIgnorance. The Arabs escaped a Lactantius and a Cosmas, but they had\ntheir Plinies and Ptolemies, their own sea epic, and in Ibn Batuta a\ntraveler second only to Marco Polo. Until the Middle Ages were ending\nthe centers of world culture were at Bagdad and Cordoba. If Christendom\naccepted the ancient fables and rejected the ancient learning, Islam\nembraced both.\n\nThe great Arab geographers blended in their works the methods of\nPtolemy and Pliny, together with a story-telling strain from the\ncoffee-houses of the east. The very titles of their works suggest\nthis--Aljahedh\u2019s _Book of the Cities and Marvels of Countries_,\nMassoudy\u2019s _Meadows of Gold and Mines of Precious Stones_, Al\nIstakhri\u2019s _Book of Climates_, Ibn Haukal\u2019s _Book of Roads and\nKingdoms_, Ibn Khordadbeh\u2019s _Principal Trade Routes_, Abulfeda\u2019s\n_Encyclop\u00e6dia_, and Idrisi\u2019s _The Delight of Those Who Seek to Wander\nThrough the Regions of the World_. These are treatises such as would\nbe expected from a race which had found its destinies in trade routes,\nwhich had pitched its tents in the seats of the ancient culture, and\nwhich took its ease in coffee-houses. They show Ptolemy\u2019s sense of\ndistances and measurements, Pliny\u2019s note-taking habits and appetite for\nmarvel, the bazar instinct for entertaining stories, and the Arab\u2019s\npoetic fancy. Massoudy\u2019s is the typical product of his race. It is a\nvast and glittering collection of history, science, travel, and legend,\nthrown together by an imagination to which the varied and shifting\nshows of life and nature were perpetual delight. What mainly it and\nits companion works lack is the Greek sense of form and capacity for\nprecise thinking.\n\nArab geography and marvel are best to be studied in the seven voyages\nof Sindbad the Sailor. These are true travels, tricked out with\nlegendary travel tales, taken by a number of men, notably the Two\nMussulman Travelers of the ninth century, and all ascribed to one man\nin order to give them the epic quality. Sindbad is the Arab Ulysses and\nthis the Arab Odyssey. The theater of the eastern epic is the Indian\nSea, rather than the Mediterranean, it is well-nigh free from myths of\nthe supernatural, and its geographical notes, although disguised, are\ndefinite. One can trace, and Beazley has done so, the itineraries of\nthe much-buffeted merchant-wanderer, and identify the material of many\nof his adventures.\n\nWak-wak, the destination of the first voyage, is perhaps Japan; the\nisland of mysterious nightly music is an echo of Solinus; the adventure\nof the whale\u2019s back is repeated by St. Brendan\u2019s companions, and the\nowl-headed fish are borrowed from Khordadbeh. The accounts of the roc\nof Zanzibar and the Indian valley of diamonds in the second voyage are\nto be found also in the _Travels_ of Marco Polo. The third voyage is\nlifted from Homer; the hairy, ugly little dwarfs are the pygmies of the\nIliad, and the one-eyed giant who ate Sindbad\u2019s companions is a negro\nPolyphemus out of the Odyssey. The fourth voyage, with its incidents\nof cannibal ghouls and their reason-destroying herbs, the burial of\nSindbad alive with his deceased native wife, and his encounter with\npepper-gatherers, is a distorted narrative of Indian races, customs,\nand products. The Old Man of the Sea, or Sheikh of the Seaboard, in the\nfifth voyage is the orang-utan of Sumatra. The sixth voyage is mainly a\ndescription of Ceylon. In the seventh voyage the account of elephants\nthat transported Sindbad to their cemetery, where without killing them\nhe could have all the ivory he required, is about as Pliny would have\nwritten it.\n\nInto this east of glowing sorceries came two men of the west in the\nthirteenth and fourteenth centuries, the one to traverse Asia from end\nto end, and see more of wonder than any man had seen before, the other\nto roam still farther, for his journeys were in his imagination and\nhad only its limits. The _Book of Diversities_ of Marco Polo is the\ngreatest of all narratives of wanderings. The _Marvellous Adventures\nof Sir John Maundeville_ is the wildest of all romances that purport\nto be fact. The two works may be considered together if for no other\nreason than the ironic comment they afford on popular judgments before\ntime redresses them. The facts of Polo were long treated as fables.\nThe fables of Maundeville were accepted as facts. Sir John\u2019s book was\ntranslated into every European tongue and passed through hundreds of\neditions. Because of his reports on the wealth of Kublai Khan, Marco\nwas nicknamed Il Milioni; he was asked on his deathbed if he would\nnot recant some of the things he had said, and after his death there\nfigured in Venetian masques a comic character who told unbelievable\ntales to guffawing street crowds and was called Marco Milioni.\n\nThe Venetian spent twenty-four years in Asia, most of the time in the\nservice of the philosopher-monarch, Kublai Khan, and returned to his\nnative city in 1295. There are fables in his book, hearsay statements\nusually reported as such; but their effect of illusion is slight\ncompared with the staggering and splendid realities which the narrative\nunfolded before eyes unprepared for them. Marco drew aside the curtain\nof Asia. It was as if the spectators in some provincial theater,\nused only to the antics of vagrant mountebanks and the crudities of\nfolk-drama, saw for the first time one of those extravaganzas of\nmusic, movement, and color, built around a tale of the Orient, which\ntax even the dramatic resources of world capitals to produce. Sitting\nin their own darkness, the simpler peoples of the west saw on a stage\nhung with costly draperies and dim with clouds of incense, a stage of\nvast spaces and long perspectives, the civilizations of the venerable\neast--India, dreaming in the sun with its jeweled rajahs and naked\nfakirs; China, with its teeming populations, its immense inland fleets,\nits wisdom and its riches; Burma, serene amid the clang of its temple\nbells; the golden roofs of Japan rising out of cherry blossoms; Tibet,\nwrapped in a vision; the Indian Archipelago, with its spices, pearls,\nand cannibals. Other figures less clearly defined appeared in the\nbackground--nomads of the steppes, fur-hunting Samoyeds of the tundras,\nmountain tribes that pressed their women upon stranger guests; glimpses\neven of farthest Africa, of a Christian Ethiopia, of the Zanzibar of\nnegroes, ivory, and ambergris, and of Madagascar, past which the sea\nbore relentlessly southward.\n\nOf many of these things Europe heard for the first time from Marco,\nof all of them his was the first illuminating report, and most of them\nhis own eyes had seen. Here Truth is the stuff of Illusion. Though\nMarco speaks of dog-faced Andamanese, and islands of Amazons, and Lop\nwith its evil spirits, and the storm-raising witches of Socotra, and\nthe roc, it is not on these, but on his verities, that wonder waits.\nThe center of the wonder is Kublai Khan, who built the pleasure-dome\nin Xanadu. Greatly is he beholden to the traveler, who came to him\none morning out of the unknown. But for Marco, as Masefield finely\nsays, this lord of lords, ruler of so many cities, so many gardens, so\nmany fish pools, would be only a name, an image covered by the sands.\nRemembrance is with those who see, and write.\n\nThough he did not see, Maundeville wrote. The author of the volume\nthat bears this name may have seen Syria, but he claims to have been\neverywhere. He served the Sultan of Egypt against the Bedouins and\ndeclined his daughter\u2019s hand in marriage. He drank of the Well of\nYouth. He served the emperor of China in his war against Mancy. He took\nastronomical observations in the Indian Ocean. He traversed Russia,\nLivonia, Asia Minor, Amazonia, Persia, India, Tartary, China, Arabia,\nLibya, Ethiopia. One great thing his humility forbade him to essay, and\nthat was the Terrestrial Paradise. \u201cI was not worthy,\u201d he says.\n\nThe fabricator of the Maundeville narrative seems to have been Jean de\nBourgogne, a physician of Li\u00e8ge, who died there in 1373, long enough\nafter his book appeared for it already to have won reputation; on his\ndeathbed he was proud to avow his authorship, though not his imposture.\nIt is to be inferred that he appropriated his pen name of Maundeville,\nknight of St. Albans in England, from the title of a romantic satire\nby Jean du Pin published a few years before, in which the writer is\nconducted in a dream through a world of allegory by a knight named\nMandevie whose home was on a white mountain--Mons Albus or St. Albans,\nas has been suggested. Where the adventures of Maundeville came from is\nnot in doubt. Friar Odoric, a great but credulous traveler, had spent\nfourteen years in Asia, largely in India and Cathay, and had written\nout his story on his return to Italy in 1330. Maundeville, whose book\nis perhaps of twenty years later, looted his predecessor so thoroughly\nthat the friar was deemed the copyist of the knight; Samuel Purchas\nthought that \u201csome later fabler,\u201d like Odoric, had stuffed the knight\u2019s\ntale. Maundeville raided also the fables of Solinus, the forged letter\nof Prester John, the travels of King Hayton of Armenia, and the varied\nlore and legend of all lands and times collected in the preceding\ncentury by the great encyclop\u00e6dist of the Middle Ages, Vincent of\nBeauvais. Apparently he never heard of Polo.\n\nThe bogus knight won a wide and fascinated audience by throwing his\nmarvels into a tale of which he is the hero. His own adventures, his\ntravels from land to land, his comments on countries and peoples, give\nhis book unity, movement, and the narrative interest which is lacking\nin the works of Ctesias, Pliny, Solinus, and their school. Ctesias\nwrites of India, but never professes to have been there, and Pliny and\nSolinus sit afar and look over the world. Maundeville comes out of\nthe library and crosses the earth, staff in hand, in an earlier, and\nunhallowed, _Pilgrim\u2019s Progress_. His is the method, and his almost was\nthe vogue, of the Odyssey and of the Sindbad saga. The classic brevity\nand sterility in recounting mirabilia, he escapes in some measure,\nrobbing several fables to enrich one. It happened that an early\nrendering of his work into English was done when the island tongue was\nin a fluid state, and done with such sense of idiom that he has been\ncalled, although falsely, the father of English prose.\n\nMaundeville is most interesting when he is most audacious, or when\nhe stumbles most. At Joppa he transposes the figures of a classic\nmyth, and reports seeing a rib forty feet long of \u201cAndromeda a great\ngiant,\u201d chained there before Noah\u2019s flood. The chameleon (chamois?) is\n\u201ca little Beast, as a Goat.\u201d In Pathen the giant tortoise of Odoric\nbecomes \u201ca kind of Snails that be so great that many Persons may lodge\nthem in their Shells.\u201d The rats in the Isle of Charia are \u201cas great as\nHounds here.\u201d There are wool-bearing hens in Mancy. The manna in the\nLand of Job \u201ccleanseth the Blood and putteth out Melancholy.\u201d Chaldea\nis a country of fair men and evil women. In the Pepper Country \u201cthe\nWomen shave their Beards and the Men not.\u201d\n\nThe author scatters his mythical islands even over the mainland of\nAsia. Yet his sense of the shape and rotundity of the earth was far\nin advance of his time. In the midst of romancings, one finds this,\nthe clearest word of his century, and in the field of exploration the\nmost constructive: \u201cI say to you certainly that Men may environ all the\nEarth of all the World, as well underneath as above, and return again\nto their Country, if that they had Company and Shipping and Conduct;\nand always they should find Men, Lands and Isles, as well as in this\nCountry.\u201d For this declaration, for the vision of the Valley of the\nShadow of Death which Bunyan took from him and he from Odoric, for\nthe delight that his fictitious narrative still conveys, and for the\nEnglish prose which is its vehicle, one may half forgive the physician\nof Liege his pose of a gouty English knight, dictating the true story\nof adventurous years to ease hours of broken rest, and ending it with a\nbenediction, followed, anthem-wise, by a chorus of amens.\n\nThe remainder of the story of marvel, so far as it is a literary\nphenomenon, is a sea tale told by men of the west, for Prince Henry\nthe Navigator was born a few years after Jean de Bourgogne died, and\nwith his manhood there opens the era of maritime discovery. Meanwhile\nthe northwest of Europe had entered the record with Norse and Irish\nchapters. Though maps of the early Middle Ages placed the griffins and\nthe cynocephali in the north of Europe, the north knew them not. Giants\nand trolls it knew, and the Iceland sagas tell of vampires that hid in\nheaps of stockfish, and monster men, dragons, and bulls that guarded a\nhaunted shore. The inevitable compilations came later. The history of\nNorway written by Pontoppidan in the eighteenth century is a brief for\nScandinavian waters as the habitat of prodigious things.\n\nThe Celts neither robbed nor traded on the sea, and the very ports of\nIreland were opened by Northmen; yet one of the three great epics of\nthe deep, the _Voyage of St. Brendan_, is Irish, and monks are its\nheroes. The five Irish _Imrama_ or sea tales, of which this is the\nchief, weave a spell beyond any other woven upon the deep, because they\nlook westward toward hidden continents that presently were to loom\nthrough the mists, and track with spectral craft the very seas that\nfoamed erelong around the prows of Spain. Working with bits of old\nbeliefs, as a craftsman with bits of broken glass, the Celt fashioned\nan oriel window through which he glimpsed the lands of dream. It was\nmagic like that of Gwyn ab Nudd, King of Faerie, who spread before St.\nCollen the semblance of a feast in a great court. \u201cI will not eat the\nleaves of trees,\u201d said the saint, and flung holy water about him, and\n\u201cthere was neither castle, nor troops, nor maidens, nor music, nor the\nappearance of any thing whatever, but the green hillocks.\u201d\n\nFables of old time which had smoldered through the later Middle Ages,\nand which were rekindled by fresh contacts with classic marvel in the\nrevival of letters, blazed into fierce life in the age of discovery.