type of him who was worshipped at Tyre, and was the great promoter of commerce and navigation; of him who was adored as the vanquifher of Bufiris in Egypt, and whose twelve labours are the fymbols of the Sun toiling through the twelve figns of the zodiac; of him, in fhort, whofe complicated history was' in after-ages, with all its extravagances, adopted by the fabulous Greeks. One of the moft curious and remarkable of the mythologic feats of Hercules was his failing in a golden cup, which Apollo, or the Sun, had given him, to the coafts of Spain, where he fet up the pillars that bear his name. On this paffage Macrobius remarks, Ego autem arbitror non POCULO Herculem maria tranfvectum, fed navigio cui SCYPHO nomen fuit.* From this fable of the golden cup, which was probably no more than a gilded veffel, we may both collect in what manner the celebrated feats of Hercules are to be understood, and arrive at an important hiftorical truth concealed under the allegory, that Hercules,` or at least a chieftain, or colony, affuming the name of their fovereign, a circumstance not unusual in the earlieft periods of time

+ Vide Macrobii Saturnalia, lib. v. cap. 21, p. 522, edit. oct. 1670.

vifited

visited Europe, and transported thither the theological rites and civil cuftoms of the Oriental world: but how they could perform with safety and fuccefs fo diftant and hazardous a voyage, without the aid of the magnetic needle to conduct them, must be left to the confideration of thofe of my readers, who may reject the hypothesis above fubmitted to them.

It ought not to be concealed, however, that by fome mythologists, and especially by the author of fome letters, on this fubject, to Sir Hildebrand Jacob, this myfterious vafe, given by Apollo to Hercules, is contended to have been itself the mariner's compass-box, by which, not in which, he failed over the vaft ocean. The fame author contends, that the image of Jupiter Hammon, whofe Libyan temple, according to Herodotus, took its rife from Phoenicia, was nothing more than a magnet, which was carried about by the priefts, when the oracle was confulted, in a golden fcyphus: that the famous golden fleece was nothing else: whence, he fays, the fhip which carried it is faid to have been fenfible, and poffeffed of the gift of fpeech; and, finally, that the high authority of Homer may be adduced to corroborate the conjecture, that

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the Phæacians, a people renowned for nautical fcience, had the knowledge of the magnet; for he obferves, either that certain lines in the 8th book of the Odyffey, defcribing the Phæacian veffels as inftinct with foul, and gliding, without a pilot, through the pathless ocean to their place of destination, allude to the attractive power of the magnet, or else are utterly unintelligible.* Whatfoever truth there may be in this ftatement, it is evident, from the extenfive intercourfe anciently carried on between nations inhabiting opposite parts of the globe, where the stars, peculiar to their own native region, could no longer afford them the means of fafe navigation, that the important discovery must be of far more ancient date than the year of our Lord 1260, to which it is generally affigned, and by the means of Marco Polo, a man famous for his travels into the Eaft.

Before I conclnde these ftrictures on Abury, another circumftance of ftriking affinity between the Scythians and old Britons fhould by no means be omitted.

* See an Inquiry into the Patriarchal and Druidical Religion, by the Rev. Mr. Cooke, p. 27.

In

In my parallel of the ancient Scythian and Indian fuperftitions, I have repeatedly mentioned the custom of interring with the venerated kings, most beloved in each country, their favourite minifters, women, horfes, arms, and accoutrements. In opening Silbury-Hill, together with the body of the inhumed monarch, the workmen found a bridle, a folid body of ruft, which Dr. Stukeley purchased on the spot, and of which he has given an engraving. In other barrows, described in page 45, they found, together with the body, other pieces of armour, fpear-heads of iron, knives, fwords, gold rings, and fragments of golden ornaments. They likewife dug up feveral large beads of amber, fome of glafs,enamelled: fome were of a white colour, others blue and azure. Now rofaries of beads form a conftant appendage to the Brahmin hermits or Yogee penitents, which they count with as much enraptured zeal as any enthusiast of the Roman church, which imported this at the fame time as it did the other fuperftitions of Afia. The introduction of beads into religious ceremonies arose from the attachment of the Afiatics, like the old Pythagoreans, to facred and myftical num

bers.

Concerning

Concerning this bridle, it should be farther obferved, Dr. Stukeley affirms, that it was the bridle of an ancient British chariot, and hence prefumes, that the first British fettlers, being an Eastern colony, learned to fabricate and make use of that kind of carriage from the Egyptians and other Eastern nations, who, even fo early as the time of Jofeph, made use of chariots both in war and peace. He adds, that they are mentioned in the wars carried on by Joshua against the Canaanites as being ufed by the latter, and that the British chariots have ever been famous, fince the Romans in the height of their luxury and glory made ufe of British chariots.

Effeda calatis fifte Britanna jugis.

On the contrary, I contend, that, as the Indians have ever made ufe of war-chariots, with a numerous train of which Porus attacked Alexander, and as the Scythians were accustomed to transport themselves and families, over the vast plains of Tartary, in rude carriages of fimilar conftruction, if a foreign origin must be affigned them, they might full as probably, at least, have derived them from that quarter as from Egypt.

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