From Mount Tabor, Arculf went to the royal city of Damascus, eight days' journey, and remained there some days. It is situated in a plain, surrounded by a broad and ample circuit of walls, with numerous towers, and is intersected by four great rivers. On all sides beyond the walls are numerous groves of olives. The king of the Saracens has obtained possession of this city, and reigns in it[18]. It contains a large church of St. John the Baptist, frequented by the Christians. The unbelieving Saracens have built themselves a large mosque here. From hence Arculf repaired to Tyre, and thence (as it appears) he returned to Jerusalem. He went subsequently from Jerusalem to Joppa, and thence sailed, in forty days, to Alexandria in Egypt, a city famous throughout the whole world. It extends to a great length from east to west, so that Arculf, who began to enter the city at nine o'clock in the morning (_hora tertia_), in the month of October, and proceeding through the whole length of the city, hardly reached the other side before dark[19]. On the south it is bounded by the mouths of the Nile, and on the north by the Lake Mareotis. Its port is difficult of access, and bears some resemblance to the human body; for in its head it is sufficiently ample, but at its entrance it is very narrow, where it admits the tide of the sea, together with such ships as run into the port to take shelter and refit. But when you have passed the narrow neck and mouth of the harbour, the sea, like the human body, stretches out far and wide. On the right hand side is a small port, in which is the Pharos, a large tower, which is every night lighted up with torches, lest mariners might mistake their way in the dark, and be dashed against the rocks in their attempt to find the entrance, particularly as this is much impeded and disturbed by the waves dashing to and fro. The port, however, is always calm, and in magnitude about thirty stadia. The precautions alluded to are necessary for a port which is, in a manner, the emporium of the whole world; for innumerable people from all parts go there for commerce, and the surrounding region is extremely fruitful. Although the country is destitute of rain, the Nile serves both as a cultivator of the land, and as the means of transferring its products from one place to another. Here you see people sowing, there navigating, which are their chief occupations. The Nile is navigable to the place they call the town of Elephants[20]; beyond that the cataracts hinder a ship from proceeding, not from want of water, but because all the waters of the river run in a sort of wild ruin down a steep descent. Towards Egypt, as we enter the city, there is a large church on the right, in which St. Mark the Evangelist is interred. The body is buried in the eastern part of the church, before the altar, with a monument of squared marble over it. Along the Nile, the Egyptians are in the habit of