Bears
the name Narkandam, in which one cannot but recognise [Script], Narak,
"Hell"; perhaps Naraka-kundam, "a pit of hell." Can it be that in old
times, but still contemporary with Hindu navigation, this volcano was
active, and that some Brahman St. Brandon recognised in it the mouth of
Hell, congenial to the Rakshasas of the adjacent group?
"Si est de saint Brandon le matere furnie;
Qui fu si pres d'enfer, a nef et a galie,
Que deable d'enfer issirent, par maistrie,
Getans brandons de feu, pour lui faire hasquie."
- Bauduin de Seboure, I. 123.
(Ramusio, III. 391; Ham. II. 65; Navarrete (Fr. Ed.), II. 101;
Cathay, 467; Bullet. de la Soc. de Geog. ser. IV. tom iii. 36-37;
J.A.S.B. u.s.; Reinaud's Abulfeda, I. 315; J. Ind. Arch., N.S.,
III. I. 105; La Porte Ouverte, p. 188.) [I shall refer to my edition of
Odoric, 206-217, for a long notice on dog-headed barbarians; I
reproduce here two of the cuts. - H.C.]
CHAPTER XIV.
CONCERNING THE ISLAND OF SEILAN.
When you leave the Island of Angamanain and sail about a thousand miles in
a direction a little south of west, you come to the Island of SEILAN,
[NOTE 1] which is in good sooth the best Island of its size in the world.
You must know that it has a compass of 2400 miles, but in old times it was
greater still, for it then had a circuit of about 3600 miles, as you find
in the charts of the mariners of those seas.
