rcumstances of plenty or want do not depend on one
single event over the whole face of a country, separated, besides, from
others by a sea, which they could not navigate, and by deserts not very
easy to pass over.

The difficulties of transporting corn, which were sufficient to deter the
Egyptians from depending on a supply from other parts, did not,
however, prevent other nations from applying to them in times of
scarcity, and accordingly it was the granary of the ancient world.

---
{24} For farther particulars of this commerce see the Digression on
the Trade to India.
-=-

[end of page #21]

To those natural advantages, the Egyptians added some others,
different in their nature, but not less precious.

They enjoyed a mild government, and an admirable and simple code
of laws. Their docility and obedience have never been equalled, and as
one maxim, was, to admit of no person being idle, it is evident that the
population must have increased rapidly, and that there must have been
an impossibility to employ the whole labour of so many hands on the
means of providing subsistence in a country, where the manners were
simple, the soil fertile, and the wants few.

The surplus of the industry of Egypt appears to have been at the
disposal of the sovereigns to whom all the lands belonged, and for
which they exacted a rent in kind, as is the custom among the native
powers on both peninsulas of India to this day. By that means, they
were enabled to produce those stupendous works which have been the
admiration and wonder of all succeeding generations, and of every
nation. The city of Thebes, with the labyrinth; Memphis, the canals,
and the pyramids would all be incredible, had not their singular
structure preserved those latter efforts of industry from the ravages of
time, and left them nearly entire to the present day.

The Phoenicians were a colony from that great country; for the
Egyptians in general had a dislike to the sea. It is well known,
however, that people who live immediately on the coast have a
propensity to navigation, and it is probable that those Egyptians who
left their own fruitful land to settle on the barren borders of Syria,
were from the delta of Lower Egypt, which lies on the sea coast, and
is intersected by a number of branches of the river Nile. {25}

It is not surprising that such a colony, following the natural propensity
to naval affairs, and carrying with it the arts of dying and weaving,
tog