CHAP famine, afflicted the subjects of Justinian, and his XLIII. reign is disgraced by a visible decrease of the hu man species, which has never been repaired in some of the fairest countries of the globe *. * After some figures of rhetoric, the sands of the sea, &c, Procopius (Anecdot. c. 18.) attempts a more definite account: that μυριάδας μυριάδων κυρίως had been exterminated under the reign of the Imperial dæmon. The expression is obscure in grammar and arithmetic, and a literal interprétation would produce several millions of millions. Alemannus (p. 80.) and Cousin (tom. iii. p. 178.) translate this passage, 66 two hundred "millions;" but I am ignorant of their motives. If we drop the pugadas, the remaining ugiadwy μugias, a myriad of myriads, uld furnish one hundred millions, a number not wholly inadmissible. END OF THE SEVENTH VOLUME. : APR 19 1970 |
