Note 2 — Chapter II · CANAL PROJECTS.
Reading edition
Herodotus tells a story how the people of Knidos were forbidden by the Delphic oracle to make a canal through the isthmus, along which their Persian enemies could advance by land to attack them. The oracle said that if Zeus had wished the place to be an island he would have made it one. There is a curious resemblance between this story and that related in the text.