Pytheas of Marseilles

Extract

The English are a nation of shopkeepers—Napoleon has said it—and as good commercials we travel. Of all those who at one time or another visit Marseilles, our gateway to the South and East, how many, I wonder, even of those who have received a classical education, remember that they are after all but paying the compliment of a return call, since from that port sailed over 2,200 years ago the first Greek expedition τω̃ν ἡμει̃ς ἴδμεν to explore the North and West and visit the British Isles, under the command of Pytheas.