VI. 
DELPHI. 237 
before published by the author of these Travels '. chap. 
The cavern alluded to by IFkeler, in the cleft 
above the Castali an fountain, was formerly acces- 
sible, by means of stairs also cut in the marble 
rock : but a part only of the steps remain; and 
it would be difficult now to approach it. The 
water of the Castalian fountain is cool and 
pleasant to the taste. Wheler quaintly describes 
it% as " fit to quench the thirst of those hot- 
headed poets, who, in their bacchanals, spare 
neither God nor man ; and to whom nothing is 
so sacred, but they will venture to profane it." 
After passing from the hath, or bason, below the 
votive receptacles, it falls down southward, in a 
deep and narrow channel, towards the Pleistus, 
separating Mount Cirphis from Parnassus*; and 
having joined that river, it runs by the ruins of 
Crissa, into the Crisscean Bay. In the first part 
of its course from the fountain, it separates the 
remains of the Gymnasium, where the Monastery 
(2) See " Tomb o{ Alexander " Appendix, No. 4. p. 155. C<tmb. IS'15. 
The Inscription is as follows : it was discovered by Sir IV. Gell : 
ET2TPATI2 
A A K I A A M O T 
AMBPT2I02 
S T M F E P I n O A O I 
F A N I N T M <& A I 2 
(S) See fr/<e/fr's Journey into Greece, p. 315. Loud. 16^-. 
(4) Ibid. p. 316. 
