Although the route was abominable it was most interesting. As the drainage of the mountains was at right angles, we crossed a succession of heights which afforded short glimpses of the sea some 600 feet beneath, with the perpendicular rock-bound coast below us, and then alternately descended into the depths of the intervening gullies. This peculiarity exhibited to perfection the geological formation. We had entered upon trap rocks and the greenstone, all of which showed traces of copper. Notwithstanding the wild and dangerous route, every available plot of ground was cultivated, although no villages were perceptible. The peasants carried their light ploughs upon donkeys from considerable distances, and with these exceedingly useful implements they ploughed inclines that would have been impossible to cultivate with any European implement except the hoe. At length we descended to the sea-beach, and marching through heavy sand for about a mile, we arrived at Pyrgos, our halting-place, twelve miles from Caravastasi. This is one of the wildest portions of Cyprus. There is no village, but the position is simply marked by the presence of one building above the sea-beach, which has been a depot for the spars and poles of pine that have periodically been delivered from the mountains by the torrents, when heavy rains have swollen them sufficiently to enable them to force the timber towards the sea. As the mountains upon this portion of the coast descend in many places actually to the shore, while in no places are they more than half a mile distant, the rivulets are numerous, as there is no time, or area, sufficient for their absorption by the soil. Within a hundred and fifty paces of the timber store beautiful streams of clear water issued from the ground in three different places, which converged into a brook abounding with water-cresses, and this, after passing through a small and thick jungle of tamarisk-bushes, formed a pool above the sea-beach which overflowed upon the shingle, and met the waves. We ascended the stream for a short distance, until, tempted by two or three large plane-trees, we halted for luncheon beneath their shade. The river, which occasionally flooded sufficiently to bring down heavy timber when felled among the mountains, flowed through an extremely rich but narrow valley, which extended into a glen between their precipitous slopes until it became a mere ravine. The mass of mountains in this district, which form a succession of wild and impassable steeps, is marked upon Kiepert's map as "unexplored." They were originally pine-forests, but the destruction of timber has been carried to such an excess that comparatively few trees remain. With my glass I could distinguish large trunks that lay rotting upon the ground, where they had pitched among the stems, and roots of trees that had been already felled; these had been rolled from the steep heights above, but having been caught in their descent to the torrent below by the opposing