16 



THE POPULAR EDUCATOR. 



at a very early period. Its course downwards to the sea was 

 well known ; and Meroe, on the confines of Egypt and Ethiopia, 

 one of the most renowned cities of the ancient world, owed its 

 importance to its position on the Nile. The Suez Canal, one of 

 the greatest engineering works of our own day, restores, and 

 partly follows, the line of an older canal, the date of the con- 

 struction of which cannot now be fixed, which connected the 

 river and the head of the Bed Sea. The river commerce of 

 the Tigris and Euphrates, furnishing an easier mode of reach- 

 ing India, was of still greater importance than that of the Nile. 



nations, who, as agents or factors, consigned their freights 

 again, at the end of the voyage, for inland distribution. Ren- 

 deied fearless by increase of knowledge, merchants discovered 

 that they could sail upon the Persian Gulf with as much safety 

 as upon the Tigris and Euphrates, and that, without losing 

 sight of the land, they could reach the coast of India. Taking 

 advantage of the monsoons, voyages foreshadowing ocean com- 

 merce soon became organised into a system of departures and 

 returns, according to seasons, as perfect as that regulating the 

 caravans. The Arabian and Indian seaa appear to have been the 



EAKLY CAKAVAN TKADE. 1. HALT OF AN EASTERN CAKAVAN. 



The Indus and Ganges, as well as the grand river system of 

 China, were, in all probability, similarly employed, but our 

 information relative to them is scanty. Better known to us, 

 from the Roman and Greek historians, is the use made, at a 

 later period, of the Rhone, the Rhine, the Po, the Danube, the 

 Don, and the Volga. These winding watercourses were the 

 pathways of the earliest travellers. River commerce, thus far, 

 was combined with that carried on by means of the caravans. 

 It received a great impetus when men learnt to venture along 

 the coast, and ultimately upon the bosom of the sea. Important, 



scenes of the first trade of this character. At a later date the 

 Mediterranean Sea was the chief seat of the carrying trade, and 

 the nations possessing it were described as having in their hands 

 the commerce of the world. One of the first nations to obtain 

 a universal traffic was the Phoenician, whose mercantile supre- 

 macy at orre time extended from India to the countries north 

 and south of the Pillars of Hercules, two rocky masses flanking 

 what are now called the Straits of Gibraltar. Many of the great 

 commercial centres on the shores of the Mediterranean grew out 

 of colonies planted by this enterprising and adventurous people. 



EARLY CARAVAN TRADE. 2. EASTERN CARAVAN ENTERING THE GATE OF AN ANCIENT CITY. 



however, as river trade was in this first pei-iod of commercial 

 history, it bears no comparison with that of times like our own. 

 3. Maritime Coasting Trade. Maritime commerce was the 

 natural sequence of that along the courses of rivers. The 

 harbours and months of rivers on the sea-coast presented such 

 advantages for ships, that cities arose upon their shores, and 

 the conveyance of goods was carried on partly by water and 

 partly by land. This division of traffic led to a corresponding 

 distinction between the persons who were thus engaged. The 

 interchange of commodities between distant nations was con- 

 ducted by several sets of hands. The original producers, in 

 caravans, or as individual dealers, conveyed their wares over- 

 land to the river depot or seaport, where they exchanged them 

 for other commodities brought by the traders cf the maritime 



Nevertheless, ocean commerce, as we understand it, was un- 

 known and impossible to the ancients. The Mediterranean 

 was to them literally the middle of the earth. The limitless 

 sea beyond was filled by their imagination with vague and 

 impassable terrors. In Ptolemy's Geography, the earth is said 

 to be bounded by ice at 63 N. lat. and by fire at the equinoctial 

 on the south. The commercial zone lay between the Tropic of 

 Cancer and 40 N. lat., but afterwards expanded to 45 N. and 

 10 S. lat. Ocean traffic began with the invention of the 

 mariner's compass, about 1300, but its first fruits were not 

 reaped by Bartholomew Diaz, Vasco de Gama, and Columbus, 

 until 1492. With these general facts and principles in our 

 minds, we are now prepared to trace, in the order of time, the 

 development of commerce to its present dimensions. 



