MERGE TO GYRENE. 
4-29 
and is no otherwise serviceable than as it affords an occasional 
draught to the Bedouins who frequent the neighbourhood during 
the summer, and to the cattle who drink with their masters. The 
excavated chambers of the fountain of Apollo * are occupied at this 
season by flocks of sheep and goats, and the whole of the level space 
in front of the mountain is thickly covered at such times with these 
animals, as well as with numerous herds of cattle, attracted thither 
by the water which now strays over its surface. When we first 
arrived at Cyrene these intruders had not made their appearance ; 
and we rambled about, to our great comfort and satisfaction, without 
meeting a single living creature besides those of our own party in 
the day time, and a few jackalls and hyaenas in the morning and 
evening, which always ran off* on our approach. 
After satisfying our thirst, and, in some degree, our curiosity, at the 
fountain, we descended a few feet to some remains which we per- 
ceived on a level piece of ground below it ; and found that they were 
those of a peripteral temple which, from the fragment of an inscrip- 
tion that we discovered among its ruins, mentioning the name of 
the Goddess, appears to have been dedicated to Diana. 
Little more than the ground-plan of this temple is now remaining, 
and' most of the columns are buried beneath the soil ; we were able, 
* In speaking of the fountain to which the Libyans conducted the founders of Cyrene, 
Herodotus says, avasyovTEr Je etti xq-nmv A'ltoWmos, eittocv — “AvS^ej 
ExXrivEr, evTocuToc vixiv iTcirri^sov ontEEiv' svra.uTx yocq o ovqavo^ rErp-nrat.’' — (Meip. §voi'). 
And as the stream here alluded to is the principal fountain of the place we may sup- 
pose it with probability to have been that of Apollo. 
