e Hellespont, appears to have been comprehended between the hillock called the Tomb of
Achilles and the southern base of the heights, on which is situated another
tomb, which goes by the name of the Tomb of Ajax. This space of
about 1500 toises in length, now sand and lagunes, where the village
Koum Kale and the fortress called the New Castle of Asia stand, and
which spreads across the mouth of the Menderé, once formed a creek, the
bottom of which, from examination on the spot, extended 1200 or 1500
for desolation implies a deficiency of inhabitants, but not a
complete destruction of the place; but those persons destroyed
it entirely, whom they think worthy of sacred rites, and worship as gods; unless, perhaps, they should plead that these
persons engaged in a just, and Hercules in an unjust, war, on
account of the horses of Laomedon. To this is opposed a
fabulous tale, that it was not on account of the horses but of
the reward for the delivery of Hesione from the sea-mons
Africa., where it may be seen at the present day.
In addition to these facts, it has been observed that the
waters of the Nile rise in the same proportion in which the
snows and rains of Mauritania increase. Pouring forth from
this lake, the river disdains to flow through arid and sandy
deserts, and for a distance of several days' journey conceals
itself; after which it bursts forth at another lake of greater
magnitude in the country of the MassæsyliA district which in reality was at least 1200 or 1500 miles distant from any part of the Nile, and probably near 3000 from its real source., a people of
Mauritania Cæsariensis, and thence casts a glance around, as
it were, upon the communities of men in its vicinity, giving
proofs of its identity in the same peculiarities of the animals
which it produces. It then buries itself once again in the
sands of the desert, and remains concealed for a distance of
twenty days' journey, till it has reached the confines of Æthiopia.
Here, when it ha
