the ordinary practice among the ancients to spend three
years in a voyage of twelve hundred leagues. Such a
commerce must have been very expensive, particularly as they
were obliged to carry with them their provisions, and even
fresh water. For this reason Solomon made himself master of
Palmyra, which was at that time inhabited, and was already
the magazine and high road of merchants by the way of the
Euphrates. This conquest brought Solomon much nearer to the
country of gold and pearls. This alternative of a route
either by the Red Sea or by the river Euphrates was to the
ancients, what in later times has been the alternative in a
voyage to the Indies, either by crossing the isthmus of Suez
or doubling the cape of Good Hope. It appears that till the
time of Moses, this trade was carried on across the desert
of Syria and Thebais; that afterwards it fell into the hands
of the Phoenicians, who fixed its site upon the Red Sea; and
that it was mutual jealousy that induced the kings of
Nineveh and Babylon to undertake the destruction of Tyre and
Jerusalem. I insist the more upon these facts, because I
have never seen any thing reasonable upon the subject.

**** It appears that Babylon occupied on the eastern banks
of the Euphrates a space of ground six leagues in length.
Throughout this space bricks are found by means of which
daily additions are made to the town of Helle. Upon many of
these are characters written with a nail similar to those of
Persepolis. I am indebted for these facts to M. de
Beauchamp, grand vicar of Babylon, a traveller equally
distinguished for his knowledge of astronomy and for his
veracity.