distant about five days’ sail westward from Britain; and before it there are three others, of an equal distance from one another and also from that, bearing north-west, where the sun sets in summer. In one of these the barbarians feign that Saturn is detained prisoner by Jupiter, who, as his son, having the guard or keeping of those islands and the adjacent sea, named the Saturnian, has his seat a little below; and that the continent, by which the great sea is circularly environed, is distant from Ogygia about five thousand stadia, but from the others not so far, men using to row thither in galleys, the sea being there low and ebb, and difficult to be passed by great vessels because of the mud brought thither by a multitude of rivers, which, coming from the mainland, discharge themselves into it, and raise there great bars and shelves that choke up the river and render it hardly navigable; whence anciently there arose an opinion of its being frozen. Moreover, the coasts of this continent lying on the sea are inhabited by the Greeks about a bay not much smaller than the Maeotic, the mouth of which lies in a direct line over against that of the Caspian Sea. These name and esteem themselves the inhabitants of the firm land, calling all us others islanders, as dwelling in a land encompassed round about and washed by the sea. And they think that those who heretofore came thither with Hercules and were left there by him, mixing themselves with the people of Saturn, raised up again the Greek nation, which was well near extinguished, brought under and supplanted by the language, laws, and manners of the barbarians, and made it again flourish and recover its pristine vigor. And therefore in that place they give the first honor to Hercules, and the second to Saturn. Now when the star of Saturn, by us called Phaenon and by them Nycturus, comes to the sign of Taurus, as it does once in the time of thirty years, they, having been a long time preparing what is necessary for a solemn sacrifice and a long voyage or navigation, send forth those on whom the lots fall to row in that vast sea, and make their abode for a great while in foreign countries. These men then, being embarked and departed, meet with different adventures, some in one manner, others in another. Now such as have in safety passed the danger of the sea go first ashore in those opposite, islands, which are inhabited by the Greeks, where they see that the sun is scarce hidden one full hour during the space of thirty days, and that this is their night, of which the darkness is but small, as having a twilight from the going down of the sun not unlike the dawning of the day; that having continued there ninety days, during which they are highly caressed and honored, as being reputed and termed holy men, they are afterwards conducted by the winds, and transported into the isle of Saturn, where there are no other inhabitants but themselves and such as have been sent thither before them.