\nWhen new continents swam into ken, and hidden empires showed themselves\nfor a moment on distant mountain sides, only to crash down at the onset\nof a handful of adventurous men, nothing seemed incredible. A world\nwhich had denied its own shape awoke to the fact of antipodal lands and\npeoples and was prepared to believe anything. The extravagant things\nit credited--and herein is palliation for its credulity--were yet\nsmall beside the wonders with which reality smote it in the face. The\nprodigious races of antiquity that had retreated before the traveler\nseemed at last to have been run to cover in those parts of the New\nWorld whither Spanish explorers penetrated. South America presented\nitself as a fulfillment of classic wonder and a proof of the unity of\nthe human story.\n\nMythical America was in part a projection of the dreaming mind of\nSpain upon the sensitive consciousness of savages. There are stories\nthat have a way of taking root as soon as they are transplanted, and\nby the incorporation of native elements of accommodating themselves\nso completely to new surroundings as to deceive the very men who had\nloosed them. Hence the mingling of Old and New World elements in\nthe tales of giants, pygmies, Amazons, satyrs, and acephalites. The\nconquistadors put leading questions, and had the answers they wanted.\nIf they were deceived, yet there was more of the scientific spirit in\nthe men who set out in search of Paradise or El Dorado, than in all the\ngenerations of encyclop\u00e6dists who copied down incredible things and\nnever went forth to find them.\n\nOne may trace the outlines of Mythical America in the journals of\nColumbus; in the writings of Peter Martyr and Garcilaso de la Vega;\nin the monographs of conquistadors like Coronado; in the _History of\nthe Indies_ by Oviedo, which Las Casas unjustly declares is \u201cas full\nof lies almost as pages,\u201d and in Hakluyt\u2019s _Principal Voyages_, justly\ncalled the English prose epic. For the most fabulous and fascinating\npicture one turns to Raleigh\u2019s account of his expedition to Guiana in\n1595. It is at once a collection of mirabilia, a story of adventure, a\ncourtly address to the \u201cLady of Ladies\u201d (Queen Elizabeth), a commercial\nprospectus, and the brief of a man on the defensive. In its pages the\nsouthern coasts of the Caribbean are as rich in marvel as the southern\ncoasts of the Mediterranean in the pages of Pliny.\n\nEarlier travelers had found it well to secure specimens of ores,\nplants, and savages as vouchers for their credit among skeptical\nstay-at-homes, and the Spaniards took the precaution of carrying\nnotaries in their ships to attest their statements. In the eighteenth\ncentury a more effective check was developed for travel tales.\nThe science of criticism superseded the habit of compilation. The\nreports of travelers were examined, sifted, and compared by closet\nphilosophers. French savants like Buache, Delisle, and Fleurieu\nchallenged the realms of prodigy and had no answer from them.\nHumboldt\u2019s great journey into Spanish America at the end of the century\nis the recessional. Through the lands of legend he wends his way, a\npatient, sometimes a pensive, observer, and puts Atlantis, El Dorado,\nthe Amazons and the wild men of the woods to the question. His report\nis the most tolerant, suggestive, and illuminating document in the\nliterature of marvel. Soon afterward began the scientific study of\nEuropean folklore with the brothers Grimm as pioneers.\n\nThe remarkable things which the North American Indian had to tell,\nmost of them, were not assayed until after Humboldt\u2019s time. Save where\nthe Spaniard had been, they have the undiluted aboriginal quality;\nyet a bookish note, which has been imputed to Viking influence before\nColumbus, is in eastern Algonquin and Eskimo sea lore and giant lore.\nThese tales of the northern continent did not launch expeditions, nor\nenter the great narratives of travel, and they have yet to win their\nindicated place in literature. There is wonder in them, and poetry, and\nthe deep reflection of untutored minds; though crude the backgrounds\nand the figures that animate them, they parallel almost the entire\narray of legendary lands and peoples which the classic world assembled.\nSkillful old story-tellers--\u201cdelight-makers\u201d they were called--told\nthem at night about a dim fire in the ceremonial roundhouses. Winter\nwas the time, for then, says Schoolcraft, the strange beings that might\nbe underground or in the lakes and streams could not hear through the\nfrozen surfaces the merry tales that the Indian dared tell about them,\nand the laughter of the roundhouse.\n\nRude are these records of a people whose trickster-hero might be the\nobscene and ofttimes ridiculous coyote instead of Ulysses; who spoke\nof caribou back-fat and not of the lotus, and who had \u201cthe sacred\ngroaning stick\u201d rather than the lyre of Hermes. Their myth-figures, no\ndemigods of marble perfection, are the coyote, the buzzard, the hare,\nthe loon, the lizard--in reality the Indian in his nakedness; and their\nevil beings are flint people and awesome rolling skulls. Yet they could\nsee in the stars the light of lodge fires, speak of the rainbow as the\nroad of the dead, picture the whirlwind as the dance of a ghost, find\na relation between a gust and the flutter of a moth\u2019s wings, trace the\ndrift of spirits down the wind, and catch on the throat of the humming\nbird a gleam of the fire it stole in a Promethean adventure. No weary\nTitan upholds the Indian sky, but in Tlingit story an old woman stands\nunder the earth with a mighty post and supports it.\n\nShape-shifting is at the basis of North American myth, and the\nsubstantial identity of men and animals is proclaimed by it. \u201cBaalam\u2019s\nass,\u201d says Leland, \u201cspoke once for every Christian; every animal spoke\nonce for the Indian.\u201d\n\nIf one marvels how the fabric of fable held together so long alike\nin classic and savage lands, one has only to make some change in a\nfamiliar bedtime story told to children. Their protest is instant; they\nwant the tale as they have heard it. So do men.\n\n\n\n\nChapter XXV. The Gains of Fable\n\n\nIt has been well for men that they have been citizens of two\nworlds--the traditional world and the world of reality. Whatever harm\nthey have suffered in either has come from but two things. These things\nare fear and selfishness, wherein are all the frustrations and all the\ncruelties. The rest has been good.\n\nThe myths of fear kept men from sailing west and south. Until a few\ncenturies ago the imaginary terrors of the Atlantic and of the tropics\nhid from them the knowledge that men like unto themselves lived in\nall parts of the earth, and that the winds would waft them to these\nalong smooth pathways of the sea. The myths of selfishness--the tales\nthat maritime nations told of evil things in waters and upon coasts\nwhich they would close to the enterprise of others--wrought the same\nmischiefs that greed and falsehood work anywhere. They retarded the\nadvance of learning, restrained the intercourse of nations, and\nrecoiled at last on the heads of those who invented them.\n\nThe gains of fable are writ large in the history of modern exploration.\nError was the guiding star of discovery. A vain fancy was the most\nprecious cargo of the caravels, as it was the keenest weapon of the\nconquistadors. The coasting voyages around Africa into the eastern\nworld would have been longer deferred if men had known that the Dark\nContinent reached so far to the south. The discovery of America was due\nto three stupendous mistakes--the belief that Asia stretched thousands\nof miles farther eastward than it does; the belief that Japan was\na thousand miles farther from Asia than it is; the belief that the\ncircumference of the earth was three thousand miles less than its true\ndimension. The total of these mistakes was so great that the whole of\nthe New World lay concealed within it. Had Columbus known that he must\nsail due west for nearly twelve thousand miles to reach Cathay, he\nwould have foregone his enterprise.\n\nBecause the Spaniards made marvels the text for launching expeditions\ninstead of telling or compiling stories, their delusions as to the\nAmericas of the sixteenth century constitute the strangest chapter of\ntravel tale. But \u201che that would bring home the wealth of the Indies\nmust carry the wealth of the Indies with him\u201d; the illusory expeditions\nof Spain had results that were denied to the more pedestrian\nadventuring of other nations. One of these led Cabeza de Vaca across\nthe territory of the United States from Atlantic to Pacific, as early\nas 1539. It was not until 1805, in the Lewis and Clark expedition,\nthat the cooler advance of the Anglo-Saxon matched this feat. In their\nsearch for illusive golden cities the countrymen of the Cid explored\nthe mountains and savannas of South America, the American Southwest,\nand even the South Seas, and did it all so far ahead of the English\nand American penetration of the northern continent that the story of\ntheir adventures was an old tale before the Saxon had entered the Great\nPlains, or climbed the Great Divide, or dropped down to the Pacific.\n\nSuch is the service of dreams. They fire the mind and make the feet of\nyoung men restless. The province of wonder has been to rescue men from\ntheir heaviness. They settle down in one place, and their children and\nchattels tie them there, but the nomad in them droops within unchanging\nhorizons and sickens down in dullness. No report of other lands like\ntheir own and other peoples like themselves will arouse them. They want\nto hear of marvels, and every tale of them is a pleasant tale even if\nit is of one-eyed cannibal giants, or malignant dwarfs, or headless\nmen, or the storm-winged roc, or the Swallower of the West. At least\nit opens new vistas, and peoples them with creatures such as cannot be\nseen at home. So it was that William of Wykeham instructed the scholars\nof New College, Oxford, to occupy the long winter evenings in the\nMiddle Ages with \u201csinging, or reciting poetry, or with the chronicles\nof the different kingdoms, or with the wonders of the world.\u201d\n\nThe spirit that leads men to seek distant markets, or dig for gold in\nmines, or search for raw materials on the other side of the earth, is\nmodern, and still only a few have it. Through most of the story of man\nit has seemed a better thing to hunt for hidden treasure, to seek for\nthe Golden Fleece or a golden city, to set out for the Terrestrial\nParadise, to win to the back of the north wind. Even now, report that a\nprehistoric monster haunts a lake in Patagonia, or that an expedition\nwill hunt pirate gold on an island of the Pacific, stirs pulses\nthat would not respond to the news that a great coal field had been\nuncovered in Alaska or China.\n\nImagination and curiosity, whence have come most of the travel tales,\nhave builded where building was needed to fill in empty places whereon\nmen refused to rear the structures of reality, or to replace what\nthey tore down. In their passages from age to age and in their long\nmigrations, men have been constantly forgetting things, carrying over\nlong stretches of the sea such memorials of the heliolithic culture as\na particular process of mummification, but not the arts and sciences\nthat had gone with it. They have discovered lands only to lose track\nof them. Authentic notes of distant countries and customs they would\nnot credit; there has been ignorant incredulity as well as ignorant\ncredulity. The true things in geography to which men have shut their\neyes are no more than countervailed by the vain things they thought\nthey saw. The tales of afternoon lands and the singular peoples of\nthe mountains and deserts widen, if only with the shifting contours\nof legend, horizons which had been narrowed by forgetfulness and a\nperverse refusal to believe.\n\nNor have even these tales been enough to satisfy with their close\nlikeness to realities. Men have played with the thought of other\ncountries above the clouds or in far-off seas, imagining things which\nnone was expected to believe, and yet which copyists repeated and\nliteral-minded men accepted sometimes as having basis of fact. Such\nare Plato\u2019s Republic, More\u2019s Utopia, Campanella\u2019s City of the Sun.\nAristophanes pictured a Cloud-Cuckoo Town, which the birds built\nbetween earth and heaven to bring the gods to terms, and filled it\nwith the trillings and pipings of feathered creatures. The satirist\nwho wrote of Lilliput, Brobdingnag and Laputa had read Lucian\u2019s _True\nHistory_. In Ariosto\u2019s Limbo of the Moon were stored such treasures as\ntime misspent in play, vain efforts, good intentions, unpaid vows, the\npromises of princes, and deathbed alms.\n\nThree of these imaginary countries were sketched with such fidelity to\ndetail, poetic or grotesque, that they lived in the thought of men\nwith almost a sense of the actual. Scobellum was a fruitful land, the\npeople of which went beyond the cannibals in cruelty, the Egyptians in\nluxury, the Persians in pride, the Cretans in falsehood, the Germans in\ndrunken license. Whereupon the gods turned the drunkards into swine,\nthe lecherers into goats, the gamblers into asses, the idle women\ninto milch cows, and the misers into moles. The Land of Cockaigne was\na country of luxury and high feeding where the houses were built of\nbarley sugar and the streets were paved with pastry and goods were free\nin the shops. Fiddler\u2019s Green is a place where always the fiddlers are\nfiddling and the pipers piping, and the dancers dancing; it lies on the\nother side of hell.\n\nTravel tales that purport to be true have a way of rebuking unbelief\nwith their half triumphs. Noting only the impossible items in a\ntradition, learned skepticism has opened itself to discomfiture by\nrejecting the whole. The two outstanding figures of fable, the pygmy\nand the Amazon, point the moral. In the more grotesque forms may be\nfound notes on forgotten history and on pal\u00e6ontology. Those tales for\nwhich no basis of fact can be discerned are yet projections of the\nminds of primitive men on the clouds, seen after the men themselves\nhave dropped below the horizon, like the red in the sky after sunset.\nAt least their colors illumine the manuscript of antiquity and the rude\nscroll of savagery.