to profusion, and in a genial clime, would offer no check to their
wishes. Thus the people of Canopus became notorious for the
luxury and disspluteness of their manners, which were carried to
an unbounded pitch. The sources, however, that gave wealth to
the people, and fertility to their fields, have long been dried up;
and nothing remains of the city but ruins, which still display sufficient
vestiges of it’s O ■ ancient Ograndeur.
Aboukeer, which now occupies it’s site, is a small village,
inhabited by a few fishermen, and sailors who navigate the little
vessels of the country, too poor to furnish a traveller with bread,
or any other necessary, except a little fish. In front of the village
is a very good road, where the french fleet, that conveyed Bonaparte
and his army to Egypt, lay at anchor under the command
of admiral Brueys, when it was attacked by admiral Nelson, and
almost every ship that composed it taken or destroyed, only two
ships of the line and two frigates escaping. On the point of a
cape running out into the sea stood a paltry castle, in the centre
of which was a round tower, serving for a lighthouse.
The view we have given of this place represents it as it ap •
peared before the late expedition to Egypt. When the french
attacked the turks here under Mustapha bashaw, many of the
houses, as well as the castle, were beaten into ruins by their cannons;
and others were demolished to make room for the fortifications,
which they erected in order to defend the place, when it
was in their possession.