tracts of country were supposed to be inhabited by equally monstrous
animals. Illustrations of most of these were utilised to fill up
the many vacant spaces in the mediæval maps of Asia.

One author, indeed, in his theological zeal, went much further in
modifying the conceptions of the habitable world. A Christian merchant
named Cosmas, who had journeyed to India, and was accordingly known
as COSMAS INDICOPLEUSTES, wrote, about 540 A.D., a work entitled
"Christian Topography," to confound what he thought to be the erroneous
views of Pagan authorities about the configuration of the world. What
especially roused his ire was the conception of the spherical form
of the earth, and of the Antipodes, or men who could stand upside
down. He drew a picture of a round ball, with four men standing
upon it, with their feet on opposite sides, and asked triumphantly
how it was possible that all four could stand upright? In answer
to those who asked him to explain how he could account for day
and night if the sun did not go round the earth, he supposed that
there was a huge mountain in the extreme north, round which the sun
moved once in every twenty-four hours. Night was when the sun was
going round the other side of the mountain. He also proved, entirely
to his own satisfaction, that the sun, instead of being greater,
was very much smaller than the earth. The earth was, according to
him, a moderately sized plane, the inhabited parts of which were
separated from the antediluvian world by the ocean, and at the
four corners of the whole were the pillars which supported the
heavens, so that the whole universe was something like a big glass
exhibition case, on the top of which was the firmament, dividing
the waters above and below it, according to the first chapter of
Genesis.