\n\nThough fantastic fables were bred thereof, it has been loss and not\ngain that the old sense of kinship with the fowls of the air and the\nbeasts of the field is no more. There were compassions and tolerances\nin this imagined relation, with just a hint of deep insight. Before the\nbrotherhood of man became so much as a phrase, the brotherhood of all\ncreated things was a fact. Killing for the mere stupid sake of killing\nhad no place in a world in which men believed that the first men were\nants; in which they made the hare, the coyote, and the raven heroic\nfigures of their epics; in which they celebrated the piety of the oryx,\nthe elephant, and the llama; in which they acclaimed the strength of\nthe lion, the keen sight of the eagle, and the sagacity of the fox,\nand in which they spared the bear, the deer, and the parrot because\nit seemed to them that these were ancestral folk. Were these savages\nfarther from the truth than men of the present day whose interest is\nnot in the lives but in the deaths of beasts, and who rob the woods and\nfields of half their beauty and significance by their senseless pursuit\nof the pathetic, defenseless, and yet kindred beings that harbor there?\n\u201cMy sister the swallow\u201d is the chant of St. Francis. In a better time\nwhen wild life will be cherished and not hunted, it will be remembered\nthat the dawn-peoples had a vision which was not all vanity.\n\nThe world of reality wears a rich garb that was woven for it by the\nworld of tradition ages ago. Shifting lands of legend have become solid\nground. There was no island of Brasil, but the country of Brazil bears\nits name. There was perhaps no Antilia, domain of the Seven Bishops,\nbut the Antilles stretch their veritable ramparts across the Caribbean.\nThe Amazons are commemorated by the earth\u2019s greatest river. There are\nbeasts and birds which perpetuate the names of the dragon, the harpy,\nthe sea horse, the unicorn, the satyr. The pity of the pelican lives\nin Christian symbolism. The wisdom of the brute runs through \u00c6sopian\nfables and medi\u00e6val bestiaries. The creatures of classic prodigy--the\ngriffins, the ph\u0153nix, the dragon--animate the blazons of heraldry.\nThe ideal lands and marvelous peoples of ancient story lend a strange\nbeauty to the romances of chivalry. Half of the appeal of cathedrals is\nin the monstrous figures--bestial, grotesque, devilish--which proclaim\nfrom their roofs and buttresses and sculptured walls a paradox which\nis no paradox at all, that the sanctuaries of the spirit are set among\nthe perilous ways of the world. The old credulities are enshrined in\nthe language of every people, in the imagery of the arts, and in the\nbedtime tales that follow the settings of the sun from station to\nstation around the earth.\n\nThese things have spoken neither the last nor the greatest word they\nare to utter. The fruitful use of the collections of savage myth and\npeasant lore is yet to come, when classic legend will take its place as\nbut a chapter in the volume of fantasy. What will be revealed therein\nis the mind of man in the presence of the spectacle of beauty and\nterror which is the world. Here the themes of poetry, painting, and\nthe plastic arts await a new treatment. Not so much the councils of\nthe gods, the myths of creation and of natural forces, as the simpler\ntravel tales that are close to the soil will be drawn upon. Olympus\ntowers afar with its divinities. Nearer to the earth, for example, is\nthe mountain of San Francisco in Arizona, which the Navahos say was\n\u201cbound with a sunbeam, decked with haliotis shell, clouds, he-rain,\nyellow maize, and animals, nested with eggs of the yellow warbler,\nspread with yellow cloud and made the home of White-Corn Boy and\nYellow-Corn Girl.\u201d However high their spirit soars, men\u2019s feet are\non the ground. If it is the limitation of their nature it is the\nliberation of their art that their interest is more in quests of the\nTerrestrial Paradise than in myths of things unearthly.\n\nIt was the first belief of man that with a thought he could change\nthe outer world. What was it, indeed, but the projection of his\nown soul--the demons that were his evil thoughts, \u201cthe savage and\nvoluptuous beasts that were the emblems of his folly,\u201d the ideal lands\nthat were the dawn and afterglow of his own days? The beginning of art\nwas magic, alike in the chants of rainmakers, the cave paintings of the\nDordogne, and the sculptures of Egypt; and magic is its end. Still may\nthe artist soul of man fashion its own realities.\n\nWhile he builds the pleasant marvels of his yesterdays into habitations\nof fancy, he will rear other structures of the like insubstantial stuff\nand deem them the abiding places of reality. The shows of nature are\na pageant through which man moves in a dream of his own making. The\npiling and passing of the clouds, the fog\u2019s oblivion, the sunset, the\nnight and the stars, work their spells about him, masking, concealing,\nrevealing. With the harmless revel of fireflies in the dew and dusk,\nfairy locks unbolt for him. He cannot look upon life save as a drama or\nan allegory, with the earth as the stage and the sky for its hangings.\nBy the law of his being he must be maker of myths.\n\nOnly a divine animal could question what was behind the hills, win the\nvision of unconjectured oceans, hear the note of eternity in the sound\nof running water, and, flashing into a brief ecstasy, sink back again\nwith the cry of Eheu Fugaces. The brute-gods of his myths, are they\nnot man himself with his animal routine and his divine moments? When\nhe crosses the barrier of dreams, when he sits at the gates of memory,\nwhen contemplation holds him motionless \u201clike a flame in a windless\nspot,\u201d in his Dionysian intoxications, in the very dances wherein he\nmerges the god and the brute, he creates worlds that ensphere his every\nmood. The Iranian who calls the abode of the blest the House of Song,\nand the Mongol whose official scrolls speak of the continents as the\nGolden Surface have made a new heaven and a new earth.\n\nIt is not given man to envisage reality. His is the greater gift to\nbrood over Chaos and shape it as he will.\n\n\n\n\nBibliography\n\n\nIn preparing this book the works most frequently consulted have been\nPliny\u2019s _Natural History_, Browne\u2019s _Enquiries into Vulgar and Common\nErrors_, Beazley\u2019s _Dawn of Modern Geography_, Frazer\u2019s _Golden Bough_,\nTylor\u2019s _Primitive Culture_, Hakluyt\u2019s _Principal Voyages of the\nEnglish Nation_, and Pinkerton\u2019s _Collection of Voyages and Travels_.\nBoth the Hakluyt and Pinkerton collections are libraries in themselves,\neach with some hundreds of titles, and the travel narratives they\ncontain will not be separately listed here.\n\nFollowing are the main sources drawn upon for the materials of this\nstudy:\n\n ABERCROMBY, JOHN. _The Pre- and Proto-historic Finns._\n\n AELIAN. _De Natura Animalium._\n\n ADAMS, CYRUS C. \u201cThe Sargasso Sea,\u201d in _Harper\u2019s Monthly_ for 1907.\n\n ALBERTUS MAGNUS. _Egyptian Secrets._\n\n ALDROVANDI. _Opera Omnia._\n\n ALLEN, PAUL. _History of the Lewis and Clark Expedition._\n\n ALEXANDER, HARTLEY BURR. _North American Mythology_; _Latin-American\n Mythology_.\n\n \u201cARABIAN NIGHTS.\u201d Burton Edition.\n\n ANUTSCHIN. Interpretation of old Russian manuscript on \u201c_The Unknown\n Peoples of the East_,\u201d translated by Dr. H. Mirchow in proceedings of\n the Anthropological Society of Vienna, 1910.\n\n\n BABCOCK, WILLIAM H. _Legendary Islands of the Atlantic_; \u201cAtlantis and\n Antillia,\u201d in _Geographic Review_ for 1917.\n\n BALCH, EDWIN SWIFT. \u201cAtlantis, or Minoan Crete,\u201d in _Geographic\n Review_ for 1917.\n\n BANDELIER, A. F. _The Gilded Man._\n\n BATES, HENRY WALTER. _The Naturalist on the River Amazons._\n\n BEAZLEY, C. RAYMOND. _The Dawn of Modern Geography._\n\n BEDDARD, FRANK EVARS. _A Book of Whales._\n\n BINGHAM, HIRAM. _Across South America._\n\n \u201cBLACKWOOD\u2019S MAGAZINE\u201d for 1904. \u201cHeraldry.\u201d\n\n BOTCHKAREVA, MARIA. _Yashka; My Life as Peasant, Officer and Exile._\n\n BRADLEY, HENRY. _Ptolemy\u2019s Geography of the British Isles._\n\n BREHAUT, ERNEST. _An Encyclopedist of the Dark Ages; Isidore of\n Seville._\n\n BREWER, E. COBHAM. _Dictionary of Phrase and Fable._\n\n BROOKS, NOAH. _First Across the Continent._\n\n BROWNE, SIR THOMAS. _Enquiries into Vulgar and Common Errors._\n\n BUDDHIST _Records of the Western World_. Truebner\u2019s Oriental Series.\n\n BUFFON, GEORGE LOUIS L. _Natural History._\n\n BULFINCH, THOMAS. _Legends of Charlemagne_; _The Age of Fable_.\n\n BUNBURY, E. H. _History of Ancient Geography._\n\n BURTON, SIR RICHARD F. _A Mission to G\u00e9l\u00e9l\u00e9, King of Dahome._\n\n BURCKHARDT, JOHN LEWIS. _Travels in Arabia._\n\n\n CARLYLE, THOMAS. _The French Revolution._\n\n CARNOY, ALBERT J. _Iranian Mythology._\n\n CAXTON, WILLIAM. _History of Reynard the Fox._\n\n CHAMBERLAIN, ALEXANDER F. \u201cRecent Literature on the South American\n Amazons,\u201d in _Journal of American Folk-Lore_, 1911.\n\n CHAMBERS, W. & R. _The Book of Days._\n\n \u201cCHAMBERS JOURNAL,\u201d for 1844. \u201cThe Dwarf Nation Idea.\u201d\n\n CHARNAY, D\u00c9SIR\u00c9. _The Ancient Cities of the New World._\n\n CHURCHWARD, ALBERT. _The Signs and Symbols of Primordial Man._\n\n COOK, CAPTAIN JAMES. _Voyages of Discovery._\n\n CORONADO. _His Journey as Told by Himself and His Followers_,\n translated by George Parker Winship.\n\n COX, SIR GEORGE W. _An Introduction to the Science of Comparative\n Mythology and Folklore._\n\n CTESIAS, _Indika_. Translation by John W. McCrindle.\n\n CUVIER, GEORGES. _Animal Kingdom._\n\n\n DALTON, LEONARD D. _Venezuela._\n\n DIODORUS SICULUS. _The Historical Library._\n\n DISRAELI, ISAAC. _Curiosities of Literature._\n\n DIXON, ROLAND B. _Oceanic Mythology._\n\n DONNELLY, IGNATIUS. _Atlantis: The Antediluvian World._\n\n DOUGHTY, CHARLES M. _Travels in Arabia Deserta._\n\n\n \u201cENCYCLOP\u00c6DIA BRITANNICA.\u201d _Ninth and eleventh editions._\n\n \u201cENCYCLOPEDIA OF RELIGION AND ETHICS.\u201d\n\n EVANS, E. P. _Animal Symbolism in Ecclesiastical Architecture_; _The\n Criminal Prosecution and Capital Punishment of Animals._\n\n\n FISHER, RUTH B. _On the Borders of Pigmy Land._\n\n FISKE, JOHN. _Myths and Myth Makers._\n\n FOUQU\u00c9, DE LA MOTTE. _Undine._\n\n FOX, WILLIAM SHERWOOD. _Greek and Roman Mythology._\n\n FRANCE, ANATOLE. _Penguin Island._\n\n FRAZER, J. G. _The Golden Bough; Folk-Lore in the Old Testament._\n\n FREUD, SIGMUND. _Totem and Taboo._\n\n\n \u201cGEOGRAPHICAL REVIEW\u201d for 1917. \u201cProposed Expedition to New Guinea.\u201d\n\n GERINI, COL. G. E. _Researches on Ptolemy\u2019s Geography of Eastern Asia._\n\n GESNER, KONRAD. _History of Animals._\n\n GOULD, CHARLES. _Mythical Monsters._\n\n GOULD, S. BARING. _Curious Myths of the Middle Ages._\n\n GRAY, LOUIS HERBERT. _North American Mythology._\n\n GRIBBLE, FRANCIS. _The Early Mountaineers._\n\n GROOME, FRANCIS H. _Gipsy Folk-Tales._\n\n GROTE, GEORGE. _History of Greece._\n\n GUERBER, H. A. _Myths and Legends of the Middle Ages._\n\n GUILLIM, JOHN. _A Display of Heraldry._\n\n\n HAKLUYT, RICHARD. _Principal Voyages of the English Nation._\n\n \u201cHARPER\u2019S BOOK OF FACTS.\u201d\n\n HARRISON, J. E. \u201cSatyrs\u201d and \u201cSilenoi,\u201d in _Encyclopedia of Religion\n and Ethics_, vol. xi.\n\n HEDIN, SVEN. _Through Asia_; _Central Asia_.\n\n HERODOTUS. _History._\n\n HOMER. _Iliad_ and _Odyssey_, Pope\u2019s Translation.\n\n HUGO, VICTOR. _Notre Dame de Paris._\n\n HUMBOLDT, ALEXANDER VON. _Personal Narrative of Travels to the\n Equinoctial Regions of America_; _Views of Nature_; _Researches\n Concerning the Institutions and Monuments of the Ancient Inhabitants\n of America_.\n\n HYAMSON, ALBERT H. \u201cSambatyon,\u201d in _Encyclopedia of Religion and\n Ethics_, vol. xi.\n\n\n IBANEZ, V. BLASCO. _Mexico in Revolution._\n\n IRVING, WASHINGTON. _Tour of the Prairies_; _Life and Voyages of\n Christopher Columbus_; _Voyages and Discoveries of Companions of\n Columbus_.\n\n\n JACOBS, JOSEPH. _The Story of Geographical Discovery._\n\n JOHNSTON, SIR HARRY H. _British Central Africa._\n\n JOSEPHUS. _Antiquities of the Jews_.\n\n JOHNSON, WILLIAM HENRY. _The World\u2019s Discoverers._\n\n \u201cJOURNAL OF AMERICAN FOLK-LORE,\u201d 1901 to date.\n\n JOYCE, THOMAS A. _Mexican Arch\u00e6ology._\n\n\n KEANE, JOHN. _The Evolution of Geography._\n\n KEANE, A. H. _The Gold of Ophir_; _Man, Past and Present_.\n\n KEITH, A. BERRIEDALE. _Indian Mythology._\n\n KINGSLEY, CHARLES. _The Hermits._\n\n KNAPP, PHILIP COOMBS. \u201cCrete and Atlantis,\u201d in _Geographic Review_ for\n 1919.\n\n\n LANDRIN, M. ARMAND. _Les Monstres Marins._\n\n LANG, ANDREW. _Custom and Myth_; _Modern Mythology._\n\n LANKESTER, E. RAY. _Secrets of Earth and Sea._\n\n LAUFER, BERTHOLD. \u201cThe Story of the Pinna and the Syrian Lamb,\u201d\n _Journal of American Folk-Lore_, 1915.\n\n LELAND, CHARLES G. _The Algonquin Legends of New England._\n\n LIVINGSTONE, DAVID. _Missionary Travels and Researches in South\n Africa._\n\n LOWER, MARK ANTONY. _The Curiosities of Heraldry._\n\n LUCIAN. _The True History._\n\n LUQUET, G. H. \u201cHuman Figures in Paleolithic Art,\u201d _L\u2019Anthropologie_,\n 1910.\n\n\n \u201cMABINOGION.\u201d Translation by Lady Charlotte Guest.\n\n MACHAL, JAN. _Slavic Mythology._\n\n MAHAFFY, ARTHUR. \u201cThe Solomon Islands,\u201d in _Empire Review_ for 1902.\n\n MAJOR, RICHARD HENRY. _Discoveries of Prince Henry the Navigator and\n their Results._\n\n MCCRINDLE, JOHN W. _The Invasion of India by Alexander the Great, as\n described by Arrian, Rufius, Diodorus and Plutarch._\n\n MCCULLOCH, JOHN A. \u201cCeltic Mythology\u201d; \u201cAbodes of the Blest,\u201d in\n _Encyclopedia of Religion and Ethics_, vol. i: \u201cMonsters,\u201d in vol.\n viii.\n\n MACIVER, D. 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D. \u201cProdigies and Portents,\u201d in _Encyclopedia of Religion\n and Ethics_, vol. x.\n\n WALSH, WILLIAM S. _Curiosities of Popular Customs_; _Handy Book of\n Curious Information_.\n\n \u201cWARNER\u2019S LIBRARY OF THE WORLD\u2019S BEST LITERATURE.\u201d\n\n WEIGALL, ARTHUR E. P. \u201cA Nubian Highway,\u201d in _Blackwood\u2019s Magazine_\n for 1907.\n\n WELLS, H. G. _The Outline of History._\n\n WESTROPP, THOMAS J. \u201cBrasil and the Legendary Atlantic Islands,\u201d in\n _Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy_ for 1912.\n\n WHEELER, WILLIAM A. _Familiar Allusions._\n\n WIENER, LEO. _Africa and the Discovery of America._\n\n WILLIAMS, ARCHIBALD. _The Romance of Early Exploration._\n\n WILLIAMS, HENRY S. _The Historians\u2019 History of the World._\n\n\n XENOPHON. _Anabasis._\n\n\n ZAHM, J. A. _Along the Andes and Down the Amazon_; _The Quest of\n Eldorado_; _Up the Orinoco and Down the Magdalena_; _Through South\n America\u2019s Southland_.