63. After passing these the course turns again to the east, and if you sail with the ocean to your right and the coast far to your left, you reach the Ganges and the extremity of the continent towards the east _called_ +Khrusê+ (the Golden Khersonese). The river of this region called the +Ganges+ is the largest in India; it has an _annual_ increase and decrease like the Nile, and there is on it a mart called after it, Gangê, through which passes _a considerable traffic_ consisting of betel, the Gangetic spikenard, pearl, and the finest of all muslins—those called the Gangetic. In this locality also there is said to be a gold mine and a gold coin called _Kaltis_. Near this river there is an island of the ocean called +Khrusê+ (or the Golden), which lies directly under the rising sun and at the extremity of the world towards the east. It produces the finest tortoise-shell that is found throughout the whole of the Erythræan Sea. (63) When this coast of savages and monsters is left behind, the course lies eastward, and leads to the Ganges, which is the greatest river of India, and adjoins the extremity of the Eastern continent called +Khrusê+, or the Golden. Near the river, or, according to Ptolemy, on the third of its mouths stands a great emporium of trade called +Gangê+, exporting _Malabathrum_ and cottons and other commodities. Its exact position there are not sufficient data to determine. Khrusê is not only the name of the last part of the continent, but also of an island lying out in the ocean to eastward, not far from the Ganges. It is the last part of the world which is said to be inhabited. The situation of Khrusê is differently defined by different ancient authors. It was not known to the Alexandrine geographers. Pliny seems to have preserved the most ancient report circulated regarding it. He says (VI. xxiii. 80): “Beyond the mouth of the Indus are +Chryse+ and +Argyre+ abounding in metals as I believe, for I can hardly credit what some have related that the soil consists of gold and silver.” Mela (III. 7) assigns to it a very different position, asserting it to be near +Tabis+, the last spur of the range of Taurus. He therefore places it where Eratosthenês places +Thînai+, to the north of the Ganges on the confines of the Indian and Skythian oceans. Ptolemy, in whose time the Transgangetic world was better known, refers it to the peninsula of Malacca, the Golden Khersonese. 64. Beyond this region, immediately under the north, where the sea terminates outwards, there lies somewhere in +Thîna+ a very great city,—not on the coast, but in the interior of the country, called +Thîna+,—from which silk, whether in the raw state or spun into thread