Another detachment of his army proceeded to the country of the Shepherds, who, indeed, furnished him with food; but, exasperated at the sacrilege he had committed against their god, they conducted his troops through places where they could procure no water. After suffering all this loss, he was not yet arrived beyond 24°, the parallel of Syené. From hence he dispatched ambassadors, or spies, to discover the country before him, finding he could no longer rely upon the Shepherds. These found it full of black war-like people, of great size, and prodigious strength of body;
active, and continually exercised in hunting the lion, the elephant, and other monstrous beasts which live in these forests.
The inhabitants so abounded with gold, that the most common utensils and instruments were made of that metal, whilst, at the same time, they were utter strangers to bread of any kind whatever ; and, not only so, but their country was, by its nature, incapable of producing any sort of grain from which bread could be made. They subsisted upon raw flesh alone, dried in the fun, especially that of the rhinoceros, the elephant, and giraffa, which they had slain in hunting. On such food they have ever since lived, and live to this day, and on such food I myself have lived with them; yet still it appears strange, that people confined to this diet, without variety or change, should have it for their characteristic that they were long livers.
They were not at all alarmed at the arrival of Cambyses's ambassadors. On the contrary, they treated them as an inferior species of men. Upon asking them about their diet,
