$ 15. Having thus stated the boundaries of Africa, we shall now speak of the islands in the Mediterranean: Cyprus lies opposite to Cilicia, and Isauria on that arm of the sea called Mesicos, being 170 miles long, and 122 miles broad. The island of Crete is opposite to the sea called Artatium, northwest is the sea of Crete, and west is the Sicilian or Adriatic sea. It is 100 miles long, and 150 miles broad. There are fifty-three of the islands called the Cyclades. To the east of them is the Risca Sea, to the south the Cretisca or Cretan, to the north the Egisca or Egean, and to the west the Adriatic. The island of Sicily is triangular, and at each end there are towns. The northern is Petores127, near which is the town of Messina; the south angle is Lilitem128, near which is a town of the same name. The island is 157 miles long from east to west, and 70 broad to the eastward. To the north-east is that part of the Mediterranean called the Adriatic, to the south the Apiscan sea, to the west the Tyrrhene sea, and to the north the129 sea, all of which are narrow and liable to storms. Opposite to Italy, a small arm of the sea divides Sardinia from Corsica, which strait is twenty-two miles broad. To the east of it is that part of the Mediterranean called the Tyrrhenian sea, into which the river Tiber empties itself. To the south is the sea which lies opposite to Numidia. To the west the Balearic islands, and to the north Corsica. The island of Corsica lies directly west from the city of Rome. To the south of Corsica is Sardinia, and Tuscany is to the north. It is sixteen miles long, and nine broad130. Africa is to the south of the Balearic islands, Gades to the west, and Spain to the north. Thus I have shortly described the situation of the islands in the Mediterranean.
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Note.-The subsequent sections of this chapter, although not of much importance in themselves, and some of them possessing rather doubtful authenticity, are inserted in this place on the authority of Hakluyt. In an English general collection of voyages and travels, it would have been improper to have omitted these early specimens, some of which are considerably interesting and curious. In some measure these sections do not strictly belong to the present chapter, as limited to the reign of Alfred, and the ninth century; but as they contain isolated circumstances, which do not otherwise properly arrange themselves into the order of our plan, they may be considered as forming a kind of appendix to the era of Alfred. The number of these might have been considerably increased from different sources, chiefly from Hakluyt, who collected them from the ancient historians; but as they contain hardly any information, except historical, which does not enter into our plan, the selection here given has been deemed quite sufficient for this work.
Andrew Leucander, or Whiteman, as his Latinized name is explained by Leland the antiquary, was an English monk, and third abbot of the monastery of Ramsay, who was much addicted to the study of the liberal sciences, devoting incredible exertions, both by day and night, to their cultivation, in which he profited exceedingly. Having a most ardent desire to visit those places where Christ our Saviour had perfected all the mysteries of our redemption, of which he only knew the names in the course of studying the Scriptures, he went from England to the holy city of Jerusalem, where he visited all the places which had been illustrated by the miracles, preaching, and passion of Christ; and on his return to the monastery he was elected abbot. He flourished in the year of our redemption, 1020, under Canute the Dane.
Swanus or Sweno, one of the sons of Earl Godwin, being of a perverse disposition, and faithless to the king, often quarrelled with his father and his brother Harold; and, becoming a pirate, he disgraced the virtues of his ancestors, by his robberies on the seas. At length, being guilty of the murder of his kinsman Bruno, and, as some report, of his own brother, he made a pilgrimage to Jerusalem; and on his return towards England, he was intercepted by the Saracens, by whom he was slain.
Upon the holy festival of Easter, King Edward the Confessor, wearing his royal crown, sat at dinner in his palace of Westminster, surrounded by many of his nobles. While others, after the long abstinence of the lent season, refreshed themselves with dainty viands, on which they fed with much earnestness, he, raising his mind above earthly enjoyments, and meditating on divine things, broke out into excessive laughter, to the great astonishment of his guests. But no one presuming to inquire into the cause of his mirth, all kept silence till dinner was ended. After dinner, when the king had retired to his bed-chamber, to divest himself of his robes, three of his nobles, Earl Harold, an abbot, and a bishop, who were more familiar with him than any of the other courtiers, followed him into the chamber, and boldly asked the reason of his mirth, as it had appeared strange to the whole court that his majesty should break out into unseemly laughter on so solemn a day, while all others were silent. "I saw," said he, "most wonderful things, and therefore did I not laugh without cause." And they, as is customary with all men, became therefore the more anxious to learn the occasion of his mirth, and humbly beseeched him to impart the reason to them. After musing for some time, he at length informed them, that seven sleepers had rested during two hundred years on Mount Ceelius, lying always hitherto on their right sides; but that, in the very moment of his laughter, they had turned themselves over to their left sides, in which posture they should continue asleep for other seventy-four years, being a dire omen of future misery to mankind. For all those things which our Saviour had foretold to his disciples, that were to be fulfilled about the end of the world, should come to pass within those seventy-four years. That nation should rise up against nation, and kingdom against kingdom; and there would be in many places earthquakes, pestilence, and famine, and terrible apparitions in the heavens, and great signs, with great alterations of dominion; wars of the infidels against the Christians, and victories gained by the Christians over the unbelievers. And, as they wondered at these things, the king explained to them the passion of the seven sleepers, with the shape and proportion of each of their bodies, which wonderful things no man had hitherto committed to writing; and all this in so plain and distinct a manner, as if he had always dwelt along with them.
In consequence of this discourse, the earl sent a knight, the bishop a clerk, and the abbot a monk, as ambassadors to Maniches the emperor of Constantinople, carrying letters and presents from the king. The emperor received them very graciously; and after a friendly entertainment, sent them to the bishop of Ephesus with letters, which they name sacred, commanding him to admit the English ambassadors to see the seven sleepers. And it came to pass, that the prophetic vision of King Edward was approved by all the Greeks, who protested that they were assured by their fathers, that the seven sleepers had always before that time reposed on their right sides; but, upon the entry of the Englishmen into the cave where they lay, their bodies confirmed the truth of the foreign vision and prophecy to their countrymen. Neither were the calamities long delayed, which had been foretold by the king. For the Agareni, Arabians, and Turks, enemies of the people of Christ, invading the country of the Christians, spoiled and destroyed many cities of Syria, Lycia, and the lesser and greater Asias, and, among the rest, depopulated Ephesus, and even the holy city of Jerusalem.
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These measures are incorrigibly erroneous, or must have been transposed from some other place, having no possible reference to Corsica. –E.