To have called them only _Apes_, had been flat and
low, and lessened the grandieur of the Battle. But this _Periphrasis_ of
them, [Greek: andres pygmaioi], raises the Reader's Phancy, and surprises
him, and is more becoming the Language of an Heroic Poem.
[Footnote A: _Strabo Geograph_. lib. 1. p.m. 25.]
[Footnote B: _Strabo_ ibid. p.m. 30.]
But how came the _Cranes_ and _Pygmies_ to fall out? What may be the Cause
of this Mortal Feud, and constant War between them? For _Brutes_, like
_Men_, don't war upon one another, to raise and encrease their Glory, or
to enlarge their Empire. Unless I can acquit my self herein, and assign
some probable Cause hereof, I may incur the same Censure as _Strabo_[A]
passed on several of the _Indian Historians_, [Greek: enekainisan de kai
taen 'Omaerikaen ton Pygmaion geranomachin trispithameis eipontes], for
reviewing the _Homerical_ Fight of the _Cranes_ and _Pygmies_, which he
looks upon only as a fiction of the Poet. But this had been very
unbecoming _Homer_ to take a _Simile_ (which is designed for illustration)
from what had no Foundation in Nature.
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