[350] Strait of Messina.
[351] Gosselin observes that Le Père Babin, who had carefully examined the currents of the Euripus of Chalcis, says that they are regular during eighteen or nineteen days of every month, the flux and reflux occurring twice in the twenty-four hours, and following the same laws as in the ocean; but from the ninth to the thirteenth, and from the twenty-first to the twenty-sixth, of each lunar month they become irregular, the flux occurring from twelve to fourteen times in the twenty-four hours, and the reflux as often.
[352] See Plutarch, de Plac. Philos. lib. i. c. 14, and Stobæus, Ecl. Phys. lib. i. c. 18.
[353] El-Kas.
[354] The Arabian Gulf. Mr. Stephenson, while examining the Temsah Lakes, anciently called the Bitter Lakes, discovered recent marine remains similar to those on the shores of the present sea, clearly showing that the basin of the Temsah Lakes was the head of the Arabian Gulf at a period geologically recent.
[355] We have here followed MSS. which all read συνελθούσης δὲ τῆς θαλάττης. The French editors propose συνενδούσης δὲ τῆς θαλάττης, with the sense of “but on the retiring of the Mediterranean,” &c.
[356] This accusation may not seem quite fair to the English reader. Touch is the nearest term in our language by which we can express the Greek συνάπτω, the use of which Strabo objects to in this passage; still the meaning of the English word is much too definite for the Greek.
[357] The Atlantic.
[358] Viz. the Mediterranean.
[359] The western part of the town of Corinth, situated in the sea of Crissa. Its modern name is Pelagio.