MERGE TO GYRENE. 479 which it presented. Night brought us to El Hilal, a mountain so called. The point of El Elihd extends to the north-east and forms a bay of about a mile in depth, in which even large ships might find shelter with the wind from north to south-east by east. It is in this spot that Cellarius has placed a naval station and town, and there are certainly remains at the present day about it indicative of an ancient site, while the harbour itself would be sufficiently qualified for a naval station to correspond with that part of the description. Two ancient forts are seen in ruins on the cliff and we noticed an ancient tomb which is excavated in the rock, close to the ravine, retaining still a very handsome facade. Three miles to the eastward of the forts at El Hilal are some others, also in ruins, and the remains of strong walls in the neighbourhood of stone-quarries, all of which would seem to point out the spot as an ancient station. This place has also the peculiarity of being the only part of the coast which can be seen from Gyrene, from which it is distant about fourteen miles.

In Ptolemy’s chart we find a naustathmos (or naval station) placed on the western side of this promontory ; but we saw nothing that would answer to the position in that direction. Kas El Hilal, with Bujebara on the south-east, forms an extensive bay ; and another with Cape Rasat on the north-west near the centre of which is situated (now called Marsa Suza) the Port of Gyrene, Apollonia-From El Hilal commence two ranges of mountains extending themselves to the westward, one along the coast, from it to Ptolemeta, forming the southern boundary of the plain on which Apollonia is built ; the other rising in a range above these, diverging towards