162 THE VOYAGE OF PYTHEAS, [CHAP.
not to lay any great stress on them in determining the question of
the extent of Pytheas' voyage.
One more point in Pytheas' account of these northern countries
„„ „ . remains to be noticed which certainly is not the
Wonders of . t
the Arctic least remarkable. This is his description of the
Regions. Arctic regions," in which," he said, " neither land,
nor sea, nor air any longer existed separately, but there was, so to
speak, a mixture of all three, resembling the pulmo marinus^ in
which the land and the sea and all things floated, and this was as
it were the element which held together the universe, while it
could not be traversed either by foot or sail. He had himself
seen that which resembled the pulmo marinu$y the rest he reported
from hearsay1." It is certainly not surprising that a description
such as this should have aroused scepticism in the minds of the
ancients, nor that it should have been a standing puzzle to exercise
the ingenuity of modern interpreters. It reads like an account on
Pytheas' part of stories communicated to him by the natives con-
cerning the weird unearthly sights—especially the effects of mist
and light—which at all times have caused the regions towards the
Pole to be a land of marvel, and concerning the strange calms and
counter-currents, which often impede navigation in those waters,
and among the Romans obtained for them the name of ' the
sluggish sea87 (Mare pigrum). This account he seems to have
invested in Platonic language; indeed there is a marked corre-
spondence in certain points between this passage and the descrip-
tion of the world of spirits in the tenth Book of Plato's Republic,
where a brilliant light is spoken of as 'the bond that holds
together the universe1; and the word by which this is expressed
(Sopot, (nJvSeor/jLos) is the same which Pytheas employs8. Much
additional perplexity, however, is introduced into the question by
1 Strabo, i. 4. r.
2 See Tacitus, Agric., 10; Mare pigrum et grave remigantibus perhibent
ne vends quidem perinde attolli. Also, for the superstitious fancies suggested
by the sunlight of the North, Germ. 45 ; Extremus cadentis jam solis fulgor in
ortum edurat adeo clarus, ut sidera hebetet; sonum insuper emergentis audiri
fonnaeque decorem et radios capitis adspici persuasio adicit.
8 Plat. Rep., 10. p. 6i6B; see Berger, GoMkU der Erdkunde, Pt. 3,
P- *3-