260 
JOURNEY FROM 
coasting navigation for the lengths of the coasts of Persia and 
Caramania*.” 
In fact it was not till the time of Ptolemy that geography began 
to be placed upon that solid basis on which it now stands so conspi- 
cuously ; and it certainly appears somewhat singular, that the writers 
on this subject who flourished between the time of Hipparchus and 
that of the Alexandrian geographer (among whom were Strabo and 
Pliny,) should not have availed themselves of the discoveries of the 
former to check the measurements which appear in their works f. 
Various errors have been pointed out in the geography of Ptolemy ; 
but as it can scarcely be supposed that he had sufficient observations 
to regulate the position of all the places which he has laid down, we 
ought not to be surprized at this circumstance. His outline of the 
Gulf of Syrtis, though it cannot be called correct, is notwithstanding 
more so than those which have since been given of it ; and the pro- 
longation of the gulf at its southern extremity, so erroneously marked 
« 
* “ Variations ever did and ever will exist (continues the Major) on computed dis- 
tances ; instances of whicli existed on our own public roads previous to their improve- 
ment, and which do yet exist on many of the ci’oss-roads.” “ It is probable,” he adds, 
“.that Hei’odotus, Xenophon, Nearchus, Strabo, &c., all intended the same stade, but 
may have given occasion to different results, by reporting the numbers on the judgment 
of different persons.” 
t Hipparchus of Nicsea (“ who can never,” says Pliny, “ be sufficiently com- 
mended,”) appeal's to have been the first who united geography with astronomy, by 
determining the position of some of the places which he described, according to their 
latitude and longitude^. He died about one hundred and twenty-five years before 
Christ, and his important discoveries remained neglected, or at least unapplied, for 
nearly three hundred years, till they were adopted by Ptolemy in his Geographical 
Treatise. 
® See Ptolemy, Geos:, lib. i. c. 4, and Pliny, Nat. Hist., lib. ii. c. 12 — 26. 
