m- ESS^y ON THE 



spiral line: and in some Purdu'as, and also a.mong 'the Ji an i^d' hist s, they 

 are considered simply as a river; and by some called the Cshird or rivei' 

 of milk; probably because it§ spurfe i§ i^ tl^e islancl of Cskiraa or 'S'ioe% 



tarn. ■. ,.-i;:: vv-^: 



''' The famous ^^/d:fif/5 no longer exists/' says Proclus* inhiscoji^!? 

 mentaryonthe T/w^'zw of Plato, *' but we can hardly doubt, but that it did 

 " once. For Marcellus, who wrote a history of Ethiopian afl:airs, says 

 *■' that such, and so great an island once existed, is evinced by those, who 

 " composed histories pf things relative to the external sea. For they re- 

 " late that in their time, there were seven islands in the Atlantic Sea sacred 

 «« to Proserpine: and besides thesCs three. others of an immense magni- 

 " tude ; one of which was sacred to Pluto, another to Ammon ( Jupiter )a 

 «* and the third, which is |n the middle pf these, and is of a thousand 

 " stadia, to Neptune. And besides this, that the inhabitants of tliis last 

 " island preserved the memory of the prodigious magnitude of the At-^ 

 *' la7itic Island, as related by their ancestors, and of its governing for 

 " many periods all the islands in the Atlantic Sea. From this isle one may 

 " pass to other large islands beyond, and which are not far from the 

 " Firm-land^ near which is the true sea/* 



Whether the Atlantis e-^er existed or not, Is immaterial; but this d€-» 

 scriptlon of seven islands, of a gi-eat magnitude, in the external or in the 

 Atlantic Sea ^ ^^Aivom. which one may pass toother islands beyond, and 

 which are not far from that Firm-land which incloses all the world. Is 

 applicable to the Britisfi Isles only, beyond which are several other 

 Islands, such as the Orkneys, Shetland, Fero and Iceland, which last 



Quoted in Clarke's Maritime Discoveries, 



