and while both were the chosen seats of popular fable and poetic monsters, the bold 
mariners of Phoenicia were familiar with their seas, and had formed settlements in their 
ports; Carthage, Cadiz, and Marseilles, were their colonies; and the tin and wolf-skins of 
Britain met the gold and silks of the remote East in the marts of Tyre. 
The wealth of her merchants, the magnificence of her buildings, and the strength 
of her battlements, were the wonder of all nations. Even when, at length, she fell 
before an enemy commissioned by an avenging Providence, she rapidly rose again, resumed 
her fame, and recommenced the Commercial Empire of the world. It is remarkable, 
that though Commerce has often raised feeble states to sudden power, there is no other 
instance in history of that unrivalled and universal influence, except our own.—Tyre and 
England, at the distance of thousands of years, alike, and alone, exhibiting the natural 
results of vigorous enterprise, guided by wisdom, cheered by national encouragement, 
and left free in its direction, its impulses, and its rewards. 
PORT OF TYRE. 
The site of Tyre, now named Sur, was once apparently a mere ledge of rocks, distant 
half a mile from the shore. The gradual accumulation of sand enlarged it, and the 
Causeway was widened by the same means into an Isthmus. Thus two bays were 
formed, the Northern and the Southern; the former being the principal roadstead. 
The Northern port, or basin, was formerly enclosed by a wall running from the 
north end of the Island, in a curve towards the mainland. This wall, of which but 
fragments remain, displays even in ruin great massiveness. Its foundations often exhibit 
marble and granite pillars laid side by side, not unlike vast pieces of ordnance. But 
enclosure has long since been useless; for the port has been nearly choked with sand, 
and it now gives a place of refuge to scarcely more than the few fishing vessels of the 
neighbouring peasantry. 
The memorable prophecy of Ezekiel against the elder Tyre, regarded in merely its 
human aspect, would supply almost a study of the commerce of antiquity; closing with the 
sentence of ruin: “ These were thy merchants in all sorts of things, in blue clothes, and 
in broidered work, and in chests of rich apparel, bound with cords, and made of cedar, 
among thy merchandise.” The previous detail embraces nearly all the wants and luxuries 
of man. 
Then follows the condemnation: “ All the inhabitants of the isles shall be astonished 
at thee, and their kings shall be sore afraid, they shall be troubled in their countenance. 
The merchants among the people shall hiss at thee; thou shalt be a terror, and never 
shalt be any more .” 1 
Ezek. xxvii. 2—36. 
