MERGE TO GYRENE. 
547 
That which is built across is placed at one angle of the range, and is 
eight feet wider the average breadth, taking it at twenty feet. If a 
groom or a coachman were to give an opinion with respect to the 
use of the chambers in question, with reference to the structure 
above, they would certainly decide, without the least hesitation, that 
this uniform, long range of building, was the stabling of the palace, 
and could only have been appropriated to the horses and chariots of 
the noble Cyrenean who inhabited it. As we have never seen the 
stables of any ancient residence, whether Grecian or Eoman, we will 
not venture to assign such a use to these chambers ; but it is w ell 
known that the Cyreneans were particularly celebrated for their skil- 
ful management of horses and chariots, and we must confess, without 
being either coachmen or grooms, that such an appropriation did 
more than once occur to us *. 
There are remains of apartments adjoining each other to the west- 
ward of the handsome colonnades which we have mentioned, the 
plans of which we would not hazard without excavation ; nor could 
we without it complete that of the porticoes, the columns of which 
are nearly four feet in diameter. The w hole building appears to 
have extended about three hundred feet in a southerly direction, and 
to have occupied more than four hundred in length from east to 
* The pasturage of Gyrene and Barca was always, as it is at present, abundant ; and both 
cities were remarkable for their excellent breed of horses, and their more than ordinary 
skill in driving. Pindar gives the epithet eutumr (renowned for horses) to Gyrene ; and 
the Barceans, we are told (see the t&nxa of Stephanus), derived their art of rearing 
them from Neptune, and their dexterity in the management of chariots from Minerva. 
o'l ras l'j^7for^a(pt(ZS' Tta^a. rio!7Ei^ft)vor, 5 e •na.^a, •nfj.a^oy. 
4 A 2 
