Also A Region Producing Plenty Of Cinnamon, Which Lies Between The Branches Of The Nile.

Also the kingdom of Habesch or Habasia,[218] a region inhabited by Christians, on both sides of the Nile.

Likewise those Ethiopians called _Ichthyophagi_, or who live only on fish, who were subdued in the wars of Alexander the Great[219]. Also the Ethiopians called _Rapsii_ and _Anthropophagi_, who are in use to eat human flesh, and inhabit the regions near the mountains of the moon. _Gazatia_ is under the tropic of Capricorn; after which comes the _front_ of Africa, and the Cape of Good Hope, past which they sail from Lisbon to Calicut: But as the capes and gulfs, with their names, are to be found on every globe and chart, it were superfluous to enumerate them here.

[Footnote 218: It is strange that Habasia or Abyssinia, inhabited by Christians, should thus be divided from the empire of Prester John. - E.]

[Footnote 219: The Icthyophagi of Alexander dwelt on the oceanic coast of Persia, now Mekran, between the river Indus and the Persian gulf, not in Ethiopia. - E.]

Some allege that Africa was so named by the Greeks, as being without cold; the Greek letter _alpha_ signifying privation, void of, or without, and _phrice_ signifying cold; as, although it has a cloudy and tempestuous season instead of winter, it is yet never cold, but rather smothering hot, with hot showers, and such scorching winds, that at certain times the inhabitants seem as if living in furnaces, and in a manner half ready for purgatory or hell. According to Gemma Phrisius, in certain parts of Africa, as in the greater Atlas, the air in the night is seen shining with many strange fires and flames, rising as it were as high as the moon, and strange noises are heard in the air, as of pipes, trumpets, and drums, which are caused perhaps by the vehement motions of these fiery exhalations, as we see in many experiments wrought by fire, air, and wind. The hollowness also, and various reflections and breakings of the clouds, may be great causes thereof, besides the great coldness of the middle region of the air, by which these fiery exhalations, when they ascend there, are suddenly driven back with great force. Daily experience teaches us, by the whizzing of a burning torch, what a noise fire occasions in the air, and much more so when it strives and is inclosed with air, as seen in guns; and even when air alone is inclosed, as in organ pipes and other wind instruments: For wind, according to philosophers, is nothing but air vehemently moved, as when propelled by a pair of bellows, and the like.

Some credible persons affirm that, in this voyage to Guinea, they felt a sensible heat in the night from the beams of the moon; which, though it seem strange to us who inhabit a cold region, may yet reasonably have been the case, as Pliny writes that the nature of stars and planets consists of fire, containing a spirit of life, and cannot therefore be without heat.

Enter page number Go  Previous Next
Page 205 of 441
Words from 106904 to 107422 of 230997