\n\n\n\n\nIndex\n\n\n A\n\n Aaf Mountains, 207\n\n Abarimon, 114\n\n Abbadie, 130\n\n Abchaz, 220\n\n Abdallah of the Land, 3\n\n Abdallah of the Sea, 3\n\n Aberdeen Almanac, 102\n\n Abodes of the Blest, 257-261, 262, 336-337\n\n Abomey, 180, 183, 188\n\n Absalom, 188\n\n _Abu baraquish_, 60\n\n Abul Abbas, 61\n\n Abulfeda, 362\n\n Abyssinia, 38, 54, 74, 75, 76, 130, 178, 239\n\n _Academy of Armory_, 66\n\n Acephalites, 109, 346, 349, 368, 372\n\n Acheron River, 262\n\n Achilles, 152, 153\n\n Acoloro, island of, 158\n\n Acoma, 323\n\n \u201cAcorn-eaters,\u201d 247\n\n Acridophagi, 198-199\n\n Acroconopes, the, 103\n\n Act\u00e6on, 28\n\n Actium, 97\n\n Adam assayed, 357\n\n Adam of Bremen, 160, 268, 335\n\n Adam\u2019s footprint, 8\n\n Adam\u2019s Peak, 8\n\n Addison, Launcelot, 42\n\n Aden, 267;\n Gulf of, 233\n\n Adriatic Sea, 249\n\n \u00c6gean Sea, 186, 187\n\n \u00c6gipans, 206\n\n \u00c6lian, 39, 53, 55, 56, 81, 96, 123, 286, 350\n\n \u00c6neas, 76\n\n _\u00c6neid_, 75\n\n \u00c6schylus, 96, 194, 202, 207\n\n \u00c6sculapius, 84\n\n \u00c6sop\u2019s fables, 375\n\n \u00c6tas, the, 137, 148\n\n \u00c6thicus of Istria, 138\n\n _\u00c6thiopica_ of Marcellus, 286\n\n _\u00c6thiopis_, 152\n\n Afer, Dionysius, 8\n\n Afghans, 353, 359\n\n Africa, 2, 49, 78, 105, 122, 125, 134, 143, 145, 147, 153, 196, 199,\n 206, 207, 211, 263, 270, 351, 364\n\n Africa\u2019s warrior women, 178-184\n\n Age of Fable, 348\n\n Agate, 24\n\n Agatharcides, 199, 353\n\n Age of Ignorance, 362\n\n Agira, 163\n\n Agostina, 174\n\n Agriophagi, 199\n\n Aguirre, 304\n\n Ahacus, 320\n\n Aigamuxa, 115\n\n Aigiarm, 170\n\n Aikeambenanos, 166\n\n Ajasson, 90\n\n Akbar, 237\n\n Akkas, the, 132, 144, 145, 147, 149\n\n Alabama, 319\n\n Aladdin, 72, 73, 218\n\n Alani, the, 193\n\n Alarcon, 321\n\n Albany, land of, 194\n\n Albatross, 74\n\n Albertus Magnus, 140, 350\n\n Albinos, 193-194\n\n Alciphron, 60\n\n Aldrovandi, 79, 140, 212\n\n Aleutian Islands, 106, 255, 360\n\n Alexander, 19, 63, 81, 91, 232, 235, 236, 237, 259, 353\n\n Alexandria, 223, 353, 354\n\n Algonquins, 81, 118, 119, 303, 369\n\n Al Istakhri, 362\n\n Aljahedh, 362\n\n Allerion, 66\n\n Alligator god, 338\n\n Alps, the, 80, 191, 203\n\n Altai Mountains, 55, 117\n\n Alton, 80\n\n Alvarado, 323, 324\n\n Alvares, Father, 178\n\n Amazons, 2, 84, 118, 151-189, 207, 237, 362, 365, 368, 369, 375\n\n Amazon march, 177\n\n Amazon stone, 24\n\n Amazons, River of the, 161, 300, 304, 312\n\n _Amazuni_, 167\n\n Amber, 105, 201, 229, 264\n\n Ambergris, 364\n\n Ambrose, 350\n\n America, dragon in, 85;\n Lucian\u2019s reference to, 275;\n Plato\u2019s reference to, 287;\n claim that St. Brendan discovered it, 259;\n Chinese Buddhists reached it, 360;\n Norse discovery of, 267;\n discovery of by Columbus, 272-3, 371\n\n American Bureau of Ethnology, 323\n\n American Indian myths, 65, 117-120, 368-370\n\n American Museum of Natural History, 146\n\n American southwest, Ararats in, 292\n\n Amerigo Vespucci, 191, 315\n\n Amethyst, 24\n\n Amiens, cathedral at, 47\n\n Ammon, Abbot, 45\n\n Amoy, 244\n\n Amycteres, the, 108\n\n Anahuac, plateau of, 318\n\n Anamba Islands, 129\n\n _A\u2019nasa_, 54\n\n Ancient Mariner, 336\n\n Andaman Islanders, 106, 147, 148, 365\n\n Andari, 144\n\n Andes Mountains, 139, 149, 192, 290, 300, 305, 316, 332\n\n \u201cAndromeda, a great giant,\u201d 366\n\n Angola, 102, 125, 179\n\n Anguilla, 96\n\n Animal kingdom, 27-48\n\n Animals, Avenue of, 54\n\n Animals, criminal trials of, 31\n\n Animals, their names borne by men, 29;\n taking human form, 29;\n politics of, 42\n\n Annam, 149, 199\n\n Annwfir, 260\n\n Ant, 42, 43, 217, 253, 303, 361;\n gold-guarding, 62-64\n\n _Antennarius marmoratus_, 279\n\n Anthropology, 291, 353\n\n Anthropophagi, 114, 117, 128, 196, 207, 237\n\n Antichrist, 239\n\n Antigon, 28\n\n Antilia, 252, 345, 375\n\n Antilles, the, 163, 292, 296, 375\n\n Antiope, 153\n\n Antipodes, 9-10, 346\n\n Antoninus, 358\n\n Antony, Mark, 97, 246\n\n Anubis, 338\n\n Anuradhapura, 214\n\n Anutschin, 115\n\n Ape, 48, 121, 356\n\n Aphrodisiacs, 20, 22\n\n Apollo, 201, 203\n\n Apple Island, 345\n\n Apples of Adam, 358\n\n Apurimac, valley of the, 314\n\n Arab geography, 269, 362-363\n\n Arabia, 1, 2, 50, 69, 95, 104, 171, 195, 224, 229, 231, 234, 245,\n 358, 365\n\n _Arabian Nights_, 3, 16, 63, 74, 110, 159, 251, 354\n\n Arabian Sea, 261\n\n Araby the Happy, 232\n\n Arachne, 28\n\n Arapahoes, the, 139\n\n Arawaks, the, 292\n\n Arcadia, 1, 77, 246-248\n\n Arctic night, 221\n\n Arctinus, 151, 152\n\n Ardnainiq, the, 112\n\n Aretias, island of, 77\n\n Argensola, 206\n\n Argonauts, 75, 77\n\n Argos, 174\n\n Ariana, 197\n\n Arimaspians, 55, 107\n\n Arinadillo, 218\n\n Ariosto, 373\n\n Aristeas of Proconesus, 107, 349\n\n Aristophanes, 285, 373\n\n Aristotle, 12, 16, 39, 50, 51, 59, 135, 334, 353, 354\n\n Arjuna, Rajah, 156, 157\n\n Ark, 87, 292\n\n Arkansas River, 326\n\n Armada, the, 306\n\n Armenia, 60, 100, 113, 151, 171, 185, 195, 238, 258\n\n Aromatic Cape, 10, 231\n\n Arngrim, 92\n\n Arrian, 154, 196, 197, 225\n\n Artemidorus, 81, 195\n\n Artemis Stymphalia, 77\n\n Arthur, King, 64, 256, 259\n\n Art\u2019s beginning in magic, 376\n\n Aryan culture, 357\n\n Asaf\u0153tida, 94\n\n Asesa, 143\n\n Asia, 1, 2, 109, 135, 136, 148, 196, 211, 212, 213, 267, 351, 364\n\n Asia Minor, 135, 153, 169, 186, 281, 283, 365\n\n Ass, 46, 48, 122, 338, 361, 374;\n Feast of the, 48;\n Baalam\u2019s, 370\n\n Ass-bittern, 67\n\n Assuan, 143\n\n Assyria, 56, 66, 169\n\n Astarte, 186, 187\n\n Astolpho, home of, 76\n\n Astomi, the, 107-108\n\n Astrakhan, 237\n\n Astronomy, Maya, 293, 294\n\n Asuang, 111\n\n Asuncion, 300, 311\n\n Aswamedha quest, 156, 157\n\n Atahnallpa, Inca, 313, 333\n\n Atbara River, 199\n\n Athen\u00e6us, 350\n\n Athens, 83, 281, 286\n\n Athos, Mount, 193\n\n Atlantes, 194\n\n Atlantic Ocean, 1, 104, 252, 256, 261, 262-273, 277, 278, 287,\n 289, 291\n\n Atlantis, 1, 252, 254, 255, 266, 274, 276, 277, 278, 280, 281-297, 369\n\n _Atlantis: The Antediluvian World_, 288\n\n Atlas Mountains, 140, 206, 264, 282, 290\n\n Atrato River, 331\n\n Attica, 122, 152, 153, 154\n\n _Attic Nights_, 349\n\n Augustus, 90, 96, 236\n\n Aurochs, 55\n\n Aurungzebe, 170\n\n \u201cAustin the monk,\u201d 128\n\n Australia, 11, 255, 328, 329\n\n Autolycus, 249\n\n Avalon, isle of, 259, 345\n\n Avernus, lake of, 262\n\n Ayamanes, 139\n\n Azerbaijan, 337\n\n Azores, the, 12-13, 255, 271, 275, 277, 280, 287, 288, 289, 290\n\n Azov, Sea of, 154, 156, 358\n\n Aztecs, 189, 204, 292, 338\n\n\n B\n\n Baalam, 53\n\n Baalim, 185\n\n Baboons, fear of, 126\n\n Babylon, 122, 204, 238, 260, 358\n\n Babylonia, 85, 87\n\n Bacchus, 203\n\n Bactrians, 55\n\n Badger\u2019s legs, 44\n\n Bagdad, 362\n\n Bagrada River, 37\n\n Bahama Islands, 278, 314\n\n Bailey, 128\n\n Baker, Sir Samuel, 36, 135\n\n Ba-Kwamba tribe, 130\n\n Balasses, 244\n\n Balboa, 76, 330, 331-332\n\n Balm of Gilead, 230\n\n Baltic Sea, 100, 114, 151, 160, 254\n\n _Bamboo Books_, 71\n\n Bancroft, 307\n\n Banda, 206\n\n Bandelier, 322, 326\n\n Bangkok, 177\n\n Banshee, 99\n\n Bantam, 177, 184\n\n Bantu, the, 149\n\n Barbarism defined, 357\n\n Barbarossa, Frederick, 220\n\n Barcelona, 174\n\n Barentz, 41\n\n Barns of Joseph, 358\n\n Basil, 20, 350\n\n Basilisk, 2, 78\n\n Bassorah, Hassan el, 159\n\n Bastards of the Kalahari Desert, 146\n\n Bat, 76, 77, 217, 245, 331, 340, 344\n\n Bates, 75, 76, 126\n\n Battalion of Death, 154, 156, 174-177\n\n Batu, 106\n\n Batwas, the, 145\n\n Baurded, Treasurer, 143\n\n Bears, 43, 65, 118, 128, 374;\n as men bewitched, 29\n\n Beasts, fabulous, 49-67\n\n Beasts of Revelation, 65\n\n Beazley, 363\n\n Becket, Thomas \u00e0, 128\n\n Bede, 6\n\n Bedouins, 365\n\n Bedtime stories, 370, 375\n\n Bee, 44\n\n Beelzebub, the fly god, 30\n\n Beetle, 217, 218, 303\n\n Beeton, 193\n\n Behrs, the, 184\n\n Belalcazar, 299, 301\n\n Bellerophon, 152\n\n Belloc, 216\n\n Belzoni, 18\n\n Benjamin of Tudela, 108, 238, 243, 358\n\n Bennu, 70\n\n Benzom, gum, 230\n\n Berber rock-towns, 195\n\n Bermuda Islands, 101, 278, 288\n\n Bernier, 170\n\n Bertinoro, 17\n\n Beryl, 25\n\n Bes, 150\n\n Bestiaries, 46, 375\n\n Bezoar, 24, 38\n\n Bible, 83, 86, 122, 185, 192, 213, 338\n\n Bibliography, 378-383\n\n Bielovodye, 222\n\n Big-footed men, 2\n\n Billdad, 66\n\n Bimini, 314, 315\n\n Bird of paradise, 43\n\n Birds, 373\n\n Birthstone, 24\n\n Bishop-fish, 100\n\n Black River, 136\n\n Black Sea, 135, 151, 153, 187, 268\n\n Black Side of Cathedral, 204\n\n \u201cBlack Virgin,\u201d 171\n\n Bladder as sky, 119\n\n \u201cBlameless\u201d peoples, 203\n\n Brazil, 95, 123, 126, 188, 193, 218, 299, 375\n\n Blefkens, 133\n\n Blemmyes, the, 109\n\n Blessed Islands, 258-261, 262\n\n Bloodstone, 24\n\n Blue-land, 268\n\n Boadicea, 169\n\n Boccias Islands, 102\n\n Bogaz Keni, 186\n\n Bogota, 301, 304\n\n Bohemia, 171, 248-250\n\n Bokhara, 240\n\n Bolivia, 294, 299, 311\n\n Bongo tribe, 129\n\n _Book of the Cities and Marvels of Countries_, 362\n\n _Book of Climates_, 362\n\n _Book of Diversities_, 363\n\n _Book of Roads and Kingdoms_, 362\n\n Books, virtue in all, 354\n\n Borneo, 94, 129, 158, 159, 335\n\n Bororo Indians, 27\n\n Bosman, 179\n\n Bossewell, 66\n\n Boston Linn\u00e6an Society, 94\n\n _Botanic Garden_, 58\n\n Botchkareva, Maria, 156, 174-177\n\n Bothnia, Gulf of, 93\n\n Bo-tree, Sacred, 216\n\n Bottle-imps, 22\n\n Bouchey, Margaret, 23\n\n Bougainville, 138, 329\n\n Boundary between Old and New World, 277\n\n Bounteous Isle, 253\n\n Bourbourg, Abb\u00e9 Brasseur de, 293\n\n Bourgogne, Jean de, 365, 367\n\n Boys, maiming of, 172\n\n Bradamante, 172\n\n Bragman, isle of, 260\n\n Brahma, 205, 338\n\n Bran, 89\n\n Breadfruit, 260\n\n Breezes, generative, 50\n\n Brest, 289\n\n Brhaspati, 338\n\n Bridge of tortoises, 359\n\n Bridinno, dwarf land of, 138\n\n Britannus, 344\n\n British Columbia, 360\n\n British Isles, 9, 203, 254, 263, 264, 274, 290, 296, 351\n\n Brittany, 256\n\n Brobdingnag, 373\n\n Bronze Age, 294\n\n Browne, Sir Thomas, 23, 39, 44, 53, 69, 78, 99, 140, 334, 350\n\n Bruce, 71\n\n Brundusium, 349\n\n Brushwood Town, 128\n\n Brusilov, 175\n\n Brynhild, 79\n\n Buache, 369\n\n Bucephali, 103\n\n Buchanan, 125\n\n Buddha, 215, 361\n\n Buddhism, 188, 240, 261, 360\n\n Buenos Aires, 311\n\n Buffalo, 6, 318, 319, 323, 324, 325;\n Caffrarian, 56\n\n Buffon, 33, 35, 43, 77, 111, 140, 141, 192, 350\n\n Bull, 81, 338, 342, 367\n\n Bulotu, 260\n\n Bunyan, 262, 367\n\n Bunyan, Paul, 66\n\n Bunyip, 95\n\n Buried cities, 213-215\n\n Burma, 269, 293, 364\n\n Burrowing creatures, 218\n\n Burton, Lady, 180\n\n Burton, Sir Richard, 159, 179, 180, 181, 182, 183\n\n Busbequins, 63\n\n Bushmen, 145, 146, 147, 148, 149, 227\n\n Bustard, 210\n\n Butterfly, 344\n\n Buzzard, 370\n\n Byssus silk, 59\n\n Byzantium, 361\n\n\n C\n\n Cabeza, de Vaca, 319, 372\n\n Cabul, 62\n\n Cadiz, 224, 306, 308\n\n C\u00e6saristas, the, 317\n\n C\u00e6sars of South America, 317\n\n Calabash, 159, 321, 361\n\n Caldilhe, 58\n\n Caliban, 104\n\n California Indians, 8\n\n California, island of, 158\n\n California, State of, 127, 283, 360\n\n Callao, 328\n\n Calypso, 354\n\n Cambodia, 195, 269\n\n Cambyses, 15\n\n Camel, 42, 50, 62, 63, 81, 210, 232, 361;\n flying, 358\n\n Cametennus, 361\n\n Campanella, 373\n\n Camulatz, the bird, 293\n\n Canada, 290\n\n Canary Islands, 258, 265, 270, 287, 290, 345, 359\n\n Canelas, 300, 301\n\n Cape Bojador, 272\n\n Cape Cod, 289\n\n Cape of Good Hope, 270, 278\n\n Cape Guardafui, 10, 156, 231\n\n Cape Hatteras, 288\n\n Cape Santa Elena, 192\n\n Cape of Spices, 231\n\n Cape Verde Islands, 287, 289, 290\n\n Cappadocia, 185, 186, 195\n\n Capricorn, 67\n\n Caqueta River, 302, 303\n\n Carbuncle, 24\n\n Carchemish, 185\n\n Cardan, 140\n\n Cardinal Points, 203-205\n\n Caribbean Sea, 160, 290, 291, 296, 299, 300, 369\n\n Carib, island of, 160\n\n Caribs, the, 166, 217, 291, 292\n\n Caribou, 29\n\n Carlyle, 172\n\n Caroline Islands, 158\n\n Caroni River, 305, 311\n\n Carp, 81\n\n Carpini, 104, 106, 113, 194, 258\n\n Cartagena, 330\n\n Carteret, 329\n\n Carthage, 123, 263, 264, 271, 274\n\n Cartooning humanity, 103\n\n Caspian Sea, 237\n\n Cassia, 231, 233, 234, 243\n\n Cassiquiare River, 304\n\n Cassiterides, the, 263\n\n Castaneda, 322\n\n Castelnau, 125, 130\n\n Castor, 94\n\n Cat, 253, 338\n\n Cataclysm in New World myth, 292, 294\n\n Catalan map, 90, 160\n\n Cat-fish, 6, 67\n\n Cathay, 106, 113, 222, 240, 312, 365\n\n Cathedrals, animal symbolism in, 46-48, 375\n\n Catoblepas, 36\n\n Caucasus Mountains, 72, 114, 153, 171, 193, 194, 195, 207, 235, 237\n\n Cave drawings, 340\n\n Celtic glamour, 256, 348\n\n Celts, 83, 367\n\n Central America, 77, 291-294, 297\n\n Celebes, 242\n\n Cellar strain in human nature, 217\n\n Cellini, Benvenuto, 38\n\n Centaur, 66, 114, 361\n\n Central point of earth, 7\n\n Cephalopod, 95\n\n Cercopes, the, 125\n\n Cerne, 275\n\n Ceylon, 42, 157, 160, 258, 363\n\n Chalcedony, 25\n\n Chaldea, 98, 159, 366\n\n Chambers\u2019 _Journal_, 142\n\n Chameleon, 366\n\n Chamlakhu, 127\n\n Chains of Indo-China, 31\n\n Chao Fu-Kua, 137\n\n Chaos, 86\n\n Chardin, 171\n\n Charia, Isle of, 366\n\n Charlemagne cycle, 56, 75, 76, 95\n\n Charles III of Spain, 318\n\n Charles V of Spain, 317\n\n Charlevoix, Father, 343\n\n Charon\u2019s ferry, 262\n\n Chassen\u00e9e as rat advocate, 31\n\n Chatan, pygmy city of, 138\n\n Chelonophagi, the, 96, 198\n\n Chenoos, the, 119\n\n Cherokees, the, 217\n\n Chestnuts, 283\n\n Chiau Yau, 136\n\n Chibcha Indians, 301, 312\n\n Chichen Itza, 291\n\n Childbirth, a means of promoting, 24\n\n Chilean mythology, 338\n\n Chim\u00e6ra, 66\n\n China, 59, 60, 72, 73, 81, 82, 83, 84, 85, 113, 137, 147, 203, 218,\n 230, 259, 267, 269, 318, 335, 349, 359, 360, 364, 365\n\n China seas, 74\n\n Chinese discovery of North America, 360\n\n _Chinese Encyclopedia_, 57, 107\n\n Chinese wall, 139, 237\n\n Chiquitos, the, 139\n\n Chiriqui Indians, 338\n\n Choquequirau, 314, 332\n\n Choromand\u00e6, the, 104\n\n Chrism, devil\u2019s, 78\n\n Christ symbolized by unicorn, 53;\n called the ph\u0153nix, 69\n\n Christian fabulists, 356\n\n Christian pilgrims, 356, 357-358\n\n Christian symbolism, 375\n\n _Chronicle of the Cid_, 177\n\n Chrysolite, 25, 207\n\n Chrysoprase, 24\n\n Churchward, 149\n\n Cibola, 303, 312, 314, 318-323\n\n Ciconian coast, 228\n\n Cilician pirates, 265\n\n Cimarron republics, 165\n\n Cimbri, the, 3\n\n Cinnabar, 33\n\n Cinnamon, 231, 233, 234, 243;\n Land of, 301, 312\n\n City of Brass, 110\n\n City of God, 356\n\n City of Hump-backed Women, 361\n\n City of Mexico, 312, 321, 322\n\n City of the Sun, 2, 69, 373\n\n Classic myth, 375\n\n Claudius, 69\n\n Closet philosophers, 369\n\n Clothing, origin of, 87\n\n Cloud-centaurs, 103\n\n Cloud-Cuckoo Town, 285, 373\n\n Clouds of Magellan, 311\n\n Cloves, 230, 243, 245\n\n Coast Range, 283\n\n Coata, 124\n\n Cobra, 112\n\n Cochin-China, 137, 243\n\n Cock, 30, 44\n\n Cockaigne, Land of, 374\n\n Cockatrice, 66, 77-78\n\n Cock\u2019s egg, 78\n\n Cocytus River, 262\n\n Cod, 96\n\n Colic, a cure for, 24\n\n Coligny, 306\n\n _Collecteanea_, 355, 356\n\n Colombia, 207, 300, 301, 302, 311, 312\n\n Colorado River, 318, 321\n\n Columbus, 10, 12, 102, 130, 151, 160, 161, 167, 242, 258, 270, 271,\n 274, 277, 279, 368, 371\n\n Comedy, Greek, 339\n\n Commercial subtlety, 244\n\n Communal