* The worship of Melkarth at Gados (Cadiz) and the functions of his priests are described by Silius Italicus: as Gades was a Tyrian colony, it has been naturally assumed that the main features of the religion of Tyre were reproduced there, and Silius's account of the Melkarth of Gades thus applies to his namesake of the mother city. Festivals, similar to those of Adonis at Byblos, were held in his honour twice a year: in the summer, when the sun burnt up the earth with his glowing heat, he offered himself as an expiatory victim to the solar orb, giving himself to the flames in order to obtain some mitigation of the severity of the sky;* once the winter had brought with it a refreshing coolness, he came back to life again, and his return was celebrated with great joy. His temple stood in a prominent place on the largest of the islands furthest away from the mainland. It served to remind the people of the remoteness of their origin, for the priests relegated its foundation almost to the period of the arrival of the Phoenicians on the shores of the Mediterranean. The town had no supply of fresh water, and there was no submarine spring like that of Arvad to provide a resource in time of necessity; the inhabitants had, therefore, to resort to springs which were fortunately to be found everywhere on the hillsides of the mainland. The waters of the well of Eas el-Ain had been led down to the shore and dammed up there, so that boats could procure a ready supply from this source in time of peace: in time of war the inhabitants of Tyre had to trust to the cisterns in which they had collected the rains that fell at certain seasons.** * The festival commemorating his death by fire was celebrated at Tyre, where his tomb was shown, and in the greater number of the Tyrian colonies. ** Abisharri (Abimilki), King of Tyre, confesses to the Pharaoh Amenothes III. that in case of a siege his town would neither have water nor wood. Aqueducts and conduits of water are spoken of by Menander as existing in the time of Shalmaneser; all modern historians agree in attributing their construction to a very remote antiquity. The strait separating the island from the mainland was some six or seven hundred yards in breadth,* less than that of the Nile at several points of its course through Middle Egypt, but it was as effective as a broader channel to stop the movement of an army: a fleet alone would have a chance of taking the city by surprise, or of capturing it after a lengthened siege.