After scrambling down about five hundred feet we came to a sort of bench or narrow plateau, on the flank of the ravine, and on turning round a huge rock of black basalt came suddenly upon one of the most delightful scenic surprises which it was possible to imagine. Here in this wild, inaccessible spot, in ages long gone by, the ancients had evidently contrived a secure and enchanting retreat, for it was provided with the first requisite of beauty and of pleasure—a copious fountain of water. It lay in crystal purity in a still, oblong pool, beneath the perpendicular black rock. Against the rock, and projecting from it, were two large arches which had been constructed of solid masonry, with blocks of stone of immense size. One of these arches was almost destroyed, but the other was still in perfect preservation. It measured twenty-three feet in breadth, sixteen feet in height, and six feet six inches in depth, this being therefore the width of the fountain, which was also twenty-three feet long and about two feet deep. To my astonishment it contained numbers of small fish, which was the more surprising as it possessed no apparent outlet; but it was too cold and fresh and sparkling to be anything but a living stream, and probably disappeared by a subterranean passage through a large crevice which I observed in the rock. The wide-spreading branches of a venerable oak which grew directly in front of the arch threw a delightful shade over it, while delicate ferns clothed the sides of the grotto, which seemed to woo us to a repose and indolence which was, alas, under the circumstances, denied to us. On the keystone of the arch there was a partially effaced inscription. Though it was sixteen feet overhead, and therefore inaccessible, I should not have abandoned some attempt to decipher it had I not felt sure that, even if I were close to it, it was too much defaced by the storms of ages to be legible. I feel little doubt, however, about its having been in the Greek character; while on a slab of stone at the side of the spring I found carved the figure of a lion, which was in good preservation, and of which I made a sketch.