Description
INDIA has been traditionally regarded as a land of wonder and mystery, a place where strange people live and strange things happen. This tradition was estab- lished by the Greeks, whose first observer of whom we have any record embellished his account of India in the sixth century B.C. with marvels. The Skiapodes, he said, were a race with feet so large, that they were able to use them as sunshades, while others had ears of equal pro- portions in which they could wrap themselves against the cold. Herodotus followed with the story of ants ‘larger than foxes but smaller than dogs’ who threw out gold dust from their diggings in the desert, which was then procured by ingenious and hazardous means. From this it was but a step to the story told by Ctesias of a creature like a lion with a human face, shooting stings from its tail, and that of Megasthenes concerning a race of gentler manners’, who had no mouths.
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