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brated Mr. Pennant has difcovered and traced with great accu- 

 racy a long feries of ftations in Wales from Penbedu to Cop yr 

 Goleuni, or Hill of Fire; thefe he enumerates in Cambrian or- 

 thography, with which I fhall not fwell this paper. 



BcETHius fays that in his time there ftill were left in many 

 places in Britain remains of huge poles on which barrels of pitch 

 were elevated to give fignals by night and dayj and it is faid 

 that the cuftom of lighting fires in Ireland upon St. John's eve 

 is a commemoration of antient fignals by fire. 



The defcription of the wall of China is familiar to us, but it 

 implies ideas of extent and magnitude beyond our habits of com- 

 parifon, and fcarcely within the reach of imagination. We can 

 form no adequate idea of a wall fifteen hundred miles in extent, 

 peopled with centinels who can fpread an alarm with the celerity 

 of an eledric fhock through the nerves of a vafl empire. 



Different methods were tifed by the antients for the rapid 

 communication of intelligence — by fight and by found. Smoke 

 by day and fires * by night were the ufual fignals of particular 



Vol. VI. N events; 



* As the papers of this Academy fall into the hands of the fair fex I muft not 

 omit paying due honour to the memory of Hero and Leander. The poem of Mu- 

 fous is almofl forgotten ; this will never be the fate of the following beautiful lines 

 cf a modern poet: 



« So 



