220 On the Arabian Frontier of Egypt. 



Since it is now made clear that the large body of water to 

 the south of the Serapeum was considered the sea in Pliny's 

 time, it could not have been the " bitter lakes'"' that Strabo 

 had mentioned 50 years before ; and, indeed, he speaks of 

 that very spot with more propriety of description than he 

 has got credit for, " as the inner recess, thMyoc,, of the Arabian 

 Gulf, the one close to Egypt,'' and on (or about) which, near 

 Arsinoe, Heroopolis was situated, and other harbours and 

 dwellings; near which were several canals with lakes adja- 

 cent to them, as well as the nome and city of Phagroriopolis ; 

 — a description which never coiild have applied exclusively to 

 the immediate vicinity of the present gulf of Suez, from the 

 want of fresh water which has always characterised that in- 

 hospitable region. 



And if, even thus far, Strabo's own account would justify 

 a doubt whether his " bitter lakes'^ occupied the place of the 

 salt-marshes, that doubt will become a certainty, if we en- 

 deavour to apply the particulars he gives concei'ning the lakes, 

 to this site that hitherto has been so unfortunately chosen to 

 repi-esent them. 



Firstly, Strabo unequivocally refers to several lakes, t as 

 those through which the canal that led to Arsinoe ran. Now, 



reason of the canals being unfinished, as they say, by Darius, the greater height 

 of the Ked Sea, which made him afraid of inundating the country by cutting 

 through the isthmus ; and they add that Ptolemy, who finished it, proved this 

 to be an error ; as, by means of an euripus, — a series of locks that were opened to 

 admit the vessels, and closed again instantly, — the canal was made navigable to 

 the sea without difficulty. 



Diodorus, who is followed by Strabo, has evidently confounded the opera- 

 tions of Darius with those of Ptolemy. As the canal teas finished up to the sea 

 by Darius, according to the unequivocal account of Herodotus, the euripus would 

 be wanted there, and that work should correctly be referred to Darius, its situ- 

 ation being at Baal-zephon or Port Daneon. But Diodorus was not aware of the 

 sea's having retired, though he had learnt that, since Darius, some additions had 

 been made to the canal by Ptolemy ; the long established fact of its completion, 

 and the ingenious structure of the euripus, which was a matter of equal noto- 

 riety, easily explain the confusion this writer makes between the authors of the 

 two parts of the canal. Strabo has merely repeated his mistake. I have al- 

 ready shewn that, on this matter, he admits that he only spoke from report of 

 those parts, which he had not visited. 



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