[648] Games in honour of Proserpine, or Cora.

[649] Ptolemy VII., king of Egypt, also styled Euergetes II.; he is more commonly known by the surname of Physcon. His reign commenced B. C.170.

[650] The ancients believed that crystals consisted of water which had been frozen by excessive cold, and remained congealed for centuries. Vide Pliny, lib. xxxvii. c. 9.

[651] Cleopatra, besides being the wife, was also the niece of Ptolemy, being the offspring of his former wife, whom he had divorced, by her former marriage with Philometor.

[652] Ptolemy VIII. was nominally king, but his mother Cleopatra still held most of the real authority in her hands.

[653] Cadiz.

[654] Western Mauritania, the modern kingdom of Fez.

[655] This river is now named Lucos, and its mouth, which is about 30 leagues distant from Cadiz, is called Larais or Larache.

[656] Humboldt, Cosmos ii. 489, note, mentions the remains of a ship of the Red Sea having been brought to the coast of Crete by westerly currents.

[657] Pozzuolo, close by Naples.