tions of India did actually reach Egypt we have positive testimony from the tombs of Thebes.

The Scripture history shows the traffic established by Solomon with India, through the Red Sea, to have been of very great consequence, producing, in one voyage, no less than 450 talents of gold*, or 3,240,000l. sterling; and to the same branch of commerce may be ascribed the main cause of the flourishing condition of Tyre itself. And if the Egyptian trade was not so direct as that of Solomon and the Tyrians, it must still be admitted that any intercourse with India at so remote a period would be highly beneficial to the country, since it was enjoyed without competition, and consequently afforded increased advantages.

The other harbours in this part of the Arabian Gulf,-Myos Hormos, Berenice, Arsinoe, Nechesia, and Leucos Portus, -were built in later times; and the lucrative trade they enjoyed was greatly increased after the conquest of Egypt by the Romans: 120 vessels annually leaving the coast of Egypt for India, at midsummer, about the rising of the dogstart, and returning in the month of December or January. "The principal objects of oriental traffic," says Gibbon, "were splendid and trifling: silk (a pound of which was esteemed not inferior in value to a pound of gold), precious stones, and a variety of aromatics." When Strabo visited Egypt the Myos Hormos seems to have superseded Berenice, and

* 2 Chron. viii. 18.; 1 Kings, ix. 26.

The Periplus gives "the month of July, which is Epiphi;" and Pliny (lib. vi. 26.), “ ante Canis ortum," about July 26. o o

all the other maritime stations on the coast; and indeed it possessed greater advantages than any other, except Philoteras and Arsinoe, in its overland communication with the Nile: yet Berenice, in the later age of Pliny, was again preferred to its rival. From both ports the goods were taken on camels by an almost level road across the desert to Coptos*, and thence distributed over different parts of Egypt; and, in the time of the Ptolemies and Cæsars, those particularly suited for exportation to Europe went down the river to Alexandria, where they were sold to merchants who resorted to that city at a stated season.

At a subsequent period, during the reigns of the Arab caliphs, Apollinopolis Parva, or Qoos, succeeded Coptos, as the rendezvous of caravans from the Red Sea; and this town flourished so rapidly, in consequence of the preference it enjoyed, that in Aboolfidda's time it was second only to Fostat, the capital of Egypt; until it ceded its place to Qeneh, as Myos Hormos was destined to do in favour of Kossayr. Philoteras, however, continued to be resorted to after the Arab conquest; and it was during the reigns of the Egyptian caliphs that the modern Kossayrt took the place of that ancient port. The Myos Hormos, called also Aphrodite‡, stood

"Coptos Indicarum Arabicarumque mercium Nilo proximum emporium." Plin. v. 9. "All the Indian and Arabian goods, and even those that come from Ethiopia by the Red Sea, are brought to Coptos." Strabo, xvii.

Philoteras, now in ruins, is known by the name of Old Kossayr. Now called Abooshar. Strabo, Ειτα Μυος ορμον και Αφροδίτης coμov kaduσbai Mueva peyar," lib. xvii. Agatharcides says, it was afterwards called the Port of Venus.

in latitude 27° 22′, upon a flat coast, backed by low mountains, distant from it about three miles; where a well, the Fons Tadnos*, supplied the town and ships with water. The port was more capacious than those of Berenice and Philoteras; and though exposed to the winds, it was secure against the force of a boisterous sea. Several roads united at the gates of the town, from Berenice and Philoteras on the south, from Arsinoe on the north, and from Coptos on the west; and stations supplied those who passed to and from the Nile with water and other necessaries.

Berenice owed its foundation to Ptolemy Philadelphus, who called it after the name of his mother, the wife of Lagus or Soter. The town was extensive, and was ornamented with a small but elegant temple of Sarapis; and though the harbour was neither deep nor spacious, its position in a receding gulf tended greatly to the safety of the vessels lying within it, or anchored in the bay. A road led thence direct to Coptos, furnished with the usual stations, or hydreumas; and another, which also went to the emerald mines, joined, or rather crossed it, from Apollinopolis Magna.

* "Mox deserta ad Myos Hormon, ubi Fons Tadnos." Plin. vi. 29. + "Berenice oppidum matris Philadelphi nomine, ad quod iter à Copto diximus." Plin. vi. 29.

Strabo says, "Berenice placed in a deep bay." The headland of Cape Nose stretches out on the east of it to the distance of 21 miles from the line of the shore, agreeing with another remark of the geogra pher, that "an isthmus projects into the Red Sea near the city of Berenice, which, though without a port, affords a convenient shelter, from the vicinity of the headland."

Arsinoe, which stood at the northern extremity of the Red Sea, near the modern town of Sooez, was founded by the second Ptolemy, and so named after his sister.* Though vessels anchored there rode secure from the violence of the sea, its exposed situation, and the dangers they encountered in working up the narrow extremity of the gulf, rendered its position † less eligible for the Indian trade than either Myos Hormos or Berenice; and had it not been for the convenience of establishing a communication with the Nile by a canal, and the shortness of the journey across the desert in that part, it is probable it would not have been chosen for a seaport.

The small towns of Nechesia and the Leucos Portus were probably of Roman date, though the natural harbours they possess may have been used at a much earlier period. Their positions are still marked by the ruins on the shore, in latitude 24° 54′ and 25° 37', where I discovered them in 1826, while making a survey of this part of the coast from Sooez to Berenice. The former stands in, and perhaps gave the name to, the Wadee Nukkaree;

"Arsinoen

. . . conditam sororis nomine in sinu charandra, à Ptolemæo Philadelpho." Plin. vi. 29.

† It probably succeeded to some more ancient town. It is not certain that Clysma stood there; but Qolzim appears to have occupied the site of Arsinoe and part of the modern Sooez. Vide my Egypt and Thebes, p. 540. note t. Herodotus (ii. 158.) says the canal entered the Red Sea near to Patumos; we may therefore conclude that town stood on the same spot as Arsinoe. We again trace in Patumos the name Pi-thom. It was common to many towns. Thomu, Thmui, and others are evidently derived, like Thummim, from Thmei, the goddess of Truth or Justice. In Egyptian pi is "the," and pa belonging to."

the latter is called E'Shoona, or "the Magazine *," and, from being built of very white limestone, was readily indicated by the Arabs when I inquired of them the site of the White Harbour.

Many other ports, the "Portus multi" of Pliny t, occur along the coast, particularly between Berenice and Kossayr; but though they all have landmarks to guide boats in approaching their rocky entrances, none of them have any remains of a town, or the vestiges of habitations.

The principal objects introduced in early times into Egypt, from Arabia and India, were spices and various oriental productions ‡, required either for the service of religion, or the purposes of luxury; and a number of precious stones, lapis lazzuli, and other things brought from those countries, are frequently discovered in the tombs of Thebes, bearing the names of Pharaohs of the 18th Dynasty. The mines of their own desert did, indeed, supply the emeralds they used; and these were worked as early, at least, as the reign of Amunoph III., or 1425 B. C., but many other stones must have come from India; and some plants, as the Nymphæa Nelumbo, could only have been introduced from that country. §

Though we cannot ascertain the extent or exact

This word is taken from the Arabic Mukhzen, of similar import. † Plin. vi. 29.

Chinese bottles, with inscriptions in that language, are found in ancient tombs at Thebes, but of what date I am uncertain.

§ It was evidently not indigenous to Egypt, from the care that was necessary in planting it, and is now totally unknown in the valley of the Nile. Before they introduced it, would they not have seen the plant? and who was likely to bring the roots but some of their own people?