[114] Servius in commenting on Æneid, xii. 200, says, “The first inhabitants of the earth never carried fire to their altars, but by their prayers brought it down from heaven.” The Parsees of India, when by any accident their fire is extinguished, _use burning glasses_. [115] See Scholiast to the Clouds of Aristophanes. [116] Salanti, vol. i. p. 285. Aboulala (4th century) says, “The stars which form the milky-way.” Aristotle speaks of the mirrors for surveying the heavens. Those of Memphis and Pharos are often mentioned. Strabo speaks of tubes for magnifying objects; such tubes are mentioned in old Arabic writers. [117] Damascius (apud Photium. Biblioth, cap. 242) describes the figure of a head thrown upon the wall of the temple in this manner, which could only be done by a magic lantern. [118] Theodorus, who constructed the labyrinth of Samos, placed a chariot and four horses on the finger of a statue of himself; the chariot, horses, and charioteer could all be covered by the wings of a fly, which he also devised. The same is related of Myrmecedes. Callicrates cut insects, the limbs of which could not be discovered by the naked eye. See Pliny, Nat. Hist., b. xxxiv. c. 5; B. xxxvi. c. 5. [119] Μύρ’ ἄγοντες ἀθύρματα νηἱ μελαίνη. [120] Ἀγοράζοντες τὸν ἄργυρον μικρὸς τινὸς ὰντιδότες ἄλλων φορτιων.--STRABO. [121] “We neither inhabit a maritime country,” says Josephus, “nor do we delight in merchandise, nor in the mixture with other men that arises from it. Our cities are remote from the sea, and having a fruitful country, we take care in cultivating that only.” In the expeditions under Solomon it is expressly stated that the men of Tyre went to navigate their ships. [122] I have described a similar state of things as existing in our own times at Ambelakia in Thessaly, and the Mademo Choria in Macedonia. See “The Spirit of the East.” [123] “Nothing was known of the balance of trade, and consequently all the violent measures resulting from it were unknown to the Greeks ... as everything was decided by examinations and not by theories, there may have been exceptions, where the state for a time usurped a monopoly. But how far was this from the mercantile and restrictive system of the moderns.”--HEEREN _Pol. Hist. Ancient Greece_, c. x. 163. [124] The coin is in one of the addenda to Flores;--it is not in the copy at the British Museum. The coin is, however, known in the medal room. [125] It is figured on a vase in the Museo Borbonico. CHAPTER XII. THE STONE OF HERCULES. “Behold thou art wiser than Daniel; there is no secret that they can hide from thee.” “The wise men that were in thee, O Tyrus, were they pilots?”