houses, 303, 327\n\n Comorin, Cape, 149\n\n Compass, 7\n\n Composite creatures, doctrine of, 341\n\n Concepcion, 316\n\n Condor, 74\n\n \u201cConflict between Horus and Set,\u201d 86\n\n Confucius on jade, 24\n\n Congo, 178, 179\n\n Conquistadors, 299-333, 368, 369\n\n Constantinople, 359\n\n Constellations, animal forms of, 30\n\n Conway, 206\n\n Cook, Capt., 124\n\n Cool Lake, 7\n\n Coos Bay giants, 192\n\n Copper, 327;\n Age, 294;\n Mountains, 207\n\n Coptic Christians, 239\n\n Cordilleras, 207, 273, 300, 301\n\n Cordoba, 60, 362\n\n Corentyne River, 167\n\n Cornelius Nepos, 228\n\n Corn spirit, 30\n\n Cornwall, 255, 263, 309\n\n Coromandel Coast, 196\n\n Coronado, 320, 321-326, 368\n\n Corsali, 74\n\n Cortez, 188, 292, 329\n\n Corvo, 271\n\n Cosmas, 6, 34, 52, 362\n\n Cossack colonel a woman, 177\n\n Costa Rica, 127\n\n Cotton-plant, 59\n\n Cotzbalam, the bird, 293\n\n Cougnantainsecouima, the, 164\n\n Council of Virgins, 172\n\n _Country of the Dwarfs_, 142\n\n Country of Widows, 158\n\n Country of Women, 156\n\n Court of the Universe, 284\n\n Cow, 257, 374\n\n Cowry shell, 87\n\n Coyote, 106, 118, 370, 374\n\n Crab, 30, 43, 61, 97\n\n Cradle of Gold, 312, 332\n\n Cramps, a cure for, 24\n\n Crane, 2, 42, 118, 350;\n war with pygmies, 141\n\n Crantor, 286\n\n Crayfish, 245\n\n Creative caricature, 340\n\n Credulity of Greeks, 353\n\n Crete, 287\n\n Cricket, 81, 361\n\n Crimean war, 171\n\n Criminal courts of birds, 42\n\n _Critias_, the, 281, 282, 285\n\n Crocker Land, 255\n\n Crocodile, 36-37, 45, 47, 338, 361\n\n Cromagnons, the, 190\n\n Crow Indians, 139\n\n Crusaders, 186\n\n Ctesias, characterized, 352-353;\n cited, 18, 19, 25, 35, 37, 51, 52, 55, 57, 63, 105, 106, 109, 113,\n 133, 135, 191, 193, 335, 349, 350, 352, 353, 354, 366\n\n Cuatas, the, 123\n\n Cuba, 130\n\n Cuchiviro, Rio, 166\n\n Cuckoo, 44\n\n Cundinamarca, plateau of, 298, 300, 301\n\n Cupidity, a cure for, 24\n\n Curupira, 126, 127\n\n Cush, 17\n\n Cushing, 323\n\n \u201cCustoms\u201d of Dahomey, 179\n\n Cuttlefish, men mistaken for, 27\n\n Cuvier, 36, 54, 140, 141, 142, 144, 350\n\n Cuzco, 314, 316, 332\n\n Cybele, 186\n\n Cyclopes, 253, 361\n\n Cyme, 153, 187\n\n Cynocephali, 105, 351, 367\n\n Cyrenaica, 212\n\n Cyrene, 78, 134\n\n Cyrne, 193\n\n Cyrus the Great, 169\n\n Czecho-Slovakia, 248\n\n\n D\n\n Da Gama, 242, 244\n\n Dahomey, 179-183\n\n Dahut, Princess, 256\n\n Dalay River, 138\n\n Damastes, 202\n\n Dampier, 77, 198, 245\n\n Dance macabre, 47\n\n Dancing negresses, 182\n\n Dandini, 25\n\n Daniel, Abbott, 358\n\n D\u2019Annunzio, 341\n\n Danube River, 153, 203\n\n Dard\u00e6, 63\n\n Darkness, legends as to, 220-221\n\n Darwin, Charles, 112, 316\n\n Darwin, Erasmus, 58\n\n David, 226\n\n Davy, 102\n\n De Acunha, Father, 163\n\n Dead Sea, 358\n\n Deadly upas tree, 20\n\n De Arguello, 316\n\n Death-watch, 44\n\n De Berreo, 305, 306, 308\n\n Deccan, 177\n\n De Chaves, 311\n\n Dee, River, 102\n\n Deer, 81, 127, 327, 374\n\n Deformed Folk, 352\n\n De Gamboa, 328\n\n De la Mare, 255\n\n De Leon, Diego Flores, 317\n\n De Leon, Ponce, 314, 315\n\n Delicious Isle, 253\n\n Delight-makers, 370\n\n _Delight of Those Who Seek to Wander Through the Regions of the\n World_, 362\n\n Delisle, 369\n\n Delos, 201\n\n Delphi, 201\n\n Deluded Folk, eight, 270\n\n Deluge, 87, 292, 297\n\n Delusive water, 312\n\n De Maillet, 89\n\n Demons, 376\n\n De Ortribia, 315\n\n De Proveda, 304\n\n Derbent, 237\n\n Derceto, 98, 186\n\n Descouret, 130\n\n _Description of Greece_, 353\n\n Desert, 2, 199, 209-215\n\n De Silva, 300, 304\n\n \u201cDestruction of Mankind,\u201d 86\n\n Deucalion, 292\n\n De Urreta, 15\n\n De Ursua, 304\n\n Devil, cult of in Florida, 4\n\n Devil-fish, 67\n\n Devil-mask of the Jurupary, 163\n\n De Weltheim, 64\n\n Diable Borteux, 126\n\n Diamond, 24, 87, 244\n\n Diana of the Ephesians, 186\n\n Diana in Autun, 215\n\n Dicuil, 8\n\n Digby, Sir Kenelm, 212\n\n Dinosaur, 82\n\n Diodorus Siculus, 25, 35, 43, 49, 77, 96, 153, 165, 185, 197, 198,\n 199, 202\n\n Dionysus, 122\n\n Disappearing Islands, 1, 256-257\n\n Disraeli, 359\n\n Ditter, island of, 251\n\n Dobayba, temple of, 76\n\n Dodona, oak of, 215\n\n Dog, 30, 49, 56, 64, 89, 293, 340;\n husbands, 29\n\n Dogfish, 87\n\n Dog-headed people, 105-107, 349, 351, 360, 367\n\n Dog-ribs, the, 106\n\n Dog Star, 14, 233\n\n Dolmen, 343\n\n Dolphin, 90-91, 103\n\n Dondun, 109\n\n Donnelly, Ignatius, 278, 294\n\n Don steppes, 156\n\n D\u2019Orbigny, 139\n\n Dordogne cave paintings, 376\n\n Dos Santos, 35, 73\n\n Doughty, 210\n\n Doul-Karnain, 236\n\n Dove, 47\n\n Dowarnenez, Bay of, 256\n\n Dragon, 2, 32, 45, 47, 53, 56, 58, 65, 66, 79-88, 98, 268, 331, 344,\n 360, 361, 367, 375\n\n Dragonfly, 217, 344\n\n Dragon-tyger, 67\n\n Dragon-wolf, 67\n\n Drake, 3, 245, 277, 306, 329\n\n Dravidians, 146\n\n Drawings, Primitive, 340\n\n Dread of thick foliage, 216\n\n Dream Quests of Spain, 312-333\n\n Dreams, 339, 372\n\n Dromedary, 361\n\n Druids, 257, 265, 296\n\n Drums, magic, 241\n\n Drunkards, 374\n\n Dryads, 216\n\n Du Chaillu, 142\n\n Duck, 30\n\n Duff Islands, 329\n\n Duirs, the, 129\n\n Dumb-barter, 15, 104\n\n Dunashki, 137\n\n Du Pin, Jean, 365\n\n Dutch East India Company, 245\n\n Dwarf-gods of Egypt and Ph\u0153nicia, 150\n\n Dwarfs, 268, 343, 363, 372\n\n Dyaks, the, 36\n\n\n E\n\n Eagle, 47, 56, 81, 374\n\n Eagle-stone, 24\n\n Earth, size and shape of, 5-13\n\n Earth-holders, 6, 30, 370\n\n East, 204-205\n\n East African islands, 96\n\n Easter Island, 255\n\n Eastern Roman Empire, 239, 265\n\n East Indies, 79, 328\n\n Ecbatana, 238\n\n Ecclesiastical suits against vermin, 31-32\n\n Echo, the, 339\n\n Eclipses, 30\n\n Ecuador, 13, 302\n\n Edam, 100\n\n Eden, 87, 257, 258, 357\n\n Eden, Richard, 241\n\n Edom, land of, 224, 226\n\n Eel, 43, 96;\n \u201ceel-mother,\u201d 96\n\n Eel-like men, 112\n\n Egede, Hans, 94\n\n Egypt, 2, 69, 85, 142, 143, 144, 169, 186, 204, 210, 230, 281, 286,\n 340, 351, 365\n\n Emmet valley, 63\n\n Elbe River, 248\n\n Elders, Animal, 65\n\n El Dorado, 161, 298-310, 348, 369\n\n Elephant, 32-34, 43, 46, 51, 57, 109, 284, 291, 343, 351, 361, 374;\n tower, 33\n\n Elephantine, 143\n\n Elephantophagi, 199\n\n Eleusinian mystery, 184\n\n El Gran Moxo, 312, 333\n\n El Gran Paititi, 312, 333\n\n Elixir of life, 88\n\n Elizabethan age, 305\n\n Elizabeth, Queen, 306, 307, 369\n\n Elm\u2019s refreshing shadow, 19\n\n El Turco, 324, 325, 326\n\n Elysium, 217, 220, 257-261, 262\n\n Emerald, 24, 318\n\n Emerson, 342\n\n Empedocles, 341\n\n Enchanted City of the C\u00e6sars, 312, 316-318\n\n Enchanted Islands, 327\n\n Enchantments, a defense against, 24\n\n Enciso, Bachelor, 330\n\n Encyclop\u00e6dia Britannica, 79, 144, 242\n\n Encyclop\u00e6dists, 350, 351, 356\n\n Engano, 158\n\n English Channel a ferry of souls, 266\n\n Englishmen, tailed, 128\n\n Enmities of birds, 44\n\n Enotocoitae, the, 109\n\n _Enquiries of Browne_, 350\n\n Ephesus, 153, 186, 187\n\n Epilepsy, treatment of, 24, 56\n\n Epiphany, 358\n\n Equatorial Current, 278\n\n Equestrian statues, Carthaginian, 271\n\n Eratosthenes, 10, 263\n\n Ericson, Thorwald, 113\n\n Eriphia, 20\n\n Error the guiding star of discovery, 371\n\n Erythr\u00e6, 63\n\n Erythr\u00e6an Sea, 353\n\n _Esdras_, books of, 11\n\n Eskimos, 4, 106, 108, 110, 112, 141, 145, 338, 369\n\n Essay-writing, a dragon diet for, 81\n\n Estevanico, 319, 320, 321, 323\n\n _Esther_, book of, 187\n\n Estland, 345\n\n Estotiland, 345\n\n Etearchus, 134, 135\n\n Ethnography, 291\n\n Ethiopia, 68, 104, 108, 113, 178, 193, 203, 235, 364, 365\n\n Etymology as source of myths, 344-347\n\n Eudoxus, 113\n\n Euphrates River, 7, 185, 358\n\n Euripides, 263\n\n Europe, 106, 202, 264\n\n Evangelists as beast-headed men, 339\n\n Evans, 47\n\n Eve, 84, 87, 112\n\n Evolution of divine beast-men, 338\n\n Evolution of the Dragon, 84\n\n Ewaipanoma, 110\n\n Expedition Island, 255\n\n _Ezekiel_, book of, 235, 236\n\n Ezion-geber, 224, 227\n\n\n F\n\n Fabric of Illusion, 334-347\n\n Fabulous winged creatures, 68-78\n\n Fa-hien, 360\n\n Fairies, 150;\n queen of, 359\n\n Falcon-fish, 67\n\n Falcon-man, 159\n\n Falconry, 133\n\n Familiars, 99\n\n Fang-chang, 82\n\n Farissol, Abraham, 17\n\n Faroes, the, 93\n\n Fatephur Sikri, 33\n\n Father John, bird called, 71\n\n Faun, 122, 361\n\n Fayal, 306\n\n Fear, myths of, 371\n\n Feast of Reason, 173\n\n Feast of the Valiant Women, 174\n\n Feathered men, 349\n\n Febrifuge, a, 24\n\n Federmann, 301, 303, 332\n\n Felfel Mountain, 206\n\n _Fen-shu_, 57\n\n Female Crusade, 172\n\n Female incense, 233\n\n Fertility emblems, 30\n\n Festus Avienus, 275\n\n Fezzan, 195\n\n Fiddlers\u2019 Green, 374\n\n Fiend fly, 344\n\n Fijis, 335\n\n Filipinos, 127\n\n Finland, 240, 335\n\n Finn-folk, 242\n\n Finnish magic songs, 241;\n riddles, 346\n\n First People, Indian, 28, 118, 119, 339, 342\n\n Fish, a polygamous, 43\n\n Fish-eating races, 196-198\n\n Flaccus, 351\n\n _Flame of Life_, 341\n\n Flavianus, 90\n\n Fleurieu, 369\n\n Flint people, 370\n\n Florida, 53, 102, 315, 319\n\n Flying Dutchman, 276\n\n Foersch, 20\n\n Folk of Tradition, 190-200\n\n _Fonte perenni_, 315\n\n Forest, beliefs as to, 215-217\n\n Formosa, 129\n\n Fortunate Isles, 257-261, 262, 354\n\n Fossils as source of myths, 295, 343, 344\n\n Fountain of the Sun, 18\n\n Fountain of Youth, 15, 312, 314-315, 365\n\n Fouqu\u00e9, 99\n\n Fox, 29, 47, 342, 374\n\n Fragrant Mountains, 7\n\n France, 249, 255\n\n France, Anatole, 342\n\n Frankincense, 231\n\n Franks, the, 266\n\n Frazer, 187, 346\n\n French Amazons, 172-174\n\n Friar-fish, 67\n\n Friars, begging, 338\n\n Friedemann, 139\n\n Friendly Islanders, 260\n\n Friendships of birds, 44\n\n Friesland, West, 100\n\n Frobisher, 52\n\n Frog, 30, 118\n\n Fu-lin, 61\n\n _Fung-wang_, 70\n\n Furies, the, 265\n\n\n G\n\n Gadarenes, country of the, 44\n\n Gaditanian Sea, 92\n\n Gains of Fable, 371-377\n\n Galen, 24\n\n Galvano, 129\n\n Gambia River, 263\n\n Gamblers, 374\n\n Gamphasantes, the, 199\n\n Ganges River, 7, 203, 267\n\n Garcias ab Horto, 53\n\n Garcilaso de la Vega, 212\n\n Gargoyles, 337\n\n Garnet, 24, 244\n\n Garuda, 134\n\n Gaul, 9, 90, 203, 265\n\n Geese, wild, 41-42\n\n G\u00e9l\u00e9l\u00e9, King, 179\n\n Gellius, 349\n\n _Genesis_, book of, 7, 22, 83, 224, 235, 282\n\n Genghis Khan, 237, 239\n\n Geographers, ancient, 350\n\n Geography of Scents, 230-231\n\n Gerini, 17, 129, 136, 269\n\n Germain, Louis, 289, 290, 291\n\n German Hydrographic Office, 278\n\n Germany, 83, 96, 97, 99, 156, 356, 374\n\n Gesner, 79\n\n Gessi, 275\n\n Get\u00e6, the, 3\n\n Ghauts, the, 149\n\n Ghosts, merriment of, 4\n\n Ghouls, 363;\n isle of, 251\n\n Giants, 190-193, 257, 268, 343, 361, 367, 368, 372;\n stone, 117, 119\n\n Gibbon, 240\n\n Gibraltar, 1;\n Straits of, 265, 267, 287, 288\n\n Gihon, 7\n\n Gila Canyon, 139\n\n Gilbert, 306\n\n Gilboa, Mount, 358\n\n Gilded Man, the, 298-310\n\n Gindanes, land of the, 227\n\n Ginger, 243\n\n Ginseng, 22, 23\n\n Giraldus Cambrensis, 217\n\n Glistening Heath, 79\n\n Glooskap, 91, 119\n\n Glow-worms, 245\n\n Gnomes, 150\n\n Gnu, 36\n\n Goat, 30, 43, 122, 235, 338, 374\n\n Gobi, Desert of, 2, 214, 360\n\n Goddess of Liberty, 173\n\n God-man, 188\n\n God\u2019s land of the Celts, 217\n\n Gog and Magog, 1, 9, 207, 235-238, 362\n\n Gold, 229, 244, 284, 327;\n origin of use as money, 87;\n Spanish quest of, 298-333\n\n Gold Coast, 272\n\n Golden Age, 208, 287, 336\n\n Golden Apalache, 319\n\n _Golden Bough_, 187\n\n Golden Chain, adventure of, 332\n\n Golden Chersonese, 12, 224, 230\n\n Golden Fleece, 372\n\n Golden Surface, the, 377\n\n Goliath, 192\n\n Good intentions, 373\n\n Goodwin Sands, 255\n\n Goose, 30\n\n Gonges, Olympede, 173\n\n Gorgons, 153, 212, 213\n\n Gorilla, 123\n\n Goths, 169\n\n Gould, Baring, 98, 130\n\n Gould, Charles, 54, 82\n\n Gradlon, King, 256\n\n Grand Lama of Tibet, 187\n\n Grapes, 284\n\n Grasshoppers, 38, 348\n\n Grasshopper-eaters, 198\n\n \u201cGrasshopper warriors,\u201d 144\n\n Gravelly Sea, 211\n\n \u201cGreat China,\u201d 359\n\n Great Han Country, 360\n\n Great Mother, 186, 188\n\n Great Saracen Land, 268\n\n Great Syrtis, 194\n\n Great toe, peculiar formation of, 199\n\n Great Year, 70\n\n Greece, 90, 100, 246, 247, 262, 352\n\n Greenland, 94, 106, 133, 290\n\n Green Sea of Gloom, 1, 269\n\n Grenada, island of, 245\n\n Gribble, 80\n\n Griffin, 2, 55-56, 63, 64, 66, 67, 152, 253, 337, 350, 361, 367, 375\n\n Grimm Brothers, 22, 193, 369\n\n Guacaris, the, 163\n\n Guadeloupe, 160\n\n Guatemala, 118, 127, 293\n\n Guatavita, Lake, 298, 299\n\n Guaviare River, 302, 304\n\n Guiana, 3, 110, 163, 292, 309, 310, 311, 346\n\n Guillim, 52, 66\n\n Gulf of California, 320, 321\n\n Gulf of Mexico, 315, 319\n\n Gulf of Oraba, 331\n\n Gulf of Paria, 13\n\n Gulf Stream, 278\n\n Gulfweed, 280\n\n Gumberoo, 66\n\n Gum camphor, 20\n\n Gum-tree country, 260\n\n Gunhild, 241\n\n Gwenland, 160\n\n Gwyn ab Nudd, 368\n\n Gymnet\u00e6, the, 193\n\n Gypsies, 222, 248, 249\n\n\n H\n\n Hacus, 320\n\n Hadam, Eldad, 17\n\n Hahua-chumpi, island of, 327\n\n Haida, 6\n\n \u201cHairy ones,\u201d 122\n\n Haiti, 260\n\n Hakluyt, 3, 20, 34, 37, 101, 251, 307, 369\n\n Halcyon, 43\n\n Half-men, 111-112\n\n Halls of the Giants, 359\n\n Hamam Meskouteen, 212\n\n Haman, 187\n\n Hand of Satan, 272\n\n Hanno, 123, 263\n\n Hannum, 187\n\n Hanuman, 124, 338\n\n Hanyson, 220\n\n Happy hunting grounds, 217\n\n Harald Hardrada, 268\n\n Hardouin, 70\n\n Hare, 81, 374\n\n Harem of a queen, 179\n\n Harpies, 2, 66, 75-77, 375\n\n Hart, 47\n\n Hathor, 85, 87\n\n Hatusapur, 156\n\n Havaika, 260\n\n Hav-fruen, 101\n\n Havilah, 1, 7, 9, 223, 224, 225, 226\n\n Hav-manden, 101\n\n Hawk, 78, 338\n\n Hawkins, 52, 252\n\n Hawks, Henry, 322\n\n Hayton, King, 106\n\n Headless People, 109, 346, 349, 368, 372\n\n Hebrew the natural speech, 357\n\n Hecat\u00e6us, 202\n\n Hedgehog, 47\n\n Hedin, 208, 214\n\n Hedjaz, 138\n\n Hegesias, 349\n\n Heifer, 28\n\n _Heimskringla_, 267\n\n Heine, 314\n\n Helicon, Island of, 251\n\n Heliogabalus, 69\n\n Heliolithic culture, 373\n\n Heliopolis, 69, 70\n\n Hellebore, 204\n\n Hellespont, 352\n\n Hell-way, 204\n\n Helyon, 52\n\n Hen, 27, 245, 293, 366\n\n Henry VII, 99\n\n Henry the Navigator, Prince, 199, 225, 270, 271, 367\n\n Heraldry, 2, 66-67\n\n Herbenstein, 102\n\n Hercules, 38, 77, 132, 152, 153, 202, 205\n\n Hercynian birds, 356\n\n Herkhuf, 143\n\n Hermes, 96, 246\n\n Hermits, beasts of, 45\n\n Herodotus, characterized, 352;\n cited, 14, 26, 55, 62, 63, 71, 72, 77, 104, 107, 123, 132, 134,\n 151, 154, 155, 193, 194, 195, 196, 202, 207, 228, 230, 231,\n 233, 234, 335, 349, 350, 353, 354, 361\n\n Heroes of beast epics, 29\n\n Heron, 70\n\n Herrera, 191\n\n Hesiod, 75, 202, 263, 287\n\n Hesperides, the, 345\n\n Hibernating Samoyeds, 116-117\n\n Hiddekel, 7\n\n Hierro, island of, 20\n\n _Hill and Sea Classic_, 136\n\n Hill of Little Devils, 208\n\n Himalayas, the, 135, 149, 336, 343\n\n Himantopodes, the, 