a, must have been especially
plentiful. It was probably yielded, not only by the Kerman mines,
but also by those of Armenia, Asia Minor, and the Elburz. Copper was
obtained in great abundance from Cyprus, as well as from Carmania; and
it may have been also derived, as it is now in very large quantities,
from Armenia. Iron, really the most precious of all metals, existed
within the Persian territory in the shape of huge boulders, as well
as in nodules and in the form of ironstone. Lead was procurable from
Bactria, Armenia, Korman, and many parts of Affghanistan; orpiment
from Bactria, Kerman, and the Hazareh country; antimony from Armenia,
Affghanistan, and Media; hornblende, quartz, talc, and asbestos, from
various places in the Taurus.

Of all necessary minerals probably none was so plentiful and so widely
diffused as salt. It was not only in Persia Proper that nature had
bestowed this commodity with a lavish hand--there was scarcely
a province of the Empire which did not possess it in superfluous
abundance. Large tracts were covered by it in North Africa, in Media,
in Carmania, and in Lower Babylonia. In Asia Minor, Armenia, Syria,
Palestine, and other places, it could be obtained from lakes. In Kerman,
and again in Palestine, it showed itself in the shape of large masses,
not inappropriately termed "mountains." Finally, in India it was the
chief material of a long mountain-range, which is capable of supplying
the whole world with salt for many ages.

Bitumen and naptha were also very widely diffused. At the eastern foot
of the Caucasus, where it subsides into the Caspian Sea, at various
points in the great Mesopotamian plain, in the Deshtistan or low country
of Persia Proper, in the Bakh-tiyari mountains, and again in the distant
Jordan valley, these two inseparable products are to be found, generally
united with indications of volcanic action, present or recent. The
bitumen is of excellent quality, and was largely employed by the
ancients. The naphtha is of two kinds, black naphtha or petroleum, and
white naphtha, which is much preferred to the other. The bitumen-pits
also, in some places, yielded salt.

Another useful mineral with which the Persians were very plentifully
supplied, was sulphur. Sulphur is found in Persia Proper, in Carmania,
on the coast of Mekran, in Azerbijan, in the Elburz, on the Iranian
plateau, in the vicinity of the Dead Sea, and in very large quantities
near Mosul. Here it is quarried in