BONA, by the Moors called Balederna, a sea-port town of the kingdom of Algiers in Africa, situated in E. Long. 7. 57. N. Lat. 36. 5. It was formerly rich, populous,
populous, capital of the province of the same name under the kingdom of Constantina, and is supposed by some to be the ancient Hippo, once the seat of the great St. Austin, and a sea-port built by the Romans. The inhabitants, however, deny it to be the ancient Hippo, which had been so often taken, retaken, and destroyed by the wars; and pretend it to be since rebuilt at the distance of two or three miles from the ancient Hippo, out of its ruins, and called Baled-el-Ugued, from a sort of trees of that name that grow in the neighbourhood. It is now a very mean place, poorly built, and thinly inhabited, with scarce any traces of its former grandeur, except the ruins of a cathedral, or, as others guess, of a monastery, built by St. Austin, about three miles distant from the city. Near these ruins is a famed spring called by his name, much resorted to by the French and Italian sailors, who come to drink of its waters, and pay their devotions to a maimed statue said also to belong to the saint, but so mutilated that no traces either of face or dress are remaining; and as each of them strives to break off some splinter, or to scrape off some part of it on account of its supposed sanctity, it will probably be soon reduced to a state of non-existence. Bona was taken by the pirate Barbarossa, and joined to his new kingdom of Algiers; but as quickly lost, and recovered by its old masters the Tunisians, who soon after lost it again. It is commanded by a little fort, in which is a garrison of about 300 Turks, under the command of an aga, who is also governor of the town. The road for the ships is good for nothing before the town, but a little farther west is very deep and safe. Dr. Shaw tells us, that the continual discharging of ballast into the road, and the neglect of cleansing the port which came to the very walls, is the cause of both becoming so unsafe and inconvenient; though this might be easily remedied so as to make the town one of the most flourishing in all Barbary.