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rained down these stones upon the Ligurians themselves, and
thus have destroyed them all, than to make Hercules in need
of so many stones? As for the number, they were necessary
against so vast a multitude; so that in this respect the writer
of the myth seems to me deserving of more credit than he
who would refute it. Further, the poet, in describing it as
fated, secures himself against such fault-finding. For if you
dispute Providence and Destiny, you can find many similar
things both in human affairs and nature, that you would
suppose might be much better performed in this or that
way; as for instance, that Egypt should have plenty of rain
of its own, without being irrigated from the land of Ethiopia. That it would have been much better if Paris had suffered shipwreck on his voyage to Sparta, instead of expiating
his offences after having carried off Helen, and having been
the cause of so great destruction both amongst the Greeks
and Barbarians. Euripides attributes this to Jupiter:
Father Jupiter, willing evil to the Trojans and suffering to the
Greeks, decreed such things.
8
As to the mouths of the Rhone, Polybius asserts that there are but two, and blames Timaeus note for saying five. Artemidorus says that there are three. Afterwards Marius, observing that the mouth was becoming stopped up and difficult of entrance on account of the deposits of mud, caused a new channel to be dug, which received the greater part of the river into it. note This he gave to the people of Marseilles in recompense for their services in the war against the Ambrones and Toygeni. note This canal became to them a source of much revenue, as they levied a toll from all those who sailed up or down it: notwithstanding, the entrance [to the river] still continues difficult to navigate, on account of its great impetuosity, its deposits, and the [general] flatness of the country, so that in foul weather you cannot clearly discern the land
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Strabo, Geography (English) (XML Header) [genre: prose] [word count] [lemma count] [Str.].