That mass of columnar basalt was occupied and held sacred in Roman times, and was dedicated to Apollo. In the courtyard of the castle is a well, l'Albime it is called, that descends to the depth of 260 feet, and there still exists an enormous stone mask of the solar god that closed it, and from the mouth of which oracles were given. How these were produced is now made clear. In the side of the well is a chamber cut out of the rock that concealed a confederate who uttered the response to the questioner, and the voice came up hollow and with reverberation betwixt the gaping lips of stone, to overawe and satisfy the inquirer. "Before the old tribes of Hellas created temples to the divinities," says Porphyry in his treatise 'On the Cave of the Nymphs,' "they consecrated caverns and grottoes to their service in the island of Crete to Zeus, in Arcadia to Artemis and Pan, in the isle of Naxos to Dionysos." And from caves issued the most famous Grecian oracles, and the mysteries were often celebrated in them. The cave in which Zeus as an infant was concealed on Mount Ida naturally became sacred. Kronos had received the Kingdom of the World on condition that he should rear no male children. Accordingly when one was born he ate it. But when Zeus arrived, his mother gave Kronos a stone to eat in place of the child, and hurried off the babe to Crete, where it was nourished in a cave by the Corybantes, who sounded cymbals and drums to drown his cries. There was a Charonion at Hierapolis, an account of which we get from Apulæus and Dio Cassius. It was deep. From the orifice, which was surrounded by a balustrade, escaped so dense a vapour that animals held in it died, and men who inhaled it were stupefied. The priests who ministered to the oracle professed to be immune, but Strabo tells us that they simply held their breath when they stooped over the fumes. He who desired to consult the oracle was for a while placed on a platform above the opening. On the flank of Mount Citheron was a cave dedicated to the Nymphs. Those who desired to inquire of them entered the grotto, when it was supposed that the Nymphs inspired them with a knowledge of the future; and such persons were entitled _Nympholeptes_. The corresponding expression among the Latins was _lymphatici_, expressive of the pale and exhausted condition in which they were when they issued from the cave. Eusebius, Bishop of Cæsarea says: "There are exhalations that produce drowsiness and procure visions;" and Apulæus says: "Due to the religious fury they inspire, men remain without eating or drinking, and some become prophets and reveal future things."