Designing from hence for _Durguthli_, we continue our journey under the foot of _Sipylus_, which about two hours from the city ends in a stupendous precipice, consisting of a naked massy stone, and rising perpendicularly almost a furlong high. It was not a little surprizing, as we rode along under the foot of this hill, to observe a certain cliff of the rock, representing an exact nich and statue, with the due shape and proportion of an human body. For _Sipylus_ being the seat of the transformation of the unhappy _Niobe_[22], there was ground of imagining, that we had either met with her statue, or with that which was the first occasion of the fable; at least it was not improbable, that this was the work of some antient inhabitants of this place, who pleased themselves in fashioning the natural rock into such a figure, as might preserve the tradition of this celebrated poetic fiction. Not far from hence we begin to leave the mountain on our right hand, having the stream of the _Hermus_ in view on the left; and at a large distance before us the snowy top of the mountain _Tmolus_. Our road now lay thro a verdant and delightful plain, inriched by many advantages of nature, and not negligently manured by the inhabitants. About the fourth hour of this day’s journey we passed a bridge, erected over a large river; which, as those of the country informed us, is now called _Niphti_, or _Nymphe_, and may probably be the _Cryos_ mentioned by _Pliny_, as one of the streams that feed the _Hermus_[23]. From this bridge the road lies thro a less fertile plain, till within the neighbourhood of _Durguthli_ it is again better cultivated, and appropriated to the production of cottons. Near our entrance into the town we cross a broad and sandy chanel, which in the winter season conveys no inconsiderable current into the _Hermus_. We had here no other to rely upon, than the accommodations of a public _kane_, where, after we had fixed our lodgings, we found that we had arrived in six hours from _Magnesia_; tho an hour is to be deducted for the rests, which we were obliged to make for the security of our mules. _Durguthli_ is a town purely of Turkish fabric, and therefore has nothing to entertain the curiosity of any traveler, besides the management of cotton wool; which is here prepared in great abundance, and so transmitted to the market of _Smyrna_. As to this we observed, that they first sift it from the dust and other refuse, which it contracts in gathering, in a large wicker wheel; after this they separate the wool from the cod, in which it grows; and at last they work it betwixt a wooden and iron roller, which spinning upon one another in a rapid motion draw in the wool, and leave the seed behind.