240 Scientific Travellers : — Mr. Forbes. 



water fishes have hitherto been unsuccessful. The river Xaiithus is 

 said to contain them, but though I have offered to reward anybody 

 who would bring me some, I have not been able to procure any. 



" As however I mean to remain in this country while the ship is 

 at Malta refitting, I hope during my excursions into the interior to 

 succeed better. Among the other Vertebrata I have done but little, 

 saving the collecting of reptiles. Marine operations have so taken 

 up my time, that the preservation of birds and mammalia has been 

 out of the question. 



" Among the former, however, I have just procured a beautiful 

 Kingfisher, probably the Alcedo Smyrnensis ; among the latter, I am 

 now busy collecting information regarding those inhabiting the moun- 

 tains of Cragus and Taurus. Geology and botany have not been 

 neglected, but for my chief botanical harvest I look forward to this 

 season. Cerigo, Santorini, Rhodes and Lycia have yielded me a rich 

 harvest of fossils. Among the results of my dredging are the recent 

 analogues of several tertiary species of shells supposed extinct." 



Extracts from another letter of Mr. Forbes, dated Macri, Asia 

 Minor, February 1842 : — 



" I am now in a new continent, one I had not rambled in before, 

 and one, the scenes and wonders of which, I assure you, surpass 

 most of those I had before admired in Europe. In the month of 

 October I first set foot in Asia, a day or two after having been at 

 Patmos, where, of course, I visited the traditional scene of St. John^s 

 exile and meditations. The supposed cave where the great poet of 

 Christianity wrote his grand work is almost hidden under the mass 

 of gewgaws heaped upon it by the Greek monks who live in the 

 monastery built over it. The monastery is not, however, an un- 

 worthy one, since for many ages it has been the chief school of the 

 Archipelago. When I visited it, a large deal table with wooden 

 forms ranged round it, under a shed open to the air and facing a 

 delicious view of the sea and the distant islands, was the only furni- 

 ture of this primitive university. 



" Cnidus was the first footing afforded me in Asia, and the first of 

 the many ruined and once famous cities which I have been destined 

 to visit. Telmessus, where I now am, was the next, a site, every 

 stone of which is familiar to me, in consequence of its having unex- 

 pectedly become the Beacon's head- quarters. When I arrived here 

 I had no expectation of remaining, and was glad to make the best of 

 my time, starting off with one of our officers on an exploring tour 

 into the interior. Our route was one never before travelled by tourist, 

 and as our objects were antiquarian as well as scientific, the interest 

 was doubled ; not to mention the great pleasure of seeing the pre- 

 sent inhabitants of the country in an unsophisticated state — a peo- 

 ple possessed of more good qualities than any I had previously met, 

 yet sadly libelled by geographers and travellers, who frighten all 

 visitors from these shores by their bugbear tales of the ferocity of the 

 natives. During our inland excursion we discovered several of the lost 

 cities of Lycia, among others Choma and Balbura. I never thought 

 city-hunting could have given me so much pleasure as it has done. 



