'Travels in Assyria, Media, and Persia, including a journey from Bagdad by Mount Zagros, to Hamadan, the ancient Ecbatana, researches in Ispahan and the ruins of Persepolis, and journey from thence by Shiraz and Shapoor to the sea-shore. Description of Bussorah, Bushire, Bahrein, Ormuz, and Muscat, narrative of an expedition against the pirates of the Persian Gulf, with illustrations of the voyage of Nearchus, and passage by the Arabian Sea to Bombay.' [‎523] (554/582)

TOWN AND HARBOUR OF MUTTRAH.
523
A little to the north-west of Muscat, and seated at the bottom
of a cove, almost of the same form and size as its own, is the town
of Muttrah. As a harbour, this is quite as good as Muscat, having
the same convenient depth of anchorage, from ten to thirteen
fathoms, the same kind of holding ground, and a better shelter
from northerly and north-west winds. Ships not being able to
beat into the cove of Muscat with southerly winds, may always
stretch over to the westward, and anchor in that of Muttrah, from
whence they may weigh with the land-wind, and come into Mus
cat at pleasure. Muttrah is less a place of business than Muscat,
though there are more well-built houses in it, from its being a
cooler and more agreeable residence, and, as such, a place of re
treat for men of wealth. Provisions and refreshments for ship
ping may be had with equal ease from either of these places; in
deed, the greater part of those brought to Muscat are said to come
through Muttrah, from the country behind. # Meat, vegetables,
of one of these works, that is worth repeating. He says, ' There are now eight books of
Sibylline verses extant, but they are universally reckoned spurious. They speak so plainly
of our Saviour, of his sufferings, and of his death, as even to surpass far the sublime prediction
of Isaiah in description ; and therefore,/row this very circumstance, it is evident that they were
composed in the second century by some of the followers of Christianity, who wished to con
vince the heathens of their error, by assisting the cause of truth with the arms of pious
artifice !— Lempriere's Class- Diet. art. Sihylloe.
If the eloquence of prophecy, or the correspondence of subsequent events with the facts
predicted, render it evident that such predictions must have been composed after the events
predicted had really occurred, it is to be feared that the Sibylline legend of Coulan will rest
on as slender a basis as those of the prophetic sisters of Greece and Italy : but such a doc
trine, if admitted, would sap the foundations of even the sublime prophecies of Judea.
It was a common opinion among the ancients, that their great men and heroes, at their
death, migrated into some star; in consequence of which they deified them. Julius Ceesar
was canonized, because of a star that appeared at his death, into which they supposed he
was gone.— Virg. Eclogue, 19. 47. Horace, lib. 1. ode 12. The wise men who came from
the East to Jerusalem, thus exclaim, ' Where is he that is born King of the Jews? for we
have seen his star in the East, and are come to worship him.-Matt. u. 2. There is a pas
sage in Virgil too, which implies that the gods sent stars to point out the way to their avour-
ites in difficult and perplexed cases, and that the ancients called globes of fire appear^ .n
41,6 ' M^frnttoed at a very early period, as connected with Mnscat, under the name
3x2