18. This is exemplified particularly in the Cephissus,[351] which fills the lake Copais.[352] When the increase of the water of that lake was so great, that Copæ was in danger of being swallowed up, (the city is mentioned by the poet, and from it the lake had its name,)[353] a fissure in the ground, which took place not far from the lake, and near Copæ, opened a subterraneous channel, of about 30 stadia in length, and received the river, which reappeared on the surface, near Upper Larymna in Locris; for, as has been mentioned, there is another Larymna, in Bœotia, on the sea, surnamed the Upper by the Romans. The place where the river rises again is called Anchoë, as also the lake near it. It is from this point that the Cephissus begins its course[354] to the sea. When the overflowing of the water ceased, there was also a cessation of danger to the inhabitants on the banks, but not before some cities had been already swallowed up. When the outlets were again obstructed, Crates the Miner, a man of Chalcis, began to clear away the obstructions, but desisted in consequence of the Bœotians being in a state of insurrection; although, as he himself says, in the letter to Alexander, many places had been already drained; among these, some writers supposed was the site of the ancient Orchomenus; others, that of Eleusis, and of Athens on the Triton. These cities are said to have been founded by Cecrops, when he ruled over Bœotia, then called Ogygia, but that they were afterwards destroyed by inundations. It is said, that there was a fissure in the earth near Orchomenus, that admitted the river Melas,[355] which flows through the territory of Haliartus, and forms there a marsh, where the reed grows of which the musical pipe is made.[356] But this river has entirely disappeared, being carried off by the subterraneous channels of the chasm, or absorbed by the lakes and marshes about Haliartus; whence the poet calls Haliartus grassy,
19. These rivers descend from the Phocian mountains, and among them the Cephissus,[358] having its source at Lilæa, a Phocian city, as Homer describes it;
“And they who occupied Lilæa, at the sources of Cephissus.”[359]
It flows through Elateia,[360] the largest of the cities among the Phocians, through the Parapotamii, and the Phanoteis, which are also Phocian towns; it then goes onwards to Chæroneia in Bœotia; afterwards, it traverses the districts of Orchomenus and Coroneia, and discharges its waters into the lake Copais. The Permessus and the Olmeius[361] descend from Helicon, and uniting their streams, fall into the lake Copais near Haliartus. The waters of other streams likewise discharge themselves into it. It is a large lake with a circuit of 380 stadia;[362] the outlets are nowhere visible, if we [CAS. 407] except the chasm which receives the Cephissus, and the marshes.