of that city perfectly known, a traveller in search of antiquities in architecture would think here was a field for long study and employment.
It is in this point of view the town appears most to the advantage. The mixture of old monuments, such as the Column of Pompey, with the high moorish towers and steeples, raise our expectations of the consequence of the ruins we are to find.
But the moment we are in the port the illusion ends, and we distinguish the immense Herculean works of ancient times, now few in number, from the ill-imagined, ill-constructed, and imperfect buildings, of the several barbarous masters of Alexandria in later ages.
There are two ports, the Old and the New. The entrance into the latter is both difficult and dangerous, having a bar before it; it is the least of the two, though, it is what is called the Great Port, by [1]Strabo.
Here only the European ships can lie; and, even when here, they are not in safety; as numbers of vessels are constantly lost, though at anchor.
Above forty were cast a-shore and dashed to pieces in March 1773, when I was on my return home, mostly belonging to Ragusa, and the small ports in Provence, while little harm was done to ships of any nation accustomed to the ocean.
- ↑ Strabo, lib. xvii. p. 922.
