[12]We have already stated that Shekh Mahommed was called el Dúbbah, or the Hyæna.
[13]The camel has been known to go as much as ten days without water, but they suffer very much from an abstinence of three and four days.
[14]Μετα δε την λιμνην τοπος εστιν Ασπις, και λιμην καλλιστος των εν τῆ Συρτει.—Lib. 17, p. 836.
[15]Buildings of the same nature are also found in the Cyrenaica.
[16]Aspis is laid down in Ptolemy on the western side of the gulf, at about sixty miles within the promontory of Triæorium; but this distance would only bring us within nine miles of Jaireed, and we have already stated that Mahād Hassān is the first place in the Syrtis (travelling eastward) which can be considered as an ancient site. Strabo’s lake finishes at Sooleb, but there are no remains of building in the neighbourhood of that place, nor between it and Mahād Hassān.
[17]The naval station above mentioned, at the junction of Strabo’s lake with the sea, is not styled λιμην, but υφορμος; and we may conclude from this circumstance that it was formed by art, and not by any of those peculiarities of coast which usually constitute a fort.
[18]It is formed by a rocky projection, which appeared to have been partly natural and partly artificial; and though its inconsiderable size would not allow vessels in it to ride clear of the surf in a gale of wind, yet in moderate weather there would be quite sufficient shelter for them to load and unload; and in the event of a gale they might easily have been hauled up on the beach.—See the plan of Mersa Zaffrān annexed.
[19]The tower of Euphrantas is however stated to have been a boundary fort under the Ptolemies; and the fortress of Automala, at the bottom of the gulf, is mentioned by Diodorus to have been in existence before the occupation of Cyrene by the first of those princes.—See Strabo, lib. 17, and Diod., lib. 20.
[20]“With regard to Egypt, Africa, and Spain, (says Gibbon, in describing the distribution of the Roman forces,) as they were far removed from any important scene of war, a single legion maintained the domestic tranquillity of these great provinces.”
“We may compute (says the same writer) that the legion, which was itself a body of six thousand eight hundred and thirty-one Romans, might, with its attendant auxiliaries, amount to about twelve thousand five hundred men.”