30
FRAGMENT I.,
or an Epitome of Megasthenês.
(Diod. II. 35-42.)
(35.) 1/1bIndia, which is in shape quadrilateral, has its eastern as well as its western side bounded by the great sea, but on the northern side it is divided by Mount Hemôdos from that part of Skythia which is inhabited by those Skythians who are called the Sakai, while the fourth or western side is bounded by the river called the Indus, which is perhaps the largest of all rivers in the world after the Nile. 2The extent of the whole country from east to west is said to be 28,000 stadia, and from north to south 32,000. 3Being thus of such vast extent, it seems well-nigh to em- brace the whole of the northern tropic zone of the earth, and in fact at the extreme point of India the gnomon of the sundial may frequently be observed to cast no shadow, while the constellation of the Bear is by night invisible, and in the remotest parts even Arcturus disappears from view. Consistently with this, it is also stated that shadows there fall to the southward.
4India has many huge mountains which abound in fruit-trees of every kind, and many vast plains of great fertility-more or less beautiful,
