BOOK XIX. I. 3-6 



15 years later the praetorian senator Valerius 

 Marianus made Alexandria from Pozzuoli in nine 

 days Avith a very gentle breeze ? or that there is a 

 phint that brings Cadiz within seven days' sail from 

 the Straits of Gibraltar to Ostia, and Hither Spain 

 within four days, and the Province of Narbonne 

 within three, and Africa within two ? The last record 

 was made by Gaius Flavius, deputy of the proconsul 

 \ ibius Crispus, even with a very gentle wind blowing. 

 How audacious is Hfe and how fuU of wickedness, for nmirinijoj 

 a pUint to be grown for the purpose of catching the 0/^»«««* 

 winds and the storms, and for us not to be satisfied '"'"^^'^"y- 

 with being borne on by the waves alonc, nay tliat by 

 this tinie we are not even satisfied with sails that are 

 larger than ships, but, although single trees are 

 scarcely enough for the size of the yard-arms that 

 carry the sails, nevertheless other sails are added 

 above the yards and others besides are spread at the 

 bows and others at the sterns, and so many methods 

 are employed of challenging death, and finally that 

 out of so small a seed springs a means of carrying the 

 whole world to and fro, a plant with so slender a 

 stalk and rising to such a small lieight from the 

 ground, and that this, not after being woven into a 

 tissue by means of its natural strength but when 

 broken and crushed and reduced by force to the 

 softness of wool, afterwards by this ill-treatment 

 attains to the highest pitch of daring ! No exe- 

 cration is adequate for an inventor " in navigation 

 (whom we mentioned above in the proper place), 

 who was not content that mankind should dic upon 

 land unless he also perished where no burial awaits 

 hini. Why, in the preceding Book we wcre giving a xvm. 

 warning to beware of storms of rain and wind for the ^'^*^'^- 



423 