114\n\n Himilco, 263, 274\n\n Himyarites, the, 226\n\n Hionen Thsang, 157, 219, 360, 361\n\n Hippocampus, 67\n\n Hippo Diarrhytus, 90\n\n Hippogrif, 56\n\n Hippogypi, the, 103\n\n Hippolyte, 153\n\n Hippopotamus, 34-35, 338\n\n Hiram of Tyre, 223\n\n _History of the Indies_, 369\n\n Hittites, 185-187\n\n Ho-lao-lo-kia, vanished city of, 214\n\n Holland, 245\n\n Holme, 66\n\n Holstein coast, 254\n\n Holy Roman Empire, 99, 220, 248\n\n Homer, 5, 7, 22, 132, 133, 140, 141, 199, 202, 227, 252, 287, 349,\n 352, 354, 363\n\n Homocane, 67\n\n Homunculus, 22\n\n Hopi towns, 323\n\n Horizon Lands, 201-222\n\n Horned hogs, 245\n\n Horned men, 361\n\n Horneman, 130\n\n Horse, 30, 51, 56, 122, 156, 157, 324\n\n H\u00f6rselberg, 219\n\n Horus, 86\n\n Hospitality, proverb on, 335\n\n Hottentots, 131, 146, 225, 227;\n \u201cclick\u201d of, 105\n\n House of Song, 377\n\n Houses of the Sun, 161, 332\n\n Huallaga River, 333\n\n Huanacos, 316\n\n Huc, 115, 349\n\n Hudson Bay Company, 221\n\n Hugag, 66\n\n Hugo, Victor, 249, 337\n\n Huguenots, 306\n\n Humboldt, characterized, 369;\n cited, 26, 42, 126, 165, 166, 207, 271, 278, 288, 311\n\n Humming bird, 30, 370\n\n Hungarian Plain, 156\n\n Huns, 154, 239\n\n Hurakan, 293\n\n Hyderabad, 177\n\n Hydra, 66\n\n Hyena, 35-36, 361\n\n Hyparkhos River, 105\n\n Hyperboreans, 201-203, 261\n\n\n I\n\n Ibanez, 169\n\n Iberia, 203, 286\n\n Ibis, 43, 71\n\n Ibn Batuta, 42, 95, 106, 196, 243, 269, 362\n\n Ibn Haukal, 362\n\n Ibn Khaldun, 269\n\n Ibn Khordadbeh, 137, 206, 362, 363\n\n Iceland, 101, 289, 345\n\n Ichthyophagi, 196-198\n\n Ideal lands, 2, 257-261, 336-337, 351\n\n Ideal states, 251\n\n Idrisi, 8, 137, 270\n\n Ignatius, 81\n\n Iguanodon, 81\n\n Iliad, 81, 133, 152, 363\n\n Illampu, peak of, 207\n\n Imaus, Mount, 114\n\n Immaculate Conception, 42\n\n _Imrama_, 258, 367\n\n Im Thurn, 207\n\n Incas, fugitive, 305, 333\n\n Incense Country, the, 1, 229-235;\n Route, 233;\n battles, 230\n\n Incontinency, how discovered, 24\n\n India, 9, 55, 57, 64, 85, 104, 105, 106, 109, 113, 122, 124, 128,\n 133, 136, 141, 148, 188, 193, 203, 216, 219, 230, 261, 269,\n 351, 353, 359, 361, 364, 365\n\n Indian Archipelago, 364\n\n Indian Ocean, 1, 89, 91, 93, 196, 226, 231, 255, 263, 363, 365\n\n _Indika_, 349, 353\n\n Indo-China, 106, 136, 267\n\n Indonesia, 135\n\n Indus River, 7, 224\n\n Inis Fit\u00e6, 255\n\n Inishbofin, 257\n\n Insanity, a cure for, 24\n\n Institute of Oceanography, 288\n\n _Insula de ben faminill_, 160\n\n _Insula mulierum_, 160\n\n _Insula virorum_, 160\n\n Insurrection of Women, 172\n\n Intoxication, a preventive of, 24\n\n Io, 28\n\n Iran, 214, 337, 377\n\n Ireland, 95, 99, 254\n\n Irijo River, 165\n\n Irish sea epics, 65, 252-253, 258, 367\n\n Iron city, 157\n\n Iroquois, 119, 343\n\n Irving, 26\n\n Is, sunken city of, 255-256\n\n _Isaiah_, book of, 30, 77, 122\n\n Isidore, characterized, 356-357;\n cited, 121, 350, 351, 356\n\n Iskander\u2019s wall, 237\n\n _Isla de beimeni parte_, 315\n\n _Isla de Mugeres_, 160\n\n Islam, 171, 233, 269, 270\n\n Island of Death, 261\n\n Island of Females, 158\n\n Island of Life, 261\n\n Island of Males, 158\n\n Island of the Seven Cities, or of the Seven Bishops, 252, 259, 271,\n 319, 375\n\n Islands, number of, 8\n\n Islands of Enchantment, 251-261\n\n Islands of the Sun, 271\n\n Islas Encantadas, 327\n\n Isle of the Blessed, 91\n\n Isle of the Double Towers, 253\n\n Isle of Finn, 253\n\n Isle of Fire, 252\n\n Isle of Flowers, 252\n\n Isle of Gems, 158\n\n Isle of Laughter, 253\n\n Isle of a Saint, 253\n\n Isle of Sheep, 253\n\n Isle of Shouting, 252\n\n Isle of witches, 253\n\n Isogonus, 193, 349\n\n Israel, 207, 226\n\n Issedones, the, 107, 196\n\n Istakhri, 60\n\n Ister, the, 26\n\n Istria, 249\n\n Italy, 9, 129\n\n Itys, 28\n\n Ivan the Terrible, 241\n\n Ivory, 57, 364\n\n Ivory, apes and peacocks, 224\n\n Ivory Coast, 179\n\n\n J\n\n Jacinth, 244\n\n Jackal, 29, 338, 351\n\n Jade, 23-24, 87, 162, 164;\n Gate, 24\n\n Jaguar god, 338\n\n Jaitwas, 124\n\n Janaidar, 208\n\n Japan, 12, 97, 148, 259, 363, 364, 371\n\n Jasconius, 91\n\n Jason, 75\n\n Jasper, 24\n\n Java, 106, 158, 230, 242, 244, 260\n\n Jehovah, 125, 236\n\n Jenkinson, Anthony, 212\n\n Jerba, 229\n\n Jerusalem, 125, 238, 267, 282, 328, 357;\n center of the earth, 7\n\n Jesuits, 102, 317\n\n Jet, 351\n\n Jews, 47, 185, 244, 357, 358;\n legendary kingdoms of, 18, 238;\n with tails, 345;\n black pygmy, 138\n\n Jew\u2019s-harps, 110\n\n Jinga, Queen, 179\n\n Joan of Arc, 169;\n and bottle imp, 23\n\n Job, 46;\n his dunghill, 358\n\n _Job_, book of, 223\n\n John of Herse, 52\n\n Johnson, Doctor, 50\n\n Johnston, Sir Harry, 126, 150, 343\n\n Joliet, 80\n\n Joppa, 366\n\n Jordan, River, 315, 358\n\n Jordanus, 104\n\n Josephus, 7, 17, 22, 71\n\n Judas on his rock, 253\n\n Judy, the, 100\n\n Jujube, 229\n\n Julian, Emperor, 22\n\n Julius C\u00e6sar, 236, 246, 265\n\n Juno, temple of, 123\n\n Jupiter Ammon, oasis of, 18\n\n Juruena River, 124\n\n \u201cJust\u201d peoples, 203\n\n Justin, 165\n\n\n K\n\n Kabyles, the, 206\n\n Kadesh, 186\n\n Kaidu, 170\n\n Kali, 338\n\n Kalm, 40\n\n Kanakas, the, 260\n\n Kangaroo, 341\n\n Kansas, 326\n\n Karabel, Pass of, 186\n\n Kara-Khitai, the, 113\n\n Karaya myth, 292\n\n Karelian, 149\n\n Kasil, island of, 206\n\n Kaska tribesmen, 343\n\n _Kataphugia_, 195\n\n Kathkuri, 124\n\n Kazwini, 60, 104, 114\n\n Keane, 199, 226\n\n Kent, 128\n\n Kerensky, 175\n\n Kerner, Justinus, 25\n\n Kibu, island of, 260\n\n _Ki-lin_, 54\n\n Kilsapheen, Lost, 256\n\n Kine of Cibola, 318\n\n King of Faerie, 368\n\n Kingdom of Dogs, 107\n\n Kingdom of Women, 349, 360, 361\n\n Kingsley, 45\n\n Kinship with animals, 374-375\n\n Kirata, the, 134, 136\n\n Kirghiz, the, 208\n\n Klebermeer, 16\n\n Kobolds, 150\n\n Kohistan, 211\n\n Koliwan, Lake, 117\n\n Kollman, 148, 150\n\n Komana, 186\n\n Koran, 235, 236, 269\n\n Kordofan, 54\n\n Korean tradition of inhabited lands, 8\n\n Kors Trold, 92\n\n Korwars, the, 200\n\n Kraken, 2, 92-93\n\n Krokottas, 35\n\n Kr\u00fcmmel, 278\n\n Kublai Khan, 12, 73, 364, 365\n\n Kukulcan, 292\n\n Kurdistan, 171, 240\n\n Kwan-lun hill, 81\n\n Kyffh\u00e4user Berg, 220\n\n\n L\n\n _Lachryma Crocodili_, 37\n\n La Condamine, 164, 165, 166\n\n Lactantius, 10, 362\n\n Ladanum, 231, 234\n\n Ladrones, the, 158\n\n Lafitan, P\u00e8re, 121\n\n La Gran Quivera, 326\n\n Laguna, 323\n\n Lahore, 177\n\n La Maillard, 173\n\n Lamary, land of, 124\n\n Lamb of Revelation, 59\n\n Lamberti, 171\n\n Lambri, 128\n\n Lamias, 361\n\n Lamprey, 44\n\n Lampridius, 55\n\n Lamya, 67\n\n Land of Darkness, 221\n\n Land of Fair Women, 259\n\n Land of Ghosts, 143\n\n Land of Job, 366\n\n Lands of Legend, 223-250\n\n Land of Marked Bodies, 360\n\n Land of the Living, 259\n\n Land of Promise, 253, 259\n\n Land of Truth, 259\n\n Lane, 159\n\n Lang, 357\n\n Lanuvium, 81\n\n Laos, 136\n\n Lapis lazuli, 24\n\n Lapland, 101, 141, 145, 147, 149, 272, 343\n\n Laputa, 373\n\n Large-eared men, 2\n\n Las Casas, 369\n\n Las Jurdes, 147\n\n Lassen, 25\n\n Last of the Incas, 314\n\n Latin mind, 354\n\n Laufer, Berthold, 59\n\n Laurel-tree and lightning, 19\n\n La Vieja Islands, 315\n\n Lecherers, 374\n\n Leems, Knud, 101\n\n Legion\u2019s winter camp, 30\n\n Leigh, 78\n\n Leland, 118, 149, 370\n\n Le Maire, 191\n\n Lemuria, 1, 296\n\n Lenin, 177\n\n Leopard, 49, 65\n\n Le Plongeon, 291\n\n Leptus, 213\n\n Lesiy, the, 127\n\n _Les Merveilleuses_, 173\n\n Lestai, the, 195\n\n Lethe, fountain of, 18\n\n Leuke, isle of, 153\n\n Leviathan, 91\n\n Levine, 174\n\n Lewis and Clark expedition, 372\n\n Lhasa, 188\n\n Library of Congress, 358\n\n Libussa, 171\n\n Libya, 2, 134, 135, 153, 235, 281, 283, 365\n\n Li\u00e8ge, 365, 367\n\n Lilliput, 373\n\n Limbo of the Moon, 373\n\n Limpopo River, 225, 226\n\n Linn\u00e6us, 43\n\n Lion, 43, 44, 45, 47, 49, 51, 55, 58, 65, 66, 338, 361, 374\n\n Lipo district, 128\n\n Lisbon earthquake, 296\n\n Lisbon Wanderers, 270\n\n Little Black Men, 145\n\n Livonians, 3, 365\n\n Lizard, 82, 118, 341, 370\n\n Lizard-Man, 339\n\n Llama, 302, 305, 327, 374\n\n Lliuga, Princess, 178\n\n Lobo, 38, 54\n\n Locris, 38\n\n Locusts, 44, 65\n\n Lodestone, Mountain of, 16-17, 276\n\n Lofoden, 93\n\n Logic, Indian, 330\n\n Lok, John, 32, 104, 199\n\n _London Graphic_, 142\n\n Long, 146\n\n Loon, 370\n\n Lop, desert of, 210, 365\n\n Lopez, 179\n\n Lord of the Hollow Tree, 292\n\n Lord of the Two Horns, 236\n\n Lords of the Field, 61\n\n Lotophagi, 199, 227, 229\n\n Lot\u2019s wife, 358\n\n Lotus-land, 227-229\n\n Louhiatar, 241\n\n Louisiana, 319\n\n Lucan, 81\n\n Lucayos, the, 315\n\n Lucca, Gaudentio di, 211\n\n Lucerne, 80, 190, 209\n\n Lucian characterized, 354;\n cited, 103, 252, 258, 275\n\n Lucknow, 177\n\n Lucky-stone in toad\u2019s head, 44\n\n Ludolf, 37\n\n Lumberjack legends, 65-66\n\n Lusignan, house of, 99\n\n Lusitania, 50, 263\n\n Lust, ritual, 187\n\n Luxembourg family, 99\n\n Lydia, 186\n\n Lynn, vessels from, 269\n\n Lyonesse, 255\n\n Lyon-poisson, 66\n\n\n M\n\n Macassar poison, 20\n\n Macatoa, 303\n\n McCrindle, 64\n\n Mace, 244\n\n Macrobians, the, 193\n\n MacGregor, 214\n\n Madagascar, 73, 74, 106, 138, 159, 225, 227, 364\n\n Madanino, 160\n\n Madeira Islands, 252, 258, 287, 288\n\n M\u00e6ldune, 89\n\n Maelstrom, 93\n\n Magellan, 138, 191, 242, 270\n\n Magh Mell, 259\n\n Magic dances as sources of the races of fable, 339\n\n Magic Food, 259\n\n _Mahabharata_, 156\n\n Maid Marian, 345\n\n Maidu Indians, 127\n\n Maimonides, 238\n\n Majorca, 174\n\n Malabar, 112, 125, 233, 243\n\n Malacca, 149, 159\n\n Malatu, Sea of, 158\n\n Malays, 9, 57, 129, 145, 244\n\n Malay Peninsula, 124, 145, 147, 149, 199, 224, 260, 269\n\n Maldive Islands, 95\n\n Male incense, 233\n\n Male infants, killing of, 178\n\n Malory, 64\n\n Mambuti, 144\n\n Mammoths, frozen, 344\n\n Mamore River, 139\n\n Manannan, 89\n\n Manatee, 102\n\n Manco Capac, 314\n\n Mancy, 365\n\n Mandrake myth, 21-23, 87\n\n Mangi, 130\n\n Mangou, 130\n\n Manhattan Island, 304\n\n Manikins, 122, 342\n\n Manioc, 291\n\n Manlius, 69\n\n Manoa, 300, 305, 307, 310, 311\n\n Man of the Mountain, 61, 62\n\n Manticora, 57\n\n Maps, medi\u00e6val, 11\n\n Mara River, 52\n\n Maranon River, 333\n\n Marata, 320, 323\n\n Marcasite, 309\n\n Marcellus, 286\n\n Marco Milioni, 151, 364\n\n Marcos, Friar, 318, 320, 321, 322, 323\n\n Mare, 50, 221, 346\n\n Mareb, 125\n\n Mar Eldorado, 311\n\n Marignolli, 8, 244\n\n Marining animals, 67\n\n Market of the Sea, 89\n\n Markets, Night, 200\n\n Marquesans, the, 260\n\n Marquette, 80\n\n Marseilles, 216\n\n Martikhora, 57-58\n\n Martinez, 305\n\n Martlet, 66\n\n Martyr, Peter, 331, 368\n\n _Marvellous Adventures of Sir John Maundeville_, 363\n\n Mascardi, 317\n\n Masefield, 365\n\n Mashona region, 225\n\n Massaget\u00e6, the, 169\n\n Massoudy, 269, 362\n\n Masu, Mountains of, 260\n\n Matabele region, 225\n\n Mather, Increase, 190\n\n Matriarchate, 185\n\n Matrimonio, island of, 161\n\n Ma Tuan-Len, 128\n\n Maundeville, characterized, 365-367;\n cited, 19, 25, 55, 58, 61, 63, 68, 104, 108, 109, 110, 113, 114,\n 115, 119, 124, 130, 133, 138, 151, 159, 191, 211, 220, 237,\n 251, 258, 259, 276, 350, 363, 364\n\n Mauretania, 275\n\n Mayas, the, 292, 293, 294\n\n May Day, 187, 188\n\n Mead, 259\n\n _Meadows of Gold and Mines of Precious Stones_, 362\n\n Mecca, 138, 233\n\n Medi\u00e6val Trade, 243\n\n Medicine bag, 30\n\n Medicine men, 321\n\n Medina, 233\n\n Mediterranean Sea, 89, 90, 93, 199, 227, 251, 263, 267, 281, 282,\n 290, 296, 356, 369\n\n Megasthenes, 108, 109, 114, 133, 184\n\n Mergui archipelago, 158\n\n Megon, plain of, 221\n\n Meir, Rabbi, 621\n\n Mekong River, 136\n\n Mekran, 196\n\n Melanesia, 148\n\n Melons, 283\n\n Melusina, 99\n\n Memphis, 143\n\n Mendana, 328, 329\n\n Menendez, 318\n\n _Mercurius Politicus_, 212\n\n Merfolk, 89, 98-102, 257\n\n Mericourt, Theroigne de, 172, 173\n\n Merles, 361\n\n Mermaids, 2, 66\n\n Merodach, 187\n\n Merolla, 101, 105\n\n Meropis, island of, 286\n\n _Merveilles de L\u2019Inde_, 128\n\n Mesa Encantada, 323\n\n Mesha, 223, 225, 226\n\n Mesopotamia, 169\n\n Meta-collinarum, 361\n\n _Metamorphoses_, 125, 342\n\n Metamorphosis, 28\n\n Meta River, 305\n\n Mewan Indians, 74, 118\n\n Mexico, 83, 160, 188, 291, 360;\n calendar of, 292\n\n Mezzoramia, 211\n\n Miami River, 102\n\n Miaotze, 128\n\n Micmacs, the, 118\n\n Middle Comedy, 247\n\n Midgard serpent, 83\n\n Midian country, 224\n\n Midsummer Eve, 187\n\n Miletus, 152\n\n Miltiades, 171\n\n Milton, 345\n\n Min\u00e6ans, the, 226, 233\n\n Mincoupies, 148\n\n Mindanao Island, 242\n\n Mingrelia, 171\n\n Ming tombs, 54\n\n Mink, 342\n\n Minocane, 67\n\n Minotaur, 152\n\n Mirabeau, 172\n\n Mirabilia, 349\n\n Mirage, 199, 210\n\n Misers, 374\n\n Mississippi River, 326\n\n Missouri, 326\n\n Mistletoe, 19-20, 216\n\n Mnemosyne, fountain of, 18\n\n Mock king, 85, 188\n\n Mole, 374\n\n Molucca Islands, 1, 206, 242-245, 316\n\n Moly, 20\n\n Monaco, Prince of, 280\n\n Mongolia, 113, 222, 236, 237, 239, 269, 377\n\n Monoceros, 51\n\n Monocoli, the, 113\n\n Monomatti, the, 107\n\n Monomotapa, 179\n\n Montaigne, 341\n\n Montana, 139\n\n Montanes, 327\n\n Montegre, 57\n\n Montserrat, island of, 160\n\n Montygre, 66\n\n Moon goddess, 98\n\n Moon, voyage to, 354\n\n Moorish warrior queen, 178\n\n Mordecai, 187\n\n More, 373\n\n Morea, the, 2, 247\n\n Morgan le Fay, 256\n\n Mormons, 359\n\n Morocco, 140, 290\n\n Morris, 75\n\n Moscha, 225, 226\n\n Moses and an Ethiopian princess, 71\n\n Moslems, 138, 140, 238, 271\n\n Mount of Eden, 8\n\n Mount Ida, 25\n\n Mount Sion, 62\n\n Mountains, beliefs relating to, 205-209;\n lights on, 2, 206, 207\n\n Mountains of the Moon, 207\n\n Mouse-Apollo, 30\n\n Moving Isle, 253\n\n M\u00fcller, Max, 205, 346\n\n M\u00fcller, von, 54\n\n Mummification, 87, 373\n\n Munchausen, 354\n\n Munster, a lake in, 261\n\n Munza, King, 144\n\n Murder, ritual, 158\n\n Murger, 250\n\n Muscovites, 58\n\n Musk, 230, 234\n\n Mustaghata, Mount, 208\n\n Myrina, 153, 187\n\n Myrrh, 231\n\n _Mythical Monsters_, 82\n\n Myths of observation, 343-344\n\n Muysca Indians, 299\n\n\n N\n\n Nabatheans, 233\n\n Nagas, 112, 217\n\n Nahuatl ark legend, 292\n\n Nahuelhuapi, Lake, 312, 316, 317\n\n Nairs, the, 125\n\n Nanling Mountains, 128\n\n Narwhal, 51, 53\n\n Nasamonian youths, 134\n\n Natural histories, 350\n\n _Natural History of Norway_, 92, 93\n\n _Natural History, Pliny\u2019s_, 354-355\n\n Nature a pageant for man, 376\n\n Nausicaa, 99\n\n Navahos, 83, 95, 164, 204, 208, 217, 323, 376\n\n Navel of the World, 279\n\n Nearchus, 63, 91, 196\n\n Nebraska, 326\n\n Necho, 263\n\n Necromancers, 218\n\n Negrillos, 145\n\n Negritos, 145\n\n Negritos del Monte, 145\n\n Negro Indians, 291\n\n Negroland, 179\n\n Negro, Rio, 161\n\n Nekhbet, 75\n\n Nephrite, 24\n\n Nereids, 90, 197\n\n Nergal, 55\n\n Nero, 169, 230, 275\n\n Nesnas, 111\n\n Nestorians, 239-240, 361\n\n Nestorius, 240\n\n New Calabar, 98\n\n New