On this island probably, and the adjoining peninsula, stood the ancient Canopus, both being, to this day, covered with ruins, supposed to be those of that celebrated city.
This, I am inclined to think, is the Canopic Island known to all antiquity, and in later times called the Island Aboukir. (Eutychius, Ann. 2. 508.) This would account for the testimony given by Pliny, Strabo, &c. as to the insular situation of Canopus, and by Scylax, as to an island in the Canopic mouth, without having recourse to the supposition that the Isthmus, somewhere between Alexandria and Aboukir castle, had been covered by the sea, which indeed seems rather to have encroached upon, than receded from, that part of the coast.
St. III. l. 7.—St. Vincent’s towery steep.
On the summit of St. Vincent’s, and close on the precipices which overhang the sea, is a convent, which gives the name of its patron to the Cape.
III.—SONG OF TRAFALGAR.—Page 73.
St. II. l. 3.—Twenty hostile ensigns low.
Such was the statement of the London Gazette, of the 27th Nov. 1805; but in a subsequent number this was noticed as an error, there being, in fact, but nineteen sail of the line taken or utterly destroyed. I have been assured by a gentleman who was at that period in Germany, that this instance of the scrupulous veracity of the British government produced an effect little less favourable to the British character than the news of the victory itself.
I hope, however, that I may be forgiven for adhering to the first report, particularly as these lines were written on the day I first heard of the battle, and before the corrected statement came to my knowledge.
It was a striking proof of Lord Nelson’s almost miraculous sagacity, that just at the commencement of the action, he expressed his opinion that twenty sail of the enemy would be taken.
St. XVI.