But, alas! who can say that to-morrow is his own?—and who is there who makes the most of to-day? If we had constructed our raft before we moved farther eastward, instead of waiting for the chance of a boat when we came back, we should in all probability have been able to ascertain the extent of this mysterious river. As it was, we were obliged, by circumstances which we could neither control nor foresee, to leave the coast of Africa before we had completed our researches in the city and neighbourhood of Cyrene; and the short time which we had at our command on returning to Bengazi was insufficient (under the pressure of other occupations) for accomplishing this object of our wishes. The disappointment here alluded to was only one among many others which we experienced, in consequence of our hasty and unexpected return; but it was one which we regretted more, perhaps, than it deserved; for mystery will always add a charm to inquiry, which further investigation might probably remove, but which will continue to preserve its powers of fascination while the uncertainty remains which created it. We are too well acquainted with the talent of amplification so generally possessed by Turks and Arabs of all classes, to rely implicitly upon the truth of every part of the above-mentioned narrative related to us by the Bey of Bengazi: there is, however, no reason, of which we are aware, connected with the nature of the place, which militates against its probability; and we submit it accordingly, as we received it, to our readers, in the absence of more decided information. We have already wandered into the regions of fable in speaking of the Gardens of the Hesperides; and before we retrace our steps, we must be permitted to linger for a while on the borders of the mysterious, hidden stream above-mentioned. The Lethe, or Lathon, (for it is no less a stream to which we are going to call the attention of our readers,) is laid down by geographers in the neighbourhood of the gardens, and close to the city of the Hesperides. Strabo makes the Lathon flow into the harbour of the Hesperides, and Ptolemy also lays down the same river between Berenice and Arsinoe; Pliny describes the Lathon as situated in the neighbourhood of Berenice, and Scylax places a river (which he calls Ecceus, Εκκειος) in a similar situation. The river Lethe is supposed to have lost itself underground, and to re-appear (like the Niger) in another place[26]; and the point to which we would call the attention of the reader is—whether the subterranean stream above-mentioned, which certainly may be said to lose itself underground, be the source of the Lethe, or Lathon, in question? and whether a small spring, which runs into the lake near the town of Bengazi, may be supposed to be the re-appearance of the same river, in the place so decidedly assigned to it by Strabo—the port of the Hesperides, or, which is the same, of Berenice.