Page:Africa by Élisée Reclus, Volume 2.djvu/190

 154 NORTH-WEST AFRICA. grown wider. The fort, which defended the narrow isthmus connecting the peninsula with the mainland, is now a mere ruin. The two inlets are said to have been formerly united by a canal. The ancient port, excavated by human hands, like those of Utica and Carthage, is now choked with rubbish, and the vessels which come to take in cargoes of oil, fruits, and sponges are obliged to anchor in the roadstead. A foreign colony, composed, as in all the other coastland towns, of Maltese, Italians, and Frenchmen, has been established at Mahdiya, and is engaged in the export trade and the sardine fishery. Over two hundred boats are now occasionally crowded in the harbour. From May to July the sea on this coast teems with fish to such an extent that each boat takes on an average from two to three hundred kilogrammes of sardines in a single night. In order to fish in the day, the native sailors spread mats of alfa grass on the water, beneath the shadow of which the fish flock in shoals. The fishermen then cautiously approach and cast their nets round the space covered by the mats and the fish concealed beneath them. To the south-west, in a well-cultivated district, some distance from the sea, stands the village of Kur-es-Sef, which is a larger place than Mahdiya. At this port is shipped neai-ly all the produce exported by the merchants of the ancient " Afrika." A few miles west of Mahdiya, covering a space of several square miles, stands an ancient necropolis, whose tombs, hollowed out of the rock, have been compared by M. Renan to those of Arad in Syria ; nor can there be any doubt that a Phoe- nician town once stood on this spot. The surrounding region is one of those in which ruined cities are found crowded in the closest proximity together. Some two miles to the south the Uenshir Sclckta occupies the site of Syllcdum, and farther on, near the Ras Kapudiah, the Caput Yada of the Romans, a borj now stands where was formerly the Byzantine city of Justinianopolis. To the north, on the promontory of Ras Dimas, where there is a port protected by the remains of a jetty, ancient stone ramparts, cisterns, and the elliptical wall of an amphitheatre, whose arena is now cultivated, indicate, near Bohalta, the site of the Carthaginian city of T/iaj)su8, celebrated for the victory which Ca3sar here gained over Scipio and King Juba. Beyond this point, on that part of the coast which faces the Kuriatein Islands, the villages of Tcbulba and Moknin, surrounded by secular olive-trees, also occupy the sites of ancient cities. The coastland route then passes on to Lemta, a village which has succeeded to Leptis Minor, or " Little Leptis," so called in contra- distinction to the " Great Leptis " of Tripoli. Still, Leptis Minor was once a con- siderable city : its ruins stretch along the sea-shore for nearly three miles, and here are still to be seen remains of an aqueduct, an amphitheatre, quays, and jetties. The ancient port is now a mere wed, known as the Wed-es-Sak, or " Valley of the Market." The most populous town of this district at present is Jenial, built farther inland, to the south-west of Lemta. Monastir, or Mistir, by its name recalls, perhaps, what was once a Christian monastery ; but it had also been a Carthaginian and Roman town, probably Rmpina, i.e. " the Head of the Promontory." Like Sfakes, it is surrounded by an