Page:Arrian's Voyage Round the Euxine Sea Translated.djvu/163

162 march as the Roman armies were in the middle of the fourth century.

Mr. Rennel again allows that Strabo reckoned eight tadia to a mile, and that eemingly on his own judgment; and afterwards ays, that if the opinion of Polybius is to be followed, one-third of a tadium is to be added, as he has allotted 8½ tadia to a mile. But I have before produced a paage from the works of Polybius, now extant, in which he allows eight tadia only to a, mile; and it is probable that the paiage cited by Strabo might be only to accommodate the Greek to the Roman meaure, if it be not, as I have before hinted, a mitake of Strabo himelf.

It is rather incorrect in Mr. Rennel to ay that 8½ Olympic tadia, Of 600 feet each, were equal to 5000 feet. If he meaures the Olympic tadium by Roman feet, and allows only 600 of thee to a tadium, contrary to the account given by all the Roman writers, who aign 625 Roman feet to a tadium, his calculation will hold good; but it is more natural to uppoe that a Greek meaure hould be computed by Greek feet. If thee were meant, eight Olympic tadia, without any addition, though containing only 4800 Greek feet, would be equal to 5000 Roman feet, as has been oberved before.

It is unfortunate that a peron of Mr. Rennel's agacity and abilities hould fall into uch a mitake, as to uppoe, that a figure of eight could be ubtituted in place of a figure of in the MSS. of Strabo, when the ue of the Arabic numerals was not introduced until a later date than that of any good MSS, of that writer, and when the number is not expreed by any numeral figures