The thought is not uninspiring. It is not unreasonable to suppose that the first keel that ever ploughed the Atlantic grazed this strand. It is likely enough that the fleets of lost Atlantis, if that mystical isle possessed a ship, resorted hither, for the copper and precious metals of Tarshish. What voyages have begun from this port, from the little Phœnician craft setting forth in quest of the Tin Islands of the far north, to brave Cervera leading out his squadron to its preordained doom! "It may be that the gulfs shall wash us down, It may be we shall touch the happy isles." And careless of fate, all these dauntless sailors have adventured forth into the deep. In after years, the Phœnicians and Carthaginians had settlements here, and built great ugly palaces overlooking the sea and the estuaries. With their curling black beards I seem to see them, robed in the real Tyrian purple, reclining on their terraces even as their forefathers are shown in that strange picture in our National Gallery, "The Eve of the Deluge." Their deluge was the Roman Invasion, when, in a good hour for humanity, Latin superseded Semitic civilization, and the cruel gods of Sidon bowed before the young and beautiful gods of Rome. Gades or Gaddir--I give it its two oldest names--did not suffer by its change of masters. Its mart was crowded, its merchants known from Britain to the Fortunate Isles, from Lusitania to Arabia. Much wealth engendered luxury. Life in Gades was feverish and distempered. The people had not forgotten the worship of Astarte, and the Gaditane dancing-girls proved themselves worthy daughters of the goddess. When the gods were dethroned the sensual city pined; and under the austere yoke of Islam it languished and all but faded away. It is interesting to note that its Moslem inhabitants were drawn from the old race of Philistines, some of whose gods had probably been worshipped here in the Punic days.