The council again sent apologies and invitations to Captain Beaufort, but he replied as before; only, to show he had no resentment, he sent his surgeon, while the anchor was being weighed, to see what he could do for a member of the council who was ill. I meanwhile, with a party of officers, went off in the gig to look at some ruins we had observed to the westward on the top of a hill. We had three miles to go in the boat and about two on foot inland. The hill is high and desperately steep. On the top is a town, deserted, with ancient Greek walls, a tower, the ruins of a temple, a number of pedestals and monuments, some with inscriptions which we copied, but none of them gave us the name of the place. We have made up our minds since, judging by Strabo's description, that it must have been Laertes. The city walls, the temple, and the tower are all of cut stone and the best Greek construction, while the walls of dwellings are of small stones and mortar. This town, being all of one sort of date, is a good example by which to judge of Greek habits of building. I suppose private houses were always built in this inferior style.
Our next stoppage was at Selinty, originally Selinus, and afterwards changed, on the death of Trajan within its walls, to Trajanopolis. It stands on a remarkable rock, the Cragus, absolutely precipitous on one side and very steep on the other, with a river, sixty feet or so wide, at the bottom of the slope. It struck one as curious that with such a river there should be an aqueduct to carry water across it into the town. One could only suppose that the water of the river, like that of the cataracts near Adalia, was unwholesome because it contained a chalky sediment. To the top of the Cragus is a great climb. There we found a fortress without any inscriptions of any kind, but, to judge by the style, of no great age and no interest. The best thing was the view. Beneath us fell a sheer precipice right down into the sea, perhaps five hundred feet. As we looked over the top the eagles sprang out from the rocks far below us, so far that shots fired at them were quite ineffective. We found here a small theatre, much ruined, and the remains of a grand senate house, or perhaps a mausoleum to Trajan, also very much injured. The ship remained a day and a half. After passing a promontory we came opposite to a rocky ridge sloping rapidly to the sea, on which was a fortress, answering to Strabo's Antiochetta on the Cragus. We put off in the gig, and had to land on a precipitous rock in a high surf, which I did not like at all; but as we had been brought, it had to be done. We found a place that must have had some importance. There were fragments of polished granite columns, a modern castle, several Greek chapels, and ruins on all sides as well. The most promising were on the mountain above us and on a small peninsula jutting out from the site of the town. My companions made for the small peninsula, where they found some tombs like those at Selinty, and other matters of no great moment. I, hoping for something more considerable, went up the mountain--and a very rough climb it was. I was, however, well paid for my exertions. I found there numbers of granite columns, marble blocks and pedestals, and the ruins of a vast and magnificent edifice which might have been a senate house or a gymnasium. The situation of it was truly sublime, and it must have had a glorious effect from the sea. I hoped to return and examine it more perfectly next day, but unfortunately Captain Beaufort thought it necessary to get on to Cape Anemurium by the 24th, in order to make an observation of Jupiter's satellite which would determine at once his longitude, and the wind was favourable. We went on therefore, to my great regret, and the same evening (23rd) anchored opposite a small castle on a low rock by the sea.