Page:History of merchant shipping and ancient commerce (Volume 1).djvu/133

 the sun would at noon appear on the right hand of the observer, and not on his left, as in sailing westwards in the Mediterranean. Herodotus relates a second story, how one Sataspes was sent, during the reign of Xerxes, by way of punishment, on a voyage through the Pillars of Hercules, with orders to sail round Africa; and states that this man, after having occupied many months in traversing unknown seas and sailing along strange coasts, doubled a cape called Soloeis (Cape Spartel), and thence returned to Egypt. Sataspes gave a minute account of his journey, and of the strange, dwarfish men (probably Bosjesmans) he had met with; but Xerxes, either not crediting his tale, or angry because of his cowardice in turning back, ordered him to be impaled.

A third expedition is reported by Pliny, who states, on the authority of Cornelius Nepos, that a certain Eudoxus, his contemporary, in an attempt to escape the pursuit of Ptolemy Lathyrus, passing down the Arabian Gulf, came at length to Gades; and further, on the same authority, that Cœlius Antipater had seen a man who had made a commercial voyage from Spain to Æthiopia. Lastly, we have the memorable narrative in Strabo, of Eudoxus of Cyzicus. This Eudoxus, he tells us, was sent with sacrifices and oblations to the sacred games of Proserpine, and travelled through Egypt in the reign of Ptolemy VII. (Physcon). It befell that during his stay there, a certain Indian was brought(of Cyzicus.)