Granada, 300, 301, 304\n\n New Guinea, 106, 145, 147, 148, 242, 328\n\n New Hebrides Islands, 329\n\n New Mexico, 62, 139\n\n New Towns, 144\n\n New York, 256\n\n Niam-Niams, the, 130\n\n Nicander, 39\n\n Nicobar Islands, 17, 106\n\n Niebuhr, 156, 198\n\n Niger, 135\n\n Nightingale, 28\n\n Nile River, 85, 86, 87, 132, 135, 148, 195, 207, 275\n\n Nina-chumpi, island of, 327\n\n Ninth wave, 14\n\n Nixie, 99\n\n Njogel, 97\n\n Noah, 292\n\n Nomad spirit, the, 372\n\n Nonius Marcellus, 351\n\n Nordland, 93\n\n North, 204\n\n North Atlantic continent, 290\n\n North Atlantic, floating storehouse of, 278\n\n North Brother Island, 167\n\n North Carolina, 306\n\n Northmen, 267-268, 335\n\n North Pole, 268\n\n North Sea, 94\n\n North wind, 56, 201, 202\n\n Northern Lights, 4\n\n Norva Sound, 267\n\n Norway, 240\n\n Nosala, island of, 197\n\n Noseless nations, 108\n\n Notaries on shipboard, 369\n\n Nova Zembla, 101\n\n Novgorod manuscript, 115, 116, 117\n\n Nubian Highway, 144\n\n Nulo Mountain, 114\n\n Numantranus, 9\n\n Number of peoples, provinces, rivers, and towns, 8\n\n Numidia, 212\n\n Nutmegs, 243, 245\n\n Nys\u00e6an shore, 203\n\n\n O\n\n Obongos, the, 142\n\n O Brasile, 256, 375\n\n O\u2019Brien, Frederick, 260\n\n Oceania, 145\n\n Ocean Stream, 8, 11, 203, 207, 262\n\n Odoric, 58, 61, 96, 137, 243, 365, 366, 367\n\n Odyssey, 81, 228, 252, 352, 363, 366\n\n Ogier the Dane, 16\n\n Ogre, 343\n\n Ojibwas, the, 106\n\n Olaus Magnus, 92, 93\n\n Old Man of the Sea, 102, 363\n\n Old Man of the Woods, 216\n\n Old men\u2019s tales, 336\n\n Old Woman Islands, 315\n\n Oleacinid\u00e6, 290\n\n Olisipo, 50, 90\n\n Olive, 19, 202\n\n Olympus, 7, 376\n\n Omaguas, the, 300, 302, 303\n\n Onesicritus, 191, 349\n\n Onoscileas, the, 103\n\n Ophiophagi, the, 199\n\n Ophir, 1, 223-227\n\n Opinicus, 66\n\n Oraisan, 259\n\n Oranges, 284\n\n Orang-utan, 363\n\n Orc, 2, 95\n\n Orellana, 151, 161, 163, 167\n\n Orgy of death, Amazon, 183\n\n Orichalcum, 284\n\n Orinoco, River, 110, 258, 304, 305, 308, 311, 312, 332\n\n Orkney Islands, 241\n\n Orlando, 95\n\n Ormuz, 25\n\n Orontes River, 186\n\n Ors\u00e6an Indians, 51\n\n Ory, 51, 55, 374\n\n Osiris, 85, 86, 338\n\n Osorno, 318\n\n Ostrich, 43, 50, 114\n\n Othman, 237\n\n Otter-men, 117\n\n Otto of Freisingen, 238\n\n Ottokar, 249\n\n Ottoman empire, 185\n\n Otway, 256\n\n Ovid, 121, 125, 342\n\n Oviedo, 277, 369\n\n Owl, 47, 237\n\n Ox, 47, 58, 361;\n burrowing, 57\n\n Oxus River, 7\n\n Oysters, government of, 42\n\n\n P\n\n Pacific Ocean, 260, 296;\n lost continent in, 255;\n island traditions of, 327, 328\n\n Padua, 96\n\n Pajarito plateau, 62\n\n Palenque, 292\n\n Paleolithic artists, 340\n\n Palestine, 353\n\n Palomides, 65\n\n Palos, 242\n\n Palus M\u0153otis, 154\n\n Pamirs, the, 208\n\n Pamphagi, 199\n\n Pan, 2, 122, 127, 215, 216, 246\n\n Panama, 304, 338\n\n Panama-Pacific Exposition, 284\n\n Panathen\u00e6a, 286\n\n Pandavas, 146\n\n Pandore, 109\n\n Panther, 42, 47\n\n Paracelsus, 6\n\n Parade, negro Amazon, 182-183\n\n Paradise and pearls and pepper, 362\n\n Paraguay, 299, 300\n\n Paraguay River, 139, 312, 313\n\n Paranunta, Rani, 156\n\n Pard, 49\n\n Parik, 100\n\n Paris, 250\n\n Paris, Island of, 251\n\n Parroquet, 89\n\n Parrot, 338, 374\n\n Partridge, 47\n\n Pasto, 301\n\n Pastoral song, 246\n\n Patagonia, 316\n\n Pathen, 366\n\n Paula, 358\n\n Pausanias, characterized, 353-354;\n cited, 77, 129\n\n Peacock, 44, 60\n\n Peanuts, 291\n\n Pear, earth shaped like, 12\n\n Pearl, 87, 98, 351, 364\n\n Peary, 255\n\n Pedrarias, 331\n\n Pegasus, 66, 68, 152\n\n Pegu, 34\n\n Pelican, 44, 350, 375\n\n Pellinore, 64-65\n\n Peloponnesus, 246\n\n Peltry, Siberian, 221\n\n _Penguin Island_, 342\n\n Penang, island of, 245\n\n Peoples of Prodigy, 2, 103-120, 351\n\n Pepper, 363;\n Pepper Country, 366;\n Pepper \u201cforests,\u201d 243;\n pepper wars, 244\n\n Pepy II, Letter of, 143\n\n Perforated people, 349\n\n Periplus of Erythr\u00e6an Sea, 266\n\n Perotti, 40\n\n Persia, 63, 82, 111, 230, 235, 240, 287, 352, 365\n\n Persian Gulf, 59, 91, 290\n\n _Persica_, 63\n\n Peru, 139, 285, 299, 300, 304, 309, 316, 327, 328, 333\n\n Petachia, Rabbi Moses, 358\n\n Peter Martyr, 314, 315\n\n Petra, 231, 233\n\n Petrified cities, 211-213\n\n Petrifying river, 261\n\n Petrograd snipers, 176\n\n Ph\u00e6drus, 286\n\n Ph\u00e6acia, 99\n\n Pharaoh\u2019s Red Sea hosts, 102\n\n Pheasant, 28, 78\n\n Philes, 350\n\n Philippines, 111, 138, 145\n\n Philology, 291\n\n Philomela, 28\n\n Phineus, King, 75\n\n Phlegethon, 262\n\n Ph\u0153nicians, 98, 226, 263, 264, 295\n\n Ph\u0153nix, 2, 60, 68-70, 71, 350, 361, 375\n\n Phong, the, 136\n\n Photios, 349\n\n Phrygian cap, 186\n\n _Physiologus_, 46, 91\n\n Piasa petroglyph, 81\n\n Piedras hijades, 162\n\n Pigafetta, 138, 191\n\n Pigeon, 44\n\n Pig of the ocean, 67\n\n _Pih T\u2019an_, 89\n\n Pike, 97\n\n Pilate, Swiss legend of, 209\n\n Pilatus, Mount, 209\n\n Pillar of salt, 358\n\n Pillars of Hercules, 129, 203, 264, 274, 281\n\n Pima deluge myth, 342\n\n Pindar, 202, 263, 339, 352\n\n Pinkerton, 4, 102\n\n Pinna, 59, 61\n\n Pippilika, 64\n\n Pison, 7\n\n Pizzani, 271\n\n Pizarro, the brothers, 161, 299, 301, 302\n\n Plague, a remedy for, 24\n\n Plato, 15, 266, 274, 281, 282, 283, 285, 286, 287, 293, 295\n\n Platypus, 341\n\n Pliny, characterized, 354-355;\n cited, 10, 16, 17, 18, 19, 26, 27, 32, 34, 35, 37, 39, 43, 49, 50,\n 51, 53, 55, 68, 72, 78, 90, 91, 92, 96, 97, 104, 108, 109,\n 111, 113, 114, 115, 128, 133, 135, 141, 193, 194, 199, 202,\n 206, 228, 229, 230, 232, 286, 345, 349, 350, 351, 359, 361,\n 362, 363, 366, 369\n\n Pliny\u2019s Ape, 349\n\n Pliny the Younger, 296, 354\n\n Plutarch, 36, 43, 69, 174, 265, 286\n\n Poetry, magic of, 347\n\n Pohjola, 241\n\n Poland, 100, 154, 156\n\n Polish women fighters, 177\n\n Polo, Marco, characterized, 363-365;\n cited, 8, 12, 19, 34, 72, 73, 106, 128, 138, 158, 160, 167, 170,\n 204, 210, 221, 239, 244, 334, 349, 361, 362\n\n Polybius, 264, 265\n\n Polyhistor, 355\n\n _Polyphem ein Gorilla_, 192\n\n Polyphemus, 90, 228, 363\n\n Polystephanos, 349\n\n Pompeii, 296\n\n Pompeius Festus, 351\n\n Pompey, 246\n\n Pomponius, 199\n\n Pontoppidan, 42, 92, 93, 94, 100, 102, 367\n\n Pontus, 153\n\n Popayan, 301\n\n Pope, Alexander, 108\n\n Pope Alexander III, 239\n\n Popinjays, in the deserts, 105\n\n Popol Nuh, 118\n\n Popos, 183\n\n Porcupines, 43\n\n Pork, 259\n\n Porter-nations, fables of, 354\n\n Port of Missing Ships, 276\n\n Porto Rico, 314\n\n Portugal, 112, 162, 178, 225, 243, 244, 277\n\n Portus Nobilis, 225\n\n Poseidon, 282, 283, 285\n\n Potato, 306\n\n Pottery, animal outlines of, 30\n\n _Prabh\u00e2sakhanda_, 106\n\n Prague, 172, 248\n\n Prasias, Lake, 196\n\n Precious stones in Christian symbolism, 24-25\n\n Prejevalski, 54\n\n Prescott, 302\n\n Prester John, 1, 12, 17, 63, 211, 238-240, 359, 361, 362, 366\n\n Priestesses, armed, 184\n\n Priest-king, 85\n\n _Primum mobile_, 9\n\n _Principal Trade Routes_, 362\n\n _Principal Voyages_, 369\n\n Prison for lost souls, 276\n\n Proclus, 286\n\n Procopius, 60, 265, 266\n\n Progne, 28\n\n _Prometheus Bound_, 207\n\n Promises of princes, 373\n\n Prophecy: how the gift is conferred, 24\n\n Prospero\u2019s isle, 206\n\n Psalm-singing birds, 253\n\n Pseudo-Plutarch, 352\n\n Psylli, the, 194\n\n Psyllotoxot\u00e6, the, 103\n\n Pterodactyl, 79\n\n Ptolemy, 9, 10, 11, 16, 17, 129, 195, 207, 225, 362\n\n Public-house signs, 345\n\n Pueblo Indians, 204\n\n Puerto de Arica, 327\n\n Pu-lu tribe, 136\n\n Punt, 143, 224, 231, 233, 234\n\n _Puranas_, 269, 359\n\n Purchas, 3, 42, 53, 74, 199, 335\n\n Purgative, a, 24\n\n Pygmies, 2, 108, 117, 132-150, 208, 350, 361, 368\n\n Pygmy Highway, 144\n\n Pyramids, 358\n\n Pyrenees Mountains, 56, 203\n\n Pytheas of Massilia, 264, 334\n\n\n Q\n\n Quail, 44, 356\n\n Quatrefages, 146\n\n Queen Bee, 186\n\n Queen of Sheba, 224, 226\n\n Quesada, 301\n\n Quesada, Ximenes, 304\n\n Questing beast, 64-65\n\n Quetelet, 192\n\n Quetzalcoatl, 161, 292\n\n Quichna Indians, 314, 333\n\n Quimper, 256\n\n Quiros, 329\n\n Quito, 299, 300, 301, 302\n\n Quivera, 312, 314, 323-326\n\n Quoyas Morrov, 125\n\n\n R\n\n Rabbit, 29, 127\n\n Race-course, 253, 284, 296\n\n Rainbow, 370\n\n Rain trees, 20-21\n\n Rajputana, 124\n\n Rakshasis, 156, 157\n\n Raleigh, 3, 36, 110, 111, 151, 152, 162, 163, 166, 305-310, 329,\n 346, 369\n\n Ram, 47\n\n Ram-eagle, 67\n\n Rami, the, 137\n\n Ramni, 104\n\n Ramus, Jonas, 41\n\n Ras Sem, petrified village of, 212, 213\n\n Rat, 342, 366;\n worship of, 30-31;\n monster, 57\n\n Rath, 100\n\n Raven, 42, 43, 374\n\n Raw materials, search for, 372\n\n Rawlinson, 184, 228\n\n Realm of Big Women, 222\n\n Red River, 136\n\n Red Sea, 1, 195, 196, 199, 226, 227\n\n _Regio feminarum_, 160\n\n Region of Darkness, 221\n\n Reig Rawan, Desert of, 211\n\n Reindeer, 240\n\n Remora, 97\n\n Repose, regions of, 251\n\n _Republic_, Plato\u2019s, 286, 287, 373\n\n Retreat of the Ten Thousand, 195\n\n Retzius, 291\n\n _Revelation_, book of, 236;\n Horsemen of, 62\n\n Regnard, 40\n\n Reynard the fox, 47\n\n Rhegium, 38\n\n Rhine maidens, 99\n\n Rhinoceros, 34, 46;\n of the air, 74-75;\n horn for detecting poison, 34\n\n Rhizophagi, the, 199\n\n Rhodesia, ancient, 1, 225, 226\n\n Rhodope Mountains, 100\n\n Rhone River, 209\n\n Ribbon fish, 95\n\n Ribeiro, 125, 166\n\n Ricold of Monte Croce, 237\n\n Riddles, 346\n\n Rights of Women, 173\n\n Riph\u00e6an Rocks, 202, 203\n\n Ritual mimes, 339\n\n Ritual murder, 85\n\n River of China, 7\n\n River that flows by the Throne of God, 262\n\n Robin Hood cycle, 345\n\n Roc, 72-74, 363, 365\n\n Rock crystal, 24\n\n Rock Tibboos, 195\n\n Rocky Mountains, 207\n\n Rodriguez, Barboza, 164\n\n Rodzianko, 175\n\n Roebuck, 43\n\n Roger, King of Sicily, 270\n\n Rogero, 95\n\n Rohan, family, 99\n\n Roman pharmacopeia, animal items in, 27\n\n Rome, 90, 96, 230, 247, 258, 262, 265, 349, 354\n\n Romulus, 344\n\n Root-eaters, 199\n\n Roraima, Mount, 208\n\n Rothery, 163, 179\n\n Rotundity of the earth, 272, 366-367\n\n Roulin, 141\n\n Roundhouses, ceremonial, 370\n\n Royal Irish Society, 256\n\n Ruad, 100\n\n Rubruquis, 113, 222, 239\n\n Ruby, 24, 244\n\n Ruskin, 216\n\n Russia, 154, 240, 290, 365;\n fighting women of, 174-177;\n strange peoples of, 115-117\n\n\n S\n\n Saba, 232, 233\n\n Sab\u00e6ans, the, 226, 231, 232, 233\n\n Sacramento, 284;\n Valley, 283\n\n \u201cSacred groaning stick,\u201d 370\n\n Sacred Promontory, 10\n\n Saffron as magic diet, 217\n\n Sagittary, 66\n\n Sago tree, 138\n\n St. Augustine, 355\n\n St. Bernard, 47, 172\n\n St. Brendan, 91, 259, 271, 276, 363;\n island of, 252\n\n St. Clement, 69\n\n St. Collen, 368\n\n St. Colodoc, 45\n\n St. Costinian, 45\n\n St. Francis, 375\n\n St. Gerasimus, 45\n\n St. Guthlac, 45\n\n St. Helenus, 45\n\n St. Jerome, 237, 358\n\n St. John, 65\n\n St. John\u2019s Eve, 188\n\n St. Leonor, 45\n\n St. Maria Rotunda, 342\n\n St. Mark, treasure of, 53\n\n St. Sulpicius, 45\n\n St. Vitus dance, 39, 40\n\n Sais, temple at, 281\n\n Saint, statue of a, 271\n\n Salamanca, 147;\n Council of, 10\n\n Salamander, 38-39, 47, 70, 337, 350\n\n Salmon, 89\n\n Salt fish diet, 243\n\n Salvaje, 126\n\n Samar, 158\n\n Samarcand, 170\n\n Samaria, 358\n\n Sambation, the river, 17-18\n\n Samoan Islands, 260\n\n Samoyeds, 56, 57, 74, 115, 116, 117, 364\n\n Sanazzaro, 247\n\n Sandalwood, 230, 233\n\n Sandrokotos, 184\n\n San Joao River, 124\n\n San Francisco, 294\n\n San Francisco, mountain of, 376\n\n San Joaquin Valley, 283\n\n Santa Cruz, island of, 329\n\n Santa Marta, 301\n\n Santa Thome del Agostina, 311\n\n San Thome River, 124\n\n Santom aborigines, 136\n\n Santos, Juan, 333\n\n Sapphar Metropolis, the, 225\n\n Sapphire, 24, 25\n\n Saragossa, feminine defense of, 174\n\n Sardinia, 96, 264;\n pygmy survivals in, 147\n\n Sardonic plant, 356\n\n Sargasso Sea, 274-280, 281, 287\n\n Sarmatians, 156\n\n Sassafras, 242\n\n Satan, 112, 204, 236, 350\n\n Satyr-fish, 67\n\n Satyrs, 2, 66, 121-131, 206, 272, 356, 361, 375;\n Satyr Islands, 129\n\n Saures, 221\n\n Savaii, 260\n\n Sayce, 185, 186\n\n Sayf Al-Muluk, 251\n\n Scaliger, 58, 112, 140\n\n Scalping, 120\n\n Scandinavia, 290\n\n Scapegoat, 187\n\n Scarab, 218\n\n Scarecrows as tribal ancestors, 200\n\n _Scenes de la Vie de Boh\u00e8me_, 250\n\n Schenchzer, 80\n\n Schomburgk, 167\n\n Schoolcraft, 119, 370\n\n Schorodomachi, the, 103\n\n Schweinfurth, 142, 144, 147\n\n Sciapodes, the, 113\n\n Scilly Islands, 255, 263, 265\n\n Scipio, 265\n\n Scobellum, 374\n\n Scorpion men, 260\n\n Scotland, tide myth of, 9, 345\n\n Scrofula, animal remedies for, 27\n\n Scylax, 275, 353\n\n Scyrit\u00e6, the, 108, 114\n\n Scythia, 82, 107, 141, 154, 155, 156, 196, 235, 236, 237\n\n Scythian lamb, 58-62\n\n Sea a symbol of eternity, 262\n\n Sea creatures, 89-102;\n named after land animals, as sea-dragons, hares, horses, kites,\n lions, mice, oxen, spiders, 89\n\n Sea serpent, 2, 93-95\n\n Sea of Clarified Butter, 269\n\n Sea of Curds or Whey, 269\n\n Sea of Glass, 252\n\n Sea of Milk, 261, 269\n\n Sea of Salt Water, 269\n\n Sea of Sugar Cane Juice, 269\n\n Sea of Wine, 269\n\n Seal, 42, 89\n\n Seal-men, 117, 242, 257\n\n Sebo, 77\n\n Sedentary Indians, 320\n\n Selfishness, myths of, 371\n\n Semangs, the, 147, 260\n\n Semiramis, 18, 169\n\n Semites, commercial fictions of, 9;\n culture of, 357\n\n Seneca, 252\n\n Senegal, 286, 290, 291\n\n Senegal River, 263\n\n Sephar, Mount, 223\n\n Sepulchers of Zenu, 312, 329-330\n\n Seres, 191, 193, 230\n\n Serrano, 244\n\n Sertorius, 264, 265\n\n Set, 86, 87\n\n Seven Cities of Cibola, 312, 318-323\n\n Seven Seas, 269\n\n \u201cShadow-footed,\u201d 346\n\n Shagamaw, 66\n\n Shakespeare, 109, 248\n\n _Shan Hai King_, 359\n\n Shantung, 89, 137\n\n Shape-shifting, 28, 370\n\n Shark, 87, 95, 97-98, 260\n\n Shaw, 212\n\n Sheep, 257, 327, 358\n\n Sheikh of the Seaboard, 363\n\n Shetland Islands, 97, 241\n\n Shikh, 111\n\n Shoshones, the, 6\n\n Shrewmouse, 43\n\n _Shu-king_, 71\n\n Siam, 33, 34, 137, 240, 269, 293\n\n Siberia, 115, 116, 117, 344;\n women fighters of, 177\n\n Sicily, 147, 246\n\n Sid, the, 217\n\n Sidney, Sir Philip, 247\n\n Sierras, the, 283\n\n Sigismund, King, 101\n\n _Signs and Symbols of Primordial Man_, 149\n\n Silent Isle, 252\n\n Silver, 284, 327\n\n Silvia of Aquitaine, 358\n\n Simeon, Rabbi, 62\n\n Simhala, 157, 158\n\n Simon, Padre, 300\n\n Sinai, 143\n\n Sind, 158\n\n Sindbad, 3, 33, 72, 91, 137, 206, 234, 362, 363, 366\n\n Singular speech, 104-105\n\n Sinmenkpen, 183\n\n Siptakhora tree, 105\n\n Sirens, 48, 89, 90, 197, 272\n\n Siva, 338\n\n Skeletons, animated, 117\n\n Skin-shifting, 28\n\n Skogfrau, 216\n\n Skulls as drinking cups, 196;\n talking, 117;\n rolling, 119, 120, 370\n\n Slave Coast, 179\n\n Slavs, 100, 248, 261\n\n Sliabh Daidche, 252\n\n Sluggish Sea, 264\n\n Smith, Grafton Elliot, 84, 87\n\n Smithsonian Institution, report of, 288\n\n Smyrna, 153, 187\n\n Snails, 366\n\n Snake, 30, 