[984] Cape St. Vincent.
[985] Cape St. Vincent is about 1600 stadia west of Cape Spartel in Africa. Strabo imagined that beyond this cape the African coast inclined to the south-east. In reality it advances eleven degrees and a half farther west to Cape Verd, which is 8° 29′ west of Cape St. Vincent.
[986] Herodotus is the first who speaks of a people of Iberia, to whom he gives the name of Κυνήσιοι or Κύνητες: he describes them as inhabiting the most western part of Europe, beyond the Pillars of Hercules.
[987] This passage of Strabo relative to the rocking-stones has occasioned much perplexity to the critics. We have attempted to render the Greek words as near as possible. Many curious facts relative to rocking and amber stones have been collected, by Jabez Allies, F. S. A., in his work on the Antiquities of Worcestershire, now in the press.
[988] We extract the following notice on this passage from Humboldt (Cosmos, vol. iii. 54, Bohn’s edition). “This passage has recently been pronounced corrupt, (Kramer i. 211,) and δι’ ὑάλων (through glass spheres) substituted for δι’ αὐλῶν (Schneider, Eclog. Phys. ii. 273). The magnifying power of hollow glass spheres, filled with water, (Seneca i. 6,) was, indeed, as familiar to the ancients as the action of burning glasses or crystals, (Aristoph. Nub. v. 765,) and that of Nero’s emerald (Plin. xxxvii. 5); but these spheres most assuredly could not have been employed as astronomical measuring instruments. (Compare Cosmos i. p. 619.) Solar altitudes taken through thin light clouds, or through volcanic vapours, exhibit no trace of the influence of refraction.”
[989] Cadiz.
[990] Cape St. Vincent.
[991] Ἄνας.
[992] The Tagus, the Guadiana, and the Guadalquiver, pursue a course nearly parallel to each other, and all incline towards the south before discharging themselves into the sea; the inclination of the Tagus is not equal to that of the other rivers.
[993] Lusitania occupied the greater part of the present kingdom of Portugal. It was from the countries north of the Tagus that the Romans caused certain of the inhabitants to emigrate to the south side of that river.