[251] Herod. iii. 116; iv. 27. Ctesias, ap. Ælian. Nat. Animal. iv. 27 Mela, ii. c. 11.
[252] Arrian, “Periplus,” c. 64, 65
[253] Plin. xiv. 162. Cuvier (ap. Rawlinson’s Herod. iii. 98) speaks of a bamboo (Bambus arundinacea) which grows to the height of sixty feet. Colonel Yule states that the largest bamboos are in the Malay Islands and Cambodia. He has seen them from eighty to one hundred feet high. “Early Travels to India,” 1867, p. 93.
[254] Arrian, “Periplus,” c. 44.
[255] Sir John Herschel has called attention to the fact that the Chinese have preserved registers of comets and other celestial phenomena for more than a thousand years before the Christian Era. “Familiar Lectures,” p. 94, 1868.
[256] Friar Oderic (ap. Colonel Yule, p. 57) speaks of vessels, like the ancient boats at Rhapta, stitched with twine, without any iron, employed along the coast approaching the modern site of Bombay.
[257] See an excellent life of Alexander by Archdeacon Williams, “Family Library,” No. iii. 1829.
[258] Arrian, Ind. vii.
[259] Strabo, book xv. p. 694.
[260] Arrian, Exped. Alex. v. 3.