RELATING TO AFRICA. 
377 
Arabia * as the country in the world which extends 
farthest to the south, he manifestly betrays his very 
inadequate conceptions, as to the extent, in that di- 
rection, of the African continent. 
The next system generally adopted in the an- 
cient world was that of Eratosthenes, librarian at 
Alexandria, during the time of Ptolemy Philadel- 
phus. His system is explained to us by Strabo, 
who adopted it under some modifications ; it was 
also fundamentally that of Mela, Pliny, and gene- 
rally of the Latin classic writers. 
Eratosthenes, like his predecessor, conceived the 
southern coast of Africa to be washed by the ocean, 
and also, like him, supposed it to terminate in the 
north of the equator. It was supposed, that, after 
passing the Straits, it very soon began to take a di- 
rection to the E.S.E. which it followed till it join- 
ed the eastern coast near the foot of the Arabian 
gulf. It was compared to a trapezium, or irregu- 
lar four-sided figure, of which the Mediterrane- 
an coast formed one side, the Nile another, the 
southern coast the longest side, and the western 
coast the shortest, t So little were geographers of 
this school aware of its extent, that Pliny pronoun- 
ces it to be the least of the three continents, and 
inferior to Europe, t 
* Lib. IV. t Strabo, Lib. XVII. princ. J Lib. VI. 33. 
o 