37-38, 43, 45, 64, 78, 79, 81, 84, 112, 351, 361\n\n Snake-eaters, 199\n\n Snakes in Ireland, no, 356\n\n Snoligoster, 66\n\n Snowy Mountains, 7\n\n Society Islands, 329\n\n Socotra, island of, 226, 365\n\n Socrates, 286\n\n Soe-Drawl, 92\n\n Soe-Ormen, 94\n\n Sofala, 225\n\n Solar mythology, 83, 287, 295\n\n Solinus, characterized, 356;\n cited, 9, 35, 38, 42, 53, 206, 349, 350, 363, 366\n\n Solomon, 125, 185, 223, 224, 226, 227\n\n Solomon Islands, 260, 312, 327-329\n\n Solon, 281\n\n Somaliland, 1, 234\n\n Sombreron, 127\n\n Sorcerers that took hyena form, 36\n\n South, 9, 204\n\n South America, 2, 3, 65, 126, 291, 298\n\n South Atlantic continent, 290\n\n South Arabs, 226\n\n South Brother Island, 167\n\n South Dakota, 208\n\n South Seas, 203, 258, 336\n\n Southern hemisphere noblest, 9\n\n Souza, 271\n\n Soviets, 156\n\n Spain, 9, 161, 162, 224, 243, 264, 277, 290, 299, 300, 309, 333,\n 368, 372;\n treasure ships of, 306, 309\n\n Sparta, 246\n\n _Speculum Regale_, 101\n\n Spence, 292\n\n Spencer, 336, 345\n\n Spenser, 306\n\n Sphinx, 66, 356\n\n Spice Islands, 1, 12, 90, 225, 242-245\n\n Spices, 302, 364\n\n Spider, 28\n\n Spitzbergen, 41\n\n Splinter cat, 66\n\n Springs, magical, 18, 353\n\n Spurred men, 245\n\n Squid, 95\n\n Squonk, 66\n\n Stag, 28, 45, 48, 51\n\n Stagnant Sea, 358\n\n Staked plains, 324\n\n Stanley, 132, 144, 145\n\n Star of the Archers, 178\n\n Statues as source of myths, 340, 341\n\n Stone Age heathen, 343\n\n Stone giants, 207\n\n \u201cStone of the eyes,\u201d 26\n\n Storax, 232\n\n Stork, 28, 42, 44\n\n \u201cStory of the Winged Disk,\u201d 86\n\n Strabo, 3, 8, 9, 25, 38, 55, 107, 135, 140, 154, 197, 198, 228, 264,\n 286, 351, 353\n\n Straits of Florida, 278\n\n Straits of Magellan, 316\n\n Street of feathers, 359\n\n Streets of women, 209\n\n Struthocameli, 50\n\n Struthophagi, the, 199\n\n Struthopodes, the, 113\n\n Struys, 129\n\n Stygian Pool, 262\n\n Stymphalian birds, 2, 77\n\n Subraces, 342\n\n Suffolk, 101\n\n Sukhavati, 261\n\n Sumatra, 128, 129, 137, 159, 240, 363\n\n Sun-haters, 194\n\n Sun, track of the, 205\n\n Sunamukha, the, 106\n\n Sun-Carrier, 6-7\n\n Sunda Islands, 148, 269\n\n _Sung Geography_, 128\n\n Sunken Lands, 254-257\n\n Sunset, hissing sound at, 14\n\n Superior, Lake, 294\n\n Suwanee River, 319\n\n Svetadvipa, 261\n\n Swallow, 28, 40-41, 45, 81, 375\n\n Swallower of the West, 338, 372\n\n Swan song, 44, 202\n\n Sweden, 240;\n the Great, 268\n\n Swine, 30, 44, 48, 87, 127, 253, 260, 338, 374\n\n Symmetry, sense of cosmic, 7\n\n Symons, 250\n\n Sympathetic magic, 187\n\n Syria, 61, 169, 186, 195\n\n Syrian lamb, 61\n\n Syrtic district, 228\n\n\n T\n\n Tabernacle form of earth, 6\n\n Table of the Sun, 14-15\n\n Tachnin River, 102\n\n Tachylyte, 289, 295\n\n Tae-Ping women fighters, 177\n\n Tagus River, 50\n\n Tahetan tide myth, 9\n\n Tahiti, 260\n\n Tailed men, 121-131\n\n Takla-makan, dead city of, 215\n\n Talmud, 60, 61, 91, 204\n\n Tamerlane, 237\n\n Tanganyika country, 145\n\n Tangi, 97\n\n Tannh\u00e4user, 219, 220\n\n Taos, 323\n\n Tapio, 128\n\n Tapirs, king of the, 127\n\n Taprobane, 10, 63\n\n Taranto, 39, 59\n\n Tarantula, 39-40\n\n Tarascon, shield of, 66\n\n Tarask, 66, 337\n\n Tartars, 108, 130, 147, 154, 170, 221, 237, 365\n\n Tariessus, 224\n\n Tatius, 37\n\n Tauron, 104\n\n Taurus Mountains, 186\n\n Tawny Moors, 199\n\n Tchad, Lake, 135\n\n Tchudi, the, 117\n\n Tecumbalam, the bird, 293\n\n Tembandumba, 178\n\n Tempe, 201\n\n _Tempest, The_, 103\n\n Tempests, how to avert, 24\n\n Temple harlots, 184\n\n Temple of Dobayba, 312, 331-332\n\n Temple of the Sun, 332\n\n Ten Lost Tribes, 17, 138, 237, 359, 362\n\n Tennyson, 227, 252, 255\n\n Tenochtitlan, 318\n\n Tensevetes, 361\n\n Terhetar, 241\n\n Termeh, 153\n\n Termier, 288, 289, 290, 291, 295, 296\n\n Ternate, 244\n\n Terra Australis Incognita, 11\n\n Terrestrial Paradise, 7, 8, 117, 158, 239, 312, 365, 368, 373, 376\n\n Terrible Ocean, 262-273\n\n Tetramorph, 338\n\n Texera, 163\n\n Teyma, 211\n\n Thalestris, 154\n\n Thanet, island of, 351\n\n Tharshish, 224, 225, 226, 227\n\n Thebaid, 148\n\n Theocritus, 246\n\n Theodor, Bishop, 117\n\n Theodosius, 358\n\n Theophrastus, 275\n\n Theopompus, 286\n\n Thermiscyra, 186\n\n Thermodon River, 153\n\n Theseus, 152, 153\n\n Thevet, 53\n\n Thirty Years\u2019 War, 248\n\n Thomas, 326\n\n Thoreau, 204\n\n Thorne, 244\n\n Thought, fancied omnipotence of, 376\n\n Thrace, 135\n\n Thule, 10, 264\n\n Thunberg, 34\n\n Thunder bird, 81\n\n Thunderbolts, 26\n\n Thuringia, 220\n\n Thurium, 352\n\n Tiber River, 209\n\n Tiberius, 19, 90\n\n Tibet, 54, 64, 124, 187, 188, 196, 240, 364\n\n Tides, 9\n\n Tidor, 244\n\n Tierra del Fuego, 328\n\n Tierra-firma, 13, 303\n\n Tig-balang, 127\n\n Tiger, 49, 57, 81, 351, 361\n\n Tigris River, 238\n\n _Tim\u00e6us_, the, 281, 285, 286\n\n Tin, 284\n\n Tin Islands, 263, 265, 352\n\n Titan, 370\n\n Tithonus, 38\n\n Titicaca, Lake, 312\n\n Tityrus, 66\n\n Tlingit myths, 29, 370\n\n Toad, 78\n\n Tobacco, 306\n\n Toltecs, 292\n\n Tomyris, 169\n\n Tonga, 260\n\n Topago, province of, 162\n\n Topaz, 24\n\n Topographical legends, 14\n\n Topsell, 51\n\n Topsy-turvy, law of, 3\n\n Torca, island of, 255\n\n Torres Straits, 260\n\n Tortoise, 6, 47, 96, 343\n\n Toscanelli, map of, 12\n\n Totemism, 29\n\n Totoneac, 320, 323\n\n Toucan, 42\n\n Tower of London, 307\n\n Traconda, island of, 104\n\n Tragedy, Greek, 339\n\n Trapalanda, 316\n\n Travel Tales of Mankind, 348-370\n\n _Travels in Barbary_, 212\n\n Travelers, Lot of, 335-336\n\n Travelers\u2019 Trunk, earth like a, 6\n\n Trebizond, 153\n\n Tree of the Sun, 19\n\n Trees, 19-21, 353\n\n Trickster-hero, 370\n\n Trinidad, 300, 305, 308\n\n Trinity, the earliest, 85, 86\n\n Tritons, 89, 90, 272\n\n Troglodytes, 2, 25, 106, 109, 138, 158, 194-195\n\n Troll, 367\n\n Tronador, 318\n\n Tropic of Cancer, 277, 278, 280\n\n Trotzky, 177\n\n Troubadours, 47\n\n Troy, 75, 133, 152\n\n _True History_, 103, 275, 354\n\n Tsheremis, 107\n\n T\u2019sung-ling Mountains, 360\n\n Tuanaki, island of, 255\n\n Tuatha D\u00e9 Danann, 217\n\n Tumbleweed, 120\n\n Tupac-Amaru, 333\n\n Tupac Yupanqui, Inca, 327\n\n Tupi-Guarani myth, 292\n\n Tupimare, the hill, 292\n\n Turanians, 151, 185\n\n Turkestan, 87, 214, 361\n\n Turkey, 108, 154, 170, 237\n\n Turkomans, 186, 346, 353\n\n Turja Fells, 241\n\n Turquoise, 24, 318\n\n Turtle, 81, 119\n\n Turtle-eaters, 198\n\n Tuscany, 282\n\n Twelfth Day, 31\n\n Two Mussulman Travelers, 363\n\n Two Sisters, isles of, 158\n\n Tylor, 123, 343, 346\n\n Tzetzes, 109, 350\n\n\n U\n\n Udyana, 259\n\n Ulloa, 21, 38\n\n Ulysses, 99, 205, 228, 229, 336, 354\n\n Underground, beliefs as to, 217-220\n\n _Undine_, 99\n\n Ung-Khan, 239\n\n Unicorn, 2, 50-55, 66, 67, 340, 375;\n horn of, antidote for poison, 51\n\n Unicorn bird, 75\n\n Uniped, 113\n\n United States, 290\n\n Universe an egg, 6\n\n Unpaid vows, 373\n\n Ural Mountains, 107, 202\n\n Urcos, lake of, 332\n\n Urdu-begani, 177\n\n Utopia, 373\n\n Uttarakarns, the, 261, 336\n\n\n V\n\n Vaikuntha, 261\n\n Vain efforts, 373\n\n Valasca, 172\n\n Valencia, 178\n\n \u201cValentines,\u201d Amazon, 152, 162\n\n Vale Perilous, 191\n\n Valley of Apes, 125\n\n Valley of Diamonds, 73\n\n Valley of the Shadow of Death, 367\n\n Valum Chvim, 292\n\n Vampires, 367\n\n Vancouver Island, 28\n\n Van Diemen\u2019s Land, 95\n\n Van Noort, 191\n\n Varasena, Pass of, 361\n\n Varenius, 278\n\n Varro, 351\n\n Varthema, 138\n\n Vartomannus, 53\n\n Vashti, 187\n\n Vassals of the beasts, men as, 28\n\n Vaz, Lopez, 163, 304, 328\n\n Veddahs, the, 148\n\n Vegetable lamb, 58-62\n\n Venetus, Paulus, 53\n\n Venezuela, 126, 207, 301, 304, 306\n\n Venice, lion of, 66\n\n Venus, 219\n\n Venus, Mandragorolis, 22\n\n Vergil, Polydore, 128\n\n Vermin, a diet against, 193\n\n Verrius, 351\n\n Versailles, march on, 172\n\n Vicarious sacrifice, 86\n\n _Views of Nature_, 278\n\n Viking names, 267\n\n Villon, 249\n\n Vilna unit of girl soldiers, 177\n\n Vincent of Beauvais, 366\n\n Vine, 19\n\n Vineta, legendary city of, 254\n\n Vine-women, 103\n\n Virgil, 75, 247\n\n Virgin gift-bearers, 201\n\n Virgin Mary, 240\n\n Virtues and vices pictured, 47\n\n Vishnu, 134\n\n Vitruvius, 204\n\n Vokearos, the, 166\n\n Volcano Island, 137\n\n Volga River, 107\n\n Von Hutten, 302, 303\n\n Votiaks, the, 29\n\n Voyage of Maldune, 252\n\n _Voyage of St. Brendan_, 367\n\n Vulture, 43, 338\n\n\n W\n\n Wagon homes, 155\n\n Wak-wak, 111, 159, 261, 363\n\n Wales, legend of, 255\n\n Wallerius, 41\n\n Walnut tree, 19\n\n Walton, Isaac, 43\n\n Wandering arts, 249\n\n Wapaloosie, 66\n\n Wars over women, Indian, 162-163\n\n Wartburg, 219\n\n Water gods of northern Europe, 97\n\n Water horse, 97, 242\n\n Water sheep, 60\n\n Weddell, 102\n\n Weigall, 143\n\n Welsers, the, 302\n\n West, 204-205;\n as home of marvel, 349\n\n West African Rain Forest, 132, 148\n\n West Indies, 287, 290, 291\n\n Westropp, 256\n\n West wind, 262\n\n Whale, 3, 47, 94, 354, 363;\n bones of for dwellings, 197\n\n Wheel-shaped maps, 7\n\n Whirlwind the dance of a ghost, 370\n\n White-Corn Boy, 376\n\n White House, 333\n\n White Indians, 4, 331\n\n White Nile, 184\n\n Whitman, Walt, 193\n\n Whore of Babylon, 65\n\n Whydah, 179, 183\n\n Wichita Indians, 326\n\n Wiener, 291, 315\n\n Wild Women, 216\n\n William of Wykeham, 372\n\n Wind-egg, 50\n\n Winged serpents, 70, 233\n\n _Winter\u2019s Tale_, 249\n\n Wish, power of, 347\n\n Witchcraft, 78, 204, 218, 240-242, 272, 292, 365\n\n Witch Realm of Lapland, 240-242\n\n Wolf, 28, 30, 43, 45, 48, 58\n\n Wolf, Dr., 130\n\n Woman of the Thicket, 216\n\n Women for guests, 364\n\n Women in Mexican revolutions, 169-170\n\n World, a living being, 6\n\n Woodpecker, 29\n\n Words, power of, 347\n\n World summit, theory of, 12-13\n\n Woruisamocos, the, 167\n\n Wu-lung-li-tan, village of, 129\n\n Wyvern, 66\n\n\n X\n\n Xanadu, 365\n\n Xarayes, Laguna de los, 312, 313, 333\n\n Xecotcovach, the bird, 293\n\n Xenophon, 195, 286\n\n Xerxes, 352\n\n\n Y\n\n Yacu-mama, 95\n\n Yakuts, the, 57\n\n Yams, 260, 291\n\n Yangste Kiang, the, 137\n\n Yao, the, 128\n\n _Yashka_, 174\n\n Yazd, 214\n\n Yazel, Abraham, 17\n\n Yedua, 60, 62\n\n Yellow-Corn Girl, 376\n\n Yellow Sea, 259\n\n Yemen, 196\n\n _Yen-men_, 57\n\n Yima, garden of, 337\n\n Yoruba, 179\n\n Ysopete, 324, 325, 326\n\n Yucatan, 204\n\n Yule, Colonel, 129\n\n Yunnan, 128, 136\n\n\n Z\n\n Zahm, 207\n\n Zambesi River, 225, 226\n\n Zanzibar, 3, 245, 270, 363, 364\n\n Zell, 192\n\n Zenobia, 169\n\n Zephyria, 50\n\n Zipangu, 12\n\n Zulus, 111, 125\n\n Zu\u00f1i, 322, 323\n\n Zuyder Zee, 254\n\n\nTHE END\n\n\n\n\n_Distinguished Books_\n\n\n BARE SOULS BY GAMALIEL BRADFORD\n\nThis volume goes beyond the geographical limits of Mr. Bradford\u2019s\nsuccessful \u201cDamaged Souls,\u201d and includes a group of the world\u2019s most\nmysteriously fascinating personalities. Under Mr. Bradford\u2019s magic\ntouch they spring to life as self-revealing human beings. His subjects\ninclude John Keats, Thomas Gray, Flaubert, Voltaire, Edward Fitzgerald,\nCharles Lamb and Horace Walpole.\n\n\n LEVIATHAN BY WILLIAM BOLITHO\n\n\u201cIf you are a discriminating reader you will have marked William\nBolitho as a man whose stuff you will follow anywhere, for he stands\nout from the hordes of excellent and gentle essayists as boldly as\ndoes a woodcut when placed next a half-tone engraving.\u201d--_Laurence\nStallings_ in the New York _World_.\n\n\n THE LIFE OF THE BAT BY CHARLES DERENNES\n\nAn exciting personal narrative is told in this book--the life story of\nthe bat, much of it threaded on the life experiences of a captive bat\ncalled Noctu. He very soon develops a strong personality, and through\nhis story we learn the life history of bats generally,--their apparent\npastimes,--as in their aerial ballets--their mating, their search\nfor food and the whole fascinating range of their daily and nightly\nactivities.\n\n\n AT A VENTURE BY CHARLES A. BENNETT\n _Illustrated by Clarence Day, Jr._\n\n\u201cHow delightful to run across a new writer of such subtle penetration\ncombined with a light and lazy humor. Mr. Bennett has a fine sense of\nsatire, of character, of life, and is a master of the luminous phrase.\nHe discusses live subjects, and his papers cover all sorts of topics\nfrom advertising to zebra-raising, written with ease, elegance and\ngrace. The pictures are priceless, all movement, irony and grin.\u201d--_W.\nE. Woodward_ in the _Nation_.\n\n\nHARPER & BROTHERS\n\n\n\n\n_A Miscellany_\n\n\n THE BIBLE AND COMMON SENSE BY BASIL KING\n\nHere is a book in which honest people of every communion, groping\ntheir way through the storms of controversy, will find fresh light to\nguide them. Mr. King tells eloquently what the Bible means to him as\nan individual, and frankly and fearlessly discusses such topics as the\nVirgin Birth, the divinity of Christ, and the effect of scientific\ncriticism on the Bible. His tone is always constructive, always\nreverent, always inspiring.\n\n\n THE MYSTERY OF RELIGION BY EVERETT DEAN MARTIN\n\nWhat is religion? Has it any real bearing on morality and the\nunescapable facts of human relationship? The author of \u201cThe Behavior\nof Crowds\u201d here scientifically analyzes, in the light of social\npsychology, the ceremonials and taboos of religion, and the fundamental\nmeaning and cause of group religion as a universal human need.\n\n\n THE SEVEN LIVELY ARTS BY GILBERT SELDES\n\nA spirited and entertaining discussion of the \u201clow-brow\u201d arts and\nartists of comic stage and screen, of song and dance and newspaper\nhumor, by a \u201chigh-brow\u201d young critic who sees in them the flourishing\ngerm of a native American expression.\n\n\n A MAGICIAN AMONG THE SPIRITS BY HOUDINI\n\nA master magician here reveals the results of years of careful study\nof noted mediums and of spiritualistic phenomena of all kinds. This\naccount of his adventures during his investigations, and the striking\nconclusions to which he has been forced form an important--and\nentertaining--chapter in the crusade for truth.\n\n\n THE AMERICAN MIND IN ACTION\n BY HARVEY O\u2019HIGGINS and DR. E. H. REEDE\n\nA keen analysis of the typical American attitude, as exemplified in the\nlives and personalities of a dozen outstanding Americans. \u201cThe work is\nabsorbingly interesting, holding the reader as with a magic spell from\nbeginning to end. The American reader feels as he follows the analysis\nof the American mind that he is gradually penetrating to the mystic\ndepths of his own soul.\u201d--_Boston Transcript._\n\n\nHARPER & BROTHERS\n\n\n\n\n Transcriber's Notes:\n\n Italics are shown thus: _sloping_.\n\n Variations in spelling and hyphenation are retained.\n\n Perceived typographical errors have been changed.","title":"The coasts of illusion : $b A study of travel tales","tradition":"myth-cosmogony","translated_text":null,"word_count":155820}