306 ON THE ICTIS OF DIODORUS SICULUS. 
coast, which may at first view appear to confer 
upon this supposition some degree of probability : 
—TI mean, the fact of their taking great pains to 
conceal from the captains of the Roman vessels 
the part of the coast on which they landed, and 
to which the tin was brought by the natives, for 
the purposes of sale and exportation. Strabo 
tells us, that the master of a Pheenician trading 
vessel, on its voyage to the Cassiterides for tin, 
being followed by the captain of a Roman vessel, 
whose vigilance he was unable to elude, purposely 
steered into the shallows, and thus caused the 
destruction of the two vessels ; but that, his own 
life being preserved, he was rewarded by his 
countrymen for this act of self-devotedness, and 
patriotism.* It might, therefore, be inferred, if 
all other circumstances were favourable, that the 
Pheenicians, for the purpose of keeping in their 
own hands a monopoly of the trade in tin, instead 
of sailing directly to some point on the southern 
part of the Cornish coast, passed the Land’s 
End, and Cape Cornwall, entered the mouth cf 
the Bristol Channel, and landed somewhere on 
the western coast of the Bay of St. Ives; that 
either intentionally, or through ignorance, they 
* Strabonis Res Geographice ; Lib. iii. Tom. I. pp. 239, 
240. (Oxon. 1807. Fol.) 
