els sailed
from Myos-hormos, a port of Egypt, on the Red Sea. By the periodical
assistance of the monsoons, they traversed the ocean in about forty
days. The coast of Malabar, or the island of Ceylon, was the usual term
of their navigation, and it was in those markets that the merchants from
the more remote countries of Asia expected their arrival. The return of
the fleet of Egypt was fixed to the months of December or January; and
as soon as their rich cargo had been transported on the backs of camels,
from the Red Sea to the Nile, and had descended that river as far
as Alexandria, it was poured, without delay, into the capital of the
empire. The objects of oriental traffic were splendid and trifling;
silk, a pound of which was esteemed not inferior in value to a pound
of gold; precious stones, among which the pearl claimed the first rank
after the diamond; and a variety of aromatics, that were consumed in
religious worship and the pomp of funerals. The labor and risk of the
voyage was rewarded with almost incredible profit; but the profit was
made upon Roman subjects, and a few individuals were enriched at the
expense of the public. As the natives of Arabia and India were contented
with the productions and manufactures of their own country, silver, on
the side of the Romans, was the principal, if not the only * instrument
of commerce. It was a complaint worthy of the gravity of the senate,
that, in the purchase of female ornaments, the wealth of the state was
irrecoverably given away to foreign and hostile nations. The annual loss
is computed, by a writer of an inquisitive but censorious temper, at
upwards of eight hundred thousand pounds sterling. Such was the style of
discontent, brooding over the dark prospect of approaching poverty. And
yet, if we compare the proportion between gold and silver, as it stood
in the time of Pliny, and as it was fixed in the reign of Constantine,
we shall discover within that period a very considerable increase. There
is not the least reason to suppose that gold was become more scarce; it
is therefore evident that silver was grown more common; that whatever
might be the amount of the Indian and Arabian exports, they were far
from exhausting the wealth of the Roman world; and that the produce of
the mines abundantly supplied the demands of commerce.

Notwithstanding the propensity of mankind to exalt the past, and to
depreciate the present, the tranquil and prosperous state of the empir