mber of months which are found by reckoning to be spent in going
from Elephantine to these "Deserters": and the river runs from the West
and the setting of the sun. But what comes after that point no one can
clearly say; for this land is desert by reason of the burning heat. This
much however I heard from men of Kyrene, who told me that they had been
to the Oracle of Ammon, and had come to speech with Etearchos king of
the Ammonians: and it happened that after speaking of other matters they
fell to discourse about the Nile and how no one knew the sources of it;
and Etearchos said that once there came to him men of the Nasamonians
(this is a Libyan race which dwells in the Syrtis, and also in the land
to the East of the Syrtis reaching to no great distance), and when the
Nasamonians came and were asked by him whether they were able to tell
him anything more than he knew about the desert parts of Libya, they
said that there had been among them certain sons of chief men, who were
of unruly disposition; and these when they grew up to be men had devised
various other extravagant things and also they had told off by lot five
of themselves to go to see the desert parts of Libya and to try
whether they could discover more than those who had previously explored
furthest: for in those parts of Libya which are by the Northern Sea,
beginning from Egypt and going as far as the headland of Soloeis, which
is the extreme point of Libya, Libyans (and of them many races) extend
along the whole coast, except so much as the Hellenes and Phenicians
hold; but in the upper parts, which lie above the sea-coast and above
those people whose land comes down to the sea, Libya is full of wild
beasts; and in the parts above the land of wild beasts it is full of
sand, terribly waterless and utterly desert. These young men then (said
they), being sent out by their companions well furnished with supplies
of water and provisions, went first through the inhabited country, and
after they had passed through this they came to the country of wild
beasts, and after this they passed through the desert, making their
journey towards the West Wind; and having passed through a great tract
of sand in many days, they saw at last trees growing in a level place;
and having come up to them, they were beginning to pluck the fruit which
was upon the trees: but as they began to pluck it, there came upon them
small men, of less stature than men of the common size, and these s