Page:Arrian's Voyage Round the Euxine Sea Translated.djvu/166

Rh oracle. But this is all a conjecture of his own. The Pythic tadium never could have been in general ue among the Romans, as it is never, as far as I can find, noticed, or even named, by any other Writer than Cenorinus, even by thoe who treat profeedly of the menuration of ditances. It eems probable that it was a local meaure only, perhaps of the Gymnaium belonging to the place, and not in ue elewhere. But let us examine his arguments.

He begins with aying, that Pliny, tranlating a paage from Theophratus, renders the words, by centum triginta pedum; and as the words o applied ignify that each , or fathom, contains ten feet, which is four feet above the length aigned by Herodotus, it follows, that the fathom in the time of Pliny was as five to three to that ued in the time of Herodotus; and from thence infers, that the tadium of Pliny exceeded that of Herodotus in the ame proportion. But, uppoing the reading to be genuine, all that I can infer from it is, that thirteen fathoms in the time of Theophratus were, equal to 130 feet in the time of Pliny; and of coure, that the fathom was increaed in the proportion of five to three from the time of Herodotus to that of Theophratus, a thing difficult to conceive, as the interval was no more than 137 years. But this no ways concerns Pliny's calculation of the length of the tadium, which he never reckons by fathoms, but by paces and feet; and ays poitively, that a tadium contains