DISCOVERIES OF THE ANCIENTS* 
11 
curious discussion. Gosselin * and Vincent t have 
endeavoured to prove that it is altogether beyond 
any means which navigation, at that infant era, 
could call into action. On the other hand, the 
learned arguments of Major Rennell t appear to 
throw upon the relation a very strong aspect of 
probability. Nor is this much diminished by con- 
sidering, that the event is entirely unnoticed by 
many of the most learned writers in subsequent 
times. Ancient knowledge was of so glimmering 
and transitory a nature, that it would be easy to 
multiply instances, in which important facts, con- 
signed in the writings of the best authors, have 
been lost to the world, during a long succession of 
ages. § 
The memory of this voyage probably gave rise 
to another, which is also recorded by Herodotus. || 
Sataspes, a Persian nobleman, having committed 
an act of violence, was condemned by Xerxes to 
be crucified. One of his friends persuaded the 
monarch to commute this sentence into that of a 
* Geographie des Anciens, I. 1 99, 216. 
f Periplus of the Erythrean Sea. 
J Geography of Herodotus, sect. 24, 25. 
§ Striking examples will be furnished by comparing the 
geographical information of Herodotus and Strabo, with re- 
gard to the course of the Tanais, the nations to the north of 
the Black Sea, the form of the Caspian, &c. 
([ IV. 43. 
