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three centuries, the communication had become narrower, and not 
always deep enough for ships, and the two portions of the sea had 
already received separate names—The Lesser Syrtis and the Bay 
of Triton. 
The next geographer who has described this region, is 
Pomponius Mela, 43 A.D. “The Gulf of Syrtis,” says he, ‘is 
dangerous not only on account of its shallows, but also on account 
of the ebb and flow of the sea. Beyond this Gulf is Lake Pallas, 
or the Great Lake of Triton, which receives the waters of the river 
Triton.” 
In another passage he tells us, that at a considerable distance 
from the shore, towards the interior of the country, there are barren 
plains, where are found skeletons of fishes, shells, oyster-shells, 
rounded pebbles, such as are found in the sea, anchors still 
attached to rocks, and other similar marks, which prove that the 
sea in former times extended thither. 
From these passages we must infer that in the interval of two 
hundred years since Scylax, the Lake and the Gulf had ceased to 
have any longer a communication ; and, as no mention is made of 
the Isle of Triton, we may conclude that the waters were lowered 
by evaporation, and the Isle of Triton, as an island, no longer 
existed. 
After the interval of a century, we come to the great. 
Geographer and Mathematician, Ptolemy. His account of this 
district is too long and too dry for quotation, but there results from 
it this—that Ptolemy knew, not of one, but of several lakes, but 
makes no mention of any communication with thesea. He places, 
however, the mouth of the river Triton on the Little Syrtis, about 
the place, where in former times, had been the entrance into the 
Bay of Triton. 
From these passages there arise the following inferences. 
That at the time of Herodotus, there is a deep gulf with a large 
opening into the sea, and it, and the Little Syrtis, are known by 
the name of the Great Bay of Triton. At the head of this Bay is 
the river Triton, and in it the island Phla. 
Two hundred years later, at the time of Scylax, the Little 
shin 
