which were certainly known to the ancients. Sulphur was deposited upon
the surface of the ground in places. Some of the mountains contained
ordinary lead; but it is not unlikely that this metal escaped notice.

Ancient Persia produced a certain number of gems. The pearls of
the Gulf, which have still so great a reputation, had attracted the
attention of adventurers before the time of Alexander, whose naval
captains found a regular fishery established in one of the islands. The
Orientals have always set a high value on this commodity; and it appears
that in ancient times the Gulf pearls were more highly esteemed than any
others. Of hard stones the only kinds that can be distinctly assigned to
Persia Proper are the iritis, a species of rock-crystal; the atizoe, a
white stone which had a pleasant odor; the mithrax, a gem of many hues,
the nipparene, which resembled ivory; and the the lycardios or mule,
which was in special favor among the natives of the country.

From this account of the products of Persia Proper we have now to pass
to those of the Empire in general--a wide subject, which it will be
impossible to treat here with any completeness, owing to the limits to
which the present work is necessarily confined. In order to bring the
matter within reasonable compass, the reader may be referred in the
first instance to the account which was given in a former volume of the
products of the empire of Babylon; and the enquiry may then be confined
to those regions which were subject to Persia, but not contained within
the limits of the Fourth Monarchy.

Among the animals belonging to these regions, the following are
especially noticeable:--The tiger, the elephant, the hippopotamus, the
crocodile, the monitor, the two-humped camel, the Angora goat, the elk,
the monkey, and the spotted hysena, or _Felis chaus_. The tiger, which
is entirely absent from Mesopotamia, and unknown upon the plateau of
Iran, abounds in the low tract between the Elburz and the Caspian, in
the flat region about the Sea of Aral, and in the Indus valley. The
elephant was, perhaps, anciently an inhabitant of Upper Egypt, where the
island of Elephantine remained an evidence of the fact. It was also in
Persian times a denizen of the Indus valley, though perhaps only in a
domesticated state. The hippopotamus, unknown in India, was confined to
the single province of Egypt, where it was included among the animals
which were the objects of popular worship. T