302 THE OCEAN", 



lib death, when he had reached his eighty-fifth year ; and which afford 

 a surprising proof of the activity of mind, and the perfect command 

 of his faculties which that extraordinary man retained at so advanced 

 an age *. The third paper, on the same subject, was written by 

 Dr, William Musgravef. This opinion was first broached by Cam. 

 den, supported by Sunnier, and opposed by Vossius. Dr. Wallis 

 supports it with much learning, and points out the effects of the 

 rupture with much ingenuity. He conceives, that the tradition men- 

 tioned by Plato, of the destruction of an island in the Atlantic 

 Ocean, related to the rupture of this isthmus ; and Dr. Musgrave 

 emotes the well-known passage in Virgil : 



Penitus toto divisos orbe Britannos} 



as a proof that Virgil was aware of such a rupture, and alluded to 

 it. When men have recourse to such proofs as these in support of 

 an opinion, it affords clear evidence that they have nothing better to 

 produce. 



Another ingenious fancy that has occasionally been indulged, and 

 in a few instances been attempted to be embodied into a living fact, is 

 that of uniting one sea with another by a bold and magnificent ca- 

 nal cut through the isthmus by which they are occasionally sepa- 

 rated. One of the earliest attempts of this kind of which we have 

 any account, is the splendid undertaking to unite the Mediterranean 

 with the Red Sea by means of the Pelusian branch of the Nile. 

 This great work was begun by Scsostris, King of Eiy|t, and carried 

 on bv his successors flown to the time of Ptolemy Phihulelphus. It 

 was denominated the canal of the kirijjs ; was a hundred cubits 

 broad, and of a sufficient depth to bear the largest vessels. It was 

 nearly but never completely finished ; the sre al objection being 

 drawn from an unfounded idea that the bed of the Red Sea is much 

 loftier than the soil of Egypt, and consequently that if the canal were 

 to be opened, it would drown the country, or at least destroy all 

 the benefit of the periodical exundation of the Nile. Trajan, how- 

 ever, appears to have made some attempt to revive this magnificent 

 speculation j and M. Petit, and several other celebrated French en- 

 gineers, wore consulted by their own government as to the expe. 



* Phil. Trans. 1701. Vol. xxii. p. 967 and 1030. 

 t Phil. Trans, 1717. Vol. xxx. p. 589. 



