82 



Phoenicians drew their tin, («xtk of Diodorus, jw.)tT<? of Timseus, 

 and ov^y.Tt^ of Ptolemy being Vectis or Wight, from which the 

 tin was carried through France to Marseilles) , we may suppose 

 that in the early period, the only route for the tin of Cornwall 

 to the Mediteranean was by sea to the western parts of Spain ; 

 but that in the latter period the track by land through Gaul to 

 Massilia was preferred, and the old trade had become a tradi- 

 tion which Pliny chose not to adopt from Strabo, who is never 

 quoted on this subject by the author of the Historia Naturalis, 

 but may be obliquely and slightingly alluded to. Whether tin 

 occurs at all in any part of the Spanish Peninsula can hardly 

 be doubtful after the assertion of Pliny. He had been procu- 

 rator in Spain, and by his intimacy with Vespasian,* must be 

 supposed in position to learn much of Britain, from the dis- 

 patches of Petilius Cerealis, Ostorius Scapula, and Agricola. 

 But he was suffocated by the fumes of Vesuvius, in 79, one year 

 after the appointment of Agricola to Britain — and for the 

 greater part of his literary life, Britain was a scene of never- 

 ending war and confusion. Besides this the Cornish Promon- 

 tory appears to have been at no time much occupied by Roman 

 stations, or traversed by roads, and it may be thought to have 

 had then, as afterwards in Saxon and Norman times, a history 

 and commerce quite distinct from and little known to the Belgic 

 settlers in Albion. He might be mistaken respecting Britain, 

 of which perhaps he could know only Albion ; but his positive 

 assurance of the occurrence of tin in Spain is confirmed by a 

 passage in Bowles's Natural History of Spain, and, as I hear 

 from Mr. Kenrick, by a later German writer (Hopfensach) ; it 

 occurs, in fact, according to one of our best books of Mineralogy, 

 in beds in the Mica schist of Gallicia. (W. Phillips, 1823). 

 Oxide of Tin has been found, besides, on both sides of the 

 Erzegebirge in granite, at Puy de Vignes (Haute Vienne), 

 also in granite, in Wicklow (granite), on the east coast of 

 Sumatra, Siam and Pegu, and in Banca and Malacca. It 

 has been found in Mexico, Chili, and Greenland, and mixed 

 with other matters in Finland and Sweden. 



• Accessit imp. a.d. G9. 



