And when you have got to Olympia immediately you see the river Alpheus, a full and very pleasant river, and no less than seven notable rivers are tributaries to it. For through Megalopolis the Helisson flows into it, and the Brentheates from the district of Megalopolis, and the Gortynius near Gortyna where is a temple of Æsculapius, and from Melæneæ between the districts of Megalopolis and Heræa the Buphagus, and the Ladon from the district of the Clitorians, and the river Erymanthus from the mountain of the same name. All these flow into the Alpheus from Arcadia, and the Cladeus from Elis also contributes its stream. And the source of the Alpheus is in Arcadia and not in Elis. And there are several traditions about the Alpheus, as that he was a hunter and enamoured of Arethusa, and that she hunted with him. And as Arethusa was unwilling to marry him, she crossed over they say to an island near Syracuse, called Ortygia, and there became a spring: just as Alpheus in consequence of his love was changed into a river. This is the tradition about the Alpheus and the Ortygia. As to the river going under the sea and coming up in another place, there is no reason why I should discredit that, as I know that the god at Delphi admitted it, seeing that when he sent Archias the Corinthian to establish a colony at Syracuse, these were some of the words he used, “Ortygia lies in the cloudy sea above Trinacria, where the mouth of the Alpheus mixes and flows with the springs of the broad Arethusa.” From this circumstance of their union, and not any love passages, I imagine the traditions about the two rivers originated. And all the Greeks or Egyptians, that have penetrated into Ethiopia beyond Syene, and as far as the Ethiopian city of Meroe, say that the Nile enters into a marsh, and flows through it as if it were earth, and eventually through lower Ethiopia into Egypt to Pharos, where it has its outlet at the sea. And in the land of the Hebrews I know that the river Jordan flows through the lake of Tiberias, and into what is called the Dead Sea, by which it is absorbed. The Dead Sea has properties unlike any other water: living bodies can float in it without swimming, whereas dead bodies go to the bottom. And it has no fish, for from their evident danger they take refuge in water more congenial to them. And there is a river in Ionia similar to the Alpheus, its source is in the mountain Mycale, and it flows under the sea, and comes up again at Branchidæ at the harbour called Panormus. All this is correctly stated.