DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.6094#0079
56 A TOUR THROUGH
tius, Ovid, Sallust, Seneca, as also by
many of the old Italian and Sicilian poets,
who all speak of it in terms of horror;
and represent it as an object that inspired
terror, even when looked on at a distance.
It certainly is not now so formidable; and
very probably, the violence of this motion,
continued for so many ages, has by degrees
worn smooth the rugged rocks, and jutting
shelves, that may have intercepted and
confined the waters. The breadth of the
Straits too, in this place, I make no doubt
is considerably enlarged. Indeed, from the
nature of things it must be so; the perpe-
tual friction occasioned by the current must
At once the thundering sea Sicilia tore,
And sunder'd from the fair Hesperian more ;
And Hill the neighbouring coasts and towns divides
With scanty channels and contracted tides.
Fierce to the right tremendous Scylla roars,
Charybdis on the left the ssood devours:
Thrice swallow'd in her womb subsides the sea,
Deep, deep as hell; and thrice (he spouts away
From her black bellowing gulphs disgorg'd on high
Waves after waves, that da(h against the fey. Pn t.
wear
tius, Ovid, Sallust, Seneca, as also by
many of the old Italian and Sicilian poets,
who all speak of it in terms of horror;
and represent it as an object that inspired
terror, even when looked on at a distance.
It certainly is not now so formidable; and
very probably, the violence of this motion,
continued for so many ages, has by degrees
worn smooth the rugged rocks, and jutting
shelves, that may have intercepted and
confined the waters. The breadth of the
Straits too, in this place, I make no doubt
is considerably enlarged. Indeed, from the
nature of things it must be so; the perpe-
tual friction occasioned by the current must
At once the thundering sea Sicilia tore,
And sunder'd from the fair Hesperian more ;
And Hill the neighbouring coasts and towns divides
With scanty channels and contracted tides.
Fierce to the right tremendous Scylla roars,
Charybdis on the left the ssood devours:
Thrice swallow'd in her womb subsides the sea,
Deep, deep as hell; and thrice (he spouts away
From her black bellowing gulphs disgorg'd on high
Waves after waves, that da(h against the fey. Pn t.
wear