These, and a hundred such ridiculous _Fables_, have the _Historians_ invented of the _Pygmies_, that I can't but be of _Strabo_'s mind,[A] [Greek: Rhadion d' an tis Haesiodio, kai Homaeroi pisteuseien haeroologousi, kai tois tragikois poiaetais, hae Ktaesiai te kai Haerodotoi, kai Hellanikoi, kai allois toioutois;] i.e. _That one may sooner believe_ Hesiod, _and_ Homer, _and the_ Tragick Poets _speaking of their_ Hero's, _than_ Ctesias _and_ Herodotus _and_ Hellanicus _and such like_. So ill an Opinion had _Strabo_ of the _Indian Historians_ in general, that he censures them _all_ as fabulous;[B] [Greek: Hapantes men toinun hoi peri taes Indikaes grapsantes hos epi to poly pseudologoi gegonasi kath' hyperbolaen de Daeimachos; ta de deutera legei Megasthenaes, Onaesikritos te kai Nearchos, kai alloi toioutoi;] i.e. _All who have wrote of_ India _for the most part, are fabulous, but in the highest degree_ Daimachus; _then_ Megasthenes, Onesicritus, _and_ Nearchus, _and such like_. And as if it had been their greatest Ambition to excel herein, _Strabo_[C] brings in _Theopompus_, as bragging, [Greek: Hoti kai mythous en tais Historiais erei kreitton, ae hos Haerodotos, kai Ktaesias, kai Hellanikos, kai hoi ta Hindika syngrapsantes;] _That he could foist in Fables into History, better than_ Herodotus _and_ Ctesias _and_ Hellanicus, _and all that have wrote of_ India. The _Satyrist_ therefore had reason to say, -----_Et quicquid Græcia mendax Audet in Historia._[D] [Footnote A: _Strabo Geograph._ lib. 11. p.m. 350.] [Footnote B: _Strabo ibid._ lib. 2. p.m. 48.] [Footnote C: _Strabo ibid._ lib. 1 p.m. 29.] [Footnote D: _Juvenal._ _Satyr._ X. _vers._ 174.] _Aristotle_,[A] 'tis true, tells us, [Greek: Holos de ta men agria agriotera en tae Asia, andreiotera de panta ta en taei Europaei, polymorphotata de ta en taei libyaei; kai legetai de tis paroimia, hoti aei pherei ti libyae kainon;] i.e. _That generally the Beasts are wilder in_ Asia, _stronger in_ Europe, _and of greater variety of shapes in_ Africa; _for as the_ Proverb _saith_, Africa _always produces something new_. _Pliny_[B] indeed ascribes it to the Heat of the _Climate, Animalium, Hominumque effigies monstriferas, circa extremitates ejus gigni, minimè mirum, artifici ad formanda Corpora, effigiesque cælandas mobilitate igneâ_. But _Nature_ never formed a whole _Species_ of _Monsters_; and 'tis not the _heat_ of the Country, but the warm and fertile Imagination of these _Historians_, that has been more productive of them, than _Africa_ it self; as will farther appear by what I shall produce out of them, and particularly from the Relation that _Ctesias_ makes of the _Pygmies_. [Footnote A: _Aristotle Hist. Animal_, lib. 8. cap. 28.] [Footnote B: _Plin. Nat. Hist._ lib. 6. cap. 30. p.m. 741.]