On the twelfth of December, 1699, I set out from Marseilles to Genoa' ia atartane, and arrived late at a small French port called Cassis, where the next morning we were not a littie surprised to see the moun. tains about the town covered with green olive-trees, or laid out in beautiful gardens,whici.gave us a great variety of pleasing prospecís, even in the depth of winter. The most uncultivated of them produce abundance of sweet plants, as wild-thyme, lavender, rosemary, balm, and myrtle. We were here shown at a distance the deserts, which have been rendered so famous by the penance of Mary Magddiene, who, after her arrival with Lazarus and Joseph of Arimathea at Marseilles, is said to have wept away the rest of ber life among these solitary rocks and mountains. It is so romantic a scene, that it has always probably • This work is printed from the original text, without abridgment. VOL. XIV. B given occasion to such chimerical relations; for it is perhaps of this place that Claudian speaks, in the following description : Et locus extremum pandit qua Gallia littus Claud. in Ruf. lib. l. (A dreadfal si ene!) and skim before his eyes. I know there is nothing more undetermined among the learned than the voyage of Ulysscs; some con. fining it to the Mediterranean, others extending it to the great Ocean, sad others ascribing it to a world of the poet's own, making; though his conversations with the dead are generally supposed to have been jo the Narbon Gaul. Incultos adiit læstrigonas sitiphalenque, etc. Tibul. Lib. iv. Eleg. i. ver. 59. Uncertain whether, by the winds convey'd, On real seas to real sho he stray'd; Or, by the fable driven from coast to coast, In new imaginary worlds was lost. The next day we again set sail, and made the best of our way until we were forced, by contrary winds, into St. Remo, a very pretty town in the Genoese dominions. The front to the sea is not large; but there are a great many houses behind it, built side of the mountain to avoid the winds and vapours up the |
