e a list of
the chief places on the roads, which, radiating from Rome, formed a
network over the Empire, was inscribed on the Golden Milestone in the
Forum.

[Illustration: A PORTION OF AN OLD ROMAN MAP OF THE WORLD, SHOWING
THE ROADS THROUGH THE EMPIRE, RIVERS, MOUNTAINS, AND THE SURROUNDING
SEAS. This is a portion--a few inches--taken from the famous Peutinger
Table, a long strip map on parchment, of the fourth century, derived
from Augustan maps according to the measurements of Caesar Augustus
Agrippa. It will be noticed how the roads, beginning with the Twelve
Ways, which start from Rome in the centre, go in straight lines over
all obstacles to the towns of the Empire. Distances are marked in stadia
(about 1/9 mile).]

We may well imagine with what keen interest the schoolmen of Alexandria
would watch the extension of the Roman Empire. Here Strabo had studied,
here or at Rome he probably wrote his great work toward the close of
a long life. He has read his Homer and inclines to take every word
he says as true. Herodotus he will have none of.

"Herodotus and other writers trifle very much," he asserts, "when they
introduce into their histories the marvellous like an interlude of
some melody."

In like manner he disbelieves poor Pytheas and his accounts of the
land of Ultima Thule and his marvellous walks through Britain, while
he clings to the writings of Eratosthenes.

But in common with them all Strabo believes the world to be one vast
island, surrounded on all sides by ocean into which the rivers flow,
and the Caspian Sea and Persian Gulf are but inlets. So is also the
Mediterranean or "Our Sea," as he prefers to call it. This earth-island
reaches north to south, from Ireland, "barely habitable on account
of the cold," to the cinnamon country (Somaliland), "the most
southerly point of the habitable earth." From west to east it stretches
from the Pillars of Hercules right "through the middle of Our Sea"
to the shores of Asia Minor, then across Asia by an imaginary chain
of mountains to an imaginary spot where the Ganges, lately discovered,
emptied its waters into the world-surrounding ocean stream.

[Illustration: THE WORLD-ISLAND ACCORDING TO STRABO, 18 A.D. The blank
space within the circle is one vast sea surrounding the world.]

The breadth of the habitable earth is three thousand miles, the length
about seven thousand--a little world, indeed, with the greater world
lying all around it, still undreamt