LAKE CARALITIS. 



249 



trot on in advance of the party to gain time 

 and graze. The elder children followed, and 

 then men and women in the prime of life. 

 The seniors of the party brought up the rear, 

 among whom was an aged matron, fast approach- 

 ing a century of years, her withered and infirm 

 body doubled up on the back of a huge camel. 

 It seemed as if this was the last time she, the 

 great-grandmother of the party, was to accom- 

 pany her descendants to their summer retreat. 

 They all seemed in high spirits, and happy to 

 quit the lowlands. Such was the life of the 

 patriarchs. 



After travelling for four hours we found 

 ourselves on the top of a mountain-ridge, over- 

 looking a small plain to the westward. Our 

 guide called it Talinglee. Riding for half an 

 hour along its eastern edge, we suddenly came 

 upon a large lake or rather marsh, being a 

 great expanse of water choked with reeds and 

 rushes. This is, doubtless, the lake Caralis, or 

 Caralitis, by the side of which the army of 

 Manlius marched, on their way to Mandropo- 

 lis. Its peculiar character, very different from 

 the true lakes of the uplands, would account 

 for the term Palas applied to it by Livy. Near 



