Chap. 98.] BEMABEABLE OBJECTS. 128' 



only driven about by the wind, but may be even pushed at 

 pleasure from place to place, by poles : many citizens saved 

 themselves by this means in the Mithridatic war. There are 

 some small islands in the Nymphwus, called the Dancers^, 

 because, when choruses are sung, they are moved by the 

 motions of those who beat time. In the great Italian lake of 

 Tartjuinii, there are two islands with groves on them, which 

 are driven about by the wind, so as at one time to exhibit 

 the figure of a triangle and at another of a circle ; but they 

 never form a square*. 



CHAP. 97. (96.) — PLACES rsr which it neteb bains. 



There is at Paphos a celebrated temple of Venus, in a 

 certain court of which it never rains ; also at Nea, a town 

 of Troas, in the spot which surrounds the statue of Minerva : 

 in this place also the remains of animals tbat are sacrificed 

 never putrefy'. 



chap. 98. — THE WONDEBS^F VABIOUS COUNTBIES 

 COLLECTED TOGETUEB. 



Near Harpasa, a town of Asia, there stands a terrific rock, 

 which may be moved by a single finger ; but if it be pushed 

 by the force of the whole body, it resists*. In the Tauric 

 peninsula, in the state of the' Parasini, there is a kind of 



1 "Saltuares." In some of the MSS. the term here employed is 

 SaUares, or Saltares ; but in ail the editions which I am in the habit of 

 consuhing, it is Saltnares. 



^ There is, no doubt, some truth in these accoimts of floating iskmds, 

 although, as we may presume, much exaggerated. There are frequently 

 small portions of land detached from the edges of lakes, by floods or 

 rapid currents, held together and rendered buoyant by a mass of roots 

 and vegetable matter. In the lake of Keswick, in the county of Cum- 

 berland, there are two small floating islands, of a few yards in circimi- 

 ferenco, which are moved about by the wind or by currents j they appear 

 to consist, principally, of a mass of vegetable fibres. 



3 It has been observed, that there are certain places where bodies 

 remain for a long time without undergoing decomposition ; it depends 

 principally upon a dry and cool con(£tion of the air, such as is occa- 

 sionally found in vaults and natural caverns. See the remarks of 

 Alexandre in Lemaire, i. 424. 



■* We may conceive of a large mass of rock being so balanced upon the 

 fine point of another rock, as to be moved by the slightest touch ; but, 

 that if it be pushed with any force, it may be thrown upon a plane sur- 

 face, and wiU then remain immovable. 



