sleep. The king's court
is in the middle of the city; here he sits all night, calls every
one by name, and if they do not appear, condemns them to death for
deserting their post; their death is, to be put out; we stood by and
heard several of them plead their excuses for non-attendance. Here
I found my own lamp, talked to him, and asked him how things went on
at home; he told me everything that had happened. We stayed there
one night, and next day loosing our anchor, sailed off very near the
clouds; where we saw, and greatly admired the city of Nephelo-
coccygia, {98a} but the wind would not permit us to land. Coronus,
the son of Cottiphion, is king there. I remember Aristophanes,
{98b} the poet, speaks of him, a man of wisdom and veracity, the
truth of whose writings nobody can call in question. About three
days after this, we saw the ocean very plainly, but no land, except
those regions which hang in the air, and which appeared to us all
bright and fiery. The fourth day about noon, the wind subsiding, we
got safe down into the sea. No sooner did we touch the water, but
we were beyond measure rejoiced. We immediately gave every man his
supper, as much as we could afford, and afterwards jumped into the
sea and swam, for it was quite calm and serene.

It often happens, that prosperity is the forerunner of the greatest
misfortunes. We had sailed but two days in the sea, when early in
the morning of the third, at sun-rise, we beheld on a sudden several
whales, and one amongst them, of a most enormous size, being not
less than fifteen hundred stadia in length, he came up to us with
his mouth wide open, disturbing the sea for a long way before him,
the waves dashing round on every side; he whetted his teeth, which
looked like so many long spears, and were white as ivory; we
embraced and took leave of one another, expecting him every moment;
he came near, and swallowed us up at once, ship and all; he did not,
however, crush us with his teeth, for the vessel luckily slipped
through one of the interstices; when we were got in, for some time
it was dark, and we could see nothing; but the whale happening to
gape, we beheld a large space big enough to hold a city with ten
thousand men in it; in the middle were a great number of small fish,
several animals cut in pieces, sails and anchors of ships, men's
bones, and all kinds of merchandise; there was likewise a good
quantity of land and hills, which seemed to have been