April i.
Early in the morning we endeavour to make sail from Sigéum, but being taken in a dead calm, we were employed the whole day in warping, that so passing the mouth of the Hellespont we might lie (if occasion should so require) sheltered by the new castle, and the point on which it stands. Having with great fatigue made two or three warps, the wind at length favoured us so far, as to advance us two leagues within the said new castle of Natolia, when the captain thought it better to anchor, than to proceed in so narrow a chanel and so dark a night.
At this place it will be most proper to set down my thoughts of Troy, and the whole Trojan shore, which for the space of three days I viewed at a convenient distance in calm and serene weather from the poop of the ship, feeding my eyes and mind with an eager and boundless curiosity. That, which in a large sense was called of old by Strabo, as at present by the modern Greeks, the campain of Troas, begins at the promontory of Lecton, and then fronting the isle of Tenedos ends in a delicious green and level country, as far as the strait of the Hellespont. But from the begining of this strait we sail by the main of that, which is properly to be called the campain of Troy. And because our modern travelers give a wild and indistinct account of this famous place, I shall endeavour to describe the bounds, and situation of it, in as clear and distinct terms as possible.
From cape Sigéum (whence antiently was computed the entrance of the Hellespont) you sail about five miles, till you come opposite to the mouth of the Scamander; and from thence about two miles farther to a small prominence of land, by the antients called Rhoetéum. Betwixt this Rhoetéum and Sigéum, the marine, which bent in an even uninterrupted semicircle, afforded a commodious station for the Grecian fleet[59]. But as Strabo well observes, that in his time the Scamander began to interrupt this station, by the sand it discharges on the shore; so it has since gained more considerably on the sea, and formed that whole tongue of land, on which is now built the new castle of Natolia. However in the days of Priam the shore was undoubtedly more regular, as well as more retired. And opposite thereto in the adjoining continent, at such a distance as would admit the engagements, the flights, the pursuits, and the encampments of each army (as they are all described by Homer) we are to conceive of the walls and buildings of antient Troy. But still we must be cautious of pointing out, and distinguishing the very place; since in the reign of Tiberius Caesar we are assured by Strabo, that there remained not the least footstep of antient Troy to satisfy the curiosity of the most searching traveler[60]. So vain are the accounts of our modern journalists, who pretend to have seen the walls, the gates, or other ruins of Troy; that, which now remains, being nothing but the rubbish of new Ilium, or of that city once attempted there by Constantine.