XV.] ASCENTS PROMPTED BY RESEARCH. 319

the twentieth of July. The last-named peak is now called after
the prophet Elijah, to whom, under the name of Hagios Elias,
the great majority of the high mountains in Greece are dedicated.
Of the other motives besides religious feeling which prompted
visits to mountain-tops in antiquity, inquisitiveness
perhaps is the most prominent, whether taking the

form of mere curiosity or of scientific research, prompted by
, r, • -r. Research.
It is in this strain that Seneca writes about Etna
(10,874 feet) to his friend Lucilius, who was procurator in Sicily,
and whom he had already requested to investigate for him the
currents of Charybdis. ' When you have given me your answer
on these points/ he says, ' I shall make bold to give you a further
commission, namely, that you should do me the favour of making
the ascent of Aetna; for persons argue that the mountain is
wasting and gradually sinking, because at one time it used to
be visible to mariners from a greater distance than at present.
Now the reason of this may be, not the diminution of the height
of the mountain, but because its flames are not seen, being
emitted with less force and volume; and that would account
too for the smoke being more slack in the day-time. Still, there
is nothing incredible in either supposition — in the mountain
which is being consumed lessening from day to day, or in the
fire abating; for this is not generated of itself, but overflows
after it has been ignited in some depression in the lower regions,
and gets its aliment from elsewhere: what the mountain itself
provides is not a supply of fuel, but a passage1.'
A similar account of the object with which ascents of
Etna were undertaken is found in the following straboon
interesting passage of Strabo relating to that moun- the summit
of Etna,
tain.
£ Near Centuripa is the small town of Aetna just mentioned,
which is the halting and starting place for those who make the
ascent of the mountain, for there the upland district commences.
Now the elevated parts are bare and cindery, and are snow-
covered in the winter-time, while those below are diversified
with oak-forests and a variety of growths. But the summits of
Aetna seem to undergo numerous changes owing to the fire
1 Sen* Ep. 79. a, 3.