368 plikt's TTATTJEAL HISTOET. [Book IT. 



of Baetica, and twenty-five milea from the mouth of the 

 Straits of Grades, is the island of Gadis, twelve miles long 

 and three broad, as Polybius states in his writings. At its 

 nearest part, it is less than 700 feet^ distant from the main- 

 land, while in the remaining portion it is distant more than 

 seven miles. Its circuit is fifteen miles, and it has on it a 

 city which enjoys the rights of Eoman citizens^, and whose 

 people are called the Augustani of the city of Julia 

 Graditana. On the side which looks towards Spain, at about 

 100 paces distance, is another long island, three miles wide, 

 on which the original city of Gades stood. By Ephorus and 

 Philistides it is called Erythia, by Timajus and Silenus Aphro- 

 disias^, and by the natives the Isle of Juno. Timseus says, 

 that the larger island used to be called Cotinusa*, from its 

 portion of the article on this subject in Dr. Smith's "Dictionary of 

 Ancient Geography." " ' Fortunatae Insulae' is one of those geographical 

 names whose origin is lost in mythic darkness, but which afterwards 

 came to have a specific appHcation, so closely resembling the old mythical 

 notion, as to make it almost impossible to doubt that that notion was 

 based, in part at least, on some vague knowledge of the regions afterwards 

 discovered. The earliest Greek poetry places the abode of the happy 

 departed spirits far beyond the entrance of the Mediterranean, at the 

 extremity of the earth, and upon the shores of the river Oceanus, or in 

 islands in its midst ; and Homer's poetical description of the place may 

 be applied almost word for word to those islands in the Atlantic, off the 

 west coast of Africa, to wliich the name was given in the historical 

 period. (Od. iv. 1. 563, seq.) ' There the life of mortals is most easy ; 

 there is no snow, nor winter, nor much rain, but Ocean is ever sending 

 up the shriU breathing breezes of Zephyrus to refresh men.' Their de- 

 licious climate, and their supposed identity of situation, marked out tlie 

 Canary Islands, the Madeira gwup, and the Azores, as worthy to re- 

 present the Islands of the Blest. In the more specific sense, however, 

 the name was appHed to the two former groups ; while, in its widest 

 application, it may have even included the Cape de Verde Islands, its 

 extension being in fact adapted to that of maritime discovery." Pliny 

 gives a further description of them in B. vi. c. 37. 



1 The strait between the island and the mainland is now called the 

 River of Saint Peter. The circuit of the island, as stated by Pliny, 

 varies in the MSS. from fifteen to twenty-five miles, and this last is pro- 

 bably correct. 



2 JuUus Csesar, on his visit to the city of Gtides, during the Civil War 

 in Spain, B.C. 49, conferred the citizenship of Rome on all the citizens of 

 Gades. Under Augustus it became a municipimn, with the title of 

 * Augusta xu-bs Julia Gaditana.' The modem city of Cadiz is built upon 

 its site. ^ Or the Island of Venus. 



* From the Greek word corivos, " an olive-tree." 



