Η οι Φαιηκες εδισκεον αλληλοισιν Τον ρα περιςρέψας ηκε ςιβαρης απο χειρος it is scarcely possible to doubt, that, under the poetical figure of a quoit, he threw a bomb from a mortar; more especially as that seems to be expressed verbatim, as well by the words βομβησεν δε λιθος, alluding to the bomb itself, as by the words αυτω φαρει (quasi, ferrum), alluding to the hot iron of the mortar from which the bomb was thrown; and the conclusion is infinitely strengthened, on considering the fiery glare and extensive mischief of the bursting of the bomb, as expressed by αμφαφαων, and the great distance to which it is thrown, as noticed in the other parts of the following lines, 8 Od. 196, Και β' άλαος τοι ξεινε διεκρίνετε το σημα And the modern reader cannot but be more readily disposed to admit the reasoning above urged, when he recollects the prodigious effects which were produced against one of our squadrons a very few years since in passing the Dardanelles, by their being fired upon with stones of eight or nine hundred pounds weight, and eighteen or twenty inches in diameter, thrown either from mortars or cannon, by which the ships were materially damaged, and many men were killed and wounded. But (to speak of Gibraltar ;)-that famous rock, not forgotten by either the poets or sculptors of antiquity, has given rise to many a fiction by both it is represented in Homer by the hero Kegions, whose name may be derived from Kε6, a mountainous ridge, a term which is descriptive of the rock itself. Kebriones, in conformity with the position of Gibraltar, tells Hector that he is situated at the extremity of Europe, 11 I. 523, a part of the name of Gib-raltar, and Ναι μεν ενθ' ομιλεομεν Δαναοισι And when it is said of him in 11 Il. 581. μασεν καλλίτριχας ίππες Μαςιγι λιγυρη. τοι δε πληγης αίοντες besides the allusion to the plague (πληγης) common on the opposite coast of Barbary, those lines refer to the currents and winds which almost always set into the Mediterranean from the ocean there. The identity of Kebriones with Gibraltar is further seen from the company he is associated with, 13 Il. 790, Άμφι δε Κεβριόνην και αντίθεον Πολυφοι την Παλμον το Ασκανιον τε Μορυνθ' υἱ Ιπποτίωνος, where Mogu seems to allude to the Moors of Barbary ; Πολυφοιτην, to the prodigious marches of the African caravans, and Aσиavio to the river Gain, otherwise called Niger. The straits and the rock of Gibraltar are again represented, in 12 II. 137, by the heroes Πυλων (from σουλα janua)* and * It is said in the 189th page of the 3rd vol. of Bourgoanne's Travels in Spain, that " Glibeltath, now Gibraltar, signifies the Mountain of the Entry." Oguevos (from ogos and μevos, strength): and if in the first chapter are fixed several of the positions belonging to Troy or Ilium, the town besieged; this perhaps may be a proper place to fix one or two belonging to the besiegers. In fact, I take it that the τειχος and τάφρος Axaw, the wall and trench of the Greeks, are referable, the first to the fortress, and the second to the straits of Gibraltar; which will be in perfect conformity with the idea of considering the town besieged, or Ilium, to be allusive to Egypt as above supposed (or rather, in a more enlarged view, to the whole of Africa; for as Troy is Πρίαμε πολις, so it has been shewn above, that Priam represents the whole of Africa :) and under this view the τειχος and ταφρος of the Greeks, as above ascribed to their prototypes, will be most appropriately situate, just at the end or by the side of the town besieged. The 12th Iliad enlarges much upon these positions, and gives a particular account of a battle, fought at the gates of the wall, so fixed; 12 II. 175, Μαχην εμάχοντο τσύλησιν. The following lines there contain a description of the precipices of the rock itself, and of the batteries of cannon (σκολοπες) with which it was fortified: 12 II. 54, Κρημνοι γαρ επηρεφέες περι πασαν the last line implying that it was not easy for a hostile ship to enter the bay in the face of the cannon, as asserted again a few lines afterwards, 64, Ηδε μαλ' αργαλέη περάαν σκόλοπες γαρ εν αυτή and the expressions & κεν ρεα and ηδε μαλ' αργαλέη, in the two last quotations, seem to |