Some writers place even beyond this, upon the shore, one town of Æthiopia, called Baricaza. Juba will have it that at the Promontory of Mossylum[701] the Atlantic Sea begins, and that with a north-west wind[702] we may sail past his native country, the Mauritanias, and arrive at Gades. We ought not on this occasion to curtail any portion of the opinions so expressed by him. He says that after we pass the promontory of the Indians,[703] known as Lepteacra, and by others called Drepanum, the distance, in a straight line, beyond the island of Exusta and Malichu, is fifteen hundred miles; from thence to a place called Sceneos two hundred and twenty-five; and from thence to the island of Adanu one hundred and fifty miles; so that the distance to the open sea[704] is altogether eighteen hundred and seventy-five miles. All the other writers, however, are of opinion that, in consequence of the intensity of the sun’s heat, this sea is not navigable; added to which, commerce is greatly exposed to the depredations of a piratical tribe of Arabians called Ascitæ,[705] who dwell upon the islands: placing two inflated skins of oxen beneath a raft of wood, they ply their piratical vocation with the aid of poisoned arrows. We learn also from the same author that some nations of the Troglodytæ have the name of Therothoæ,[706] being so called from their skill in hunting. They are remarkable for their swiftness, he says, just as the Ichthyophagi are, who can swim like the animals whose element is the sea. He speaks also of the Bangeni, the Gangoræ, the Chalybes, the Xoxinæ, the Sirechæ, the Daremæ, and the Domazames. Juba states, too, that the inhabitants who dwell on the banks of the Nile from Syene as far as Meroë, are not a people of Æthiopia, but Arabians; and that the city of the Sun, which we have mentioned[707] as situate not far from Memphis, in our description of Egypt, was founded by Arabians. There are some writers who take away the further bank of the Nile from Æthiopia,[708] and unite it to Africa;[709] and they people its sides with tribes attracted thither by its water. We shall leave these matters, however, to the option of each, to form his opinion on them, and shall now proceed to mention the towns on each side[710] in the order in which they are given. CHAP. 35.—ÆTHIOPIA. On leaving Syene,[711] and taking first the Arabian side, we find the nation of the Catadupi, then the Syenitæ, and the town of Tacompsos,[712] by some called Thatice, as also Aramasos, Sesamos, Sanduma, Masindomacam, Arabeta and Boggia, Leupitorga, Tantarene, Mecindita, Noa, Gloploa, Gystate, Megada, Lea, Renni, Nups, Direa, Patiga, Bacata, Dumana, Rhadata, at which place a golden cat was worshipped as a god, Boron, in the interior, and Mallos, near Meroë; this is the account given by Bion.