56 CALIPHS OF SPAIN. 



Saracens she boasted of eighty great cities — 300 

 of the second and third order ; besides smaller 

 towns and villages innumerable. Most of these 

 were planted with nurseries of art and industry, 

 which gave an unexampled activity to trade and 

 manufactures. There was scarcely a country in 

 the civilized world to which their traffic did not ex- 

 tend. Throughout Africa, arms and accoutrements, 

 silks and woollen cloths of various colours, were in 

 great demand. With Egypt and the Grecian states 

 they bartered their different exports, to a still greater 

 amount, for such commodities as were in popular 

 request in Spain. Their drugs and dies were ex- 

 changed for oriental perfumes ; and the luxuries of 

 India were brought from Alexandria to Malaga to 

 supply the wants of the court. The manufactories 

 of Spain w^ere the arsenals from w^hich France and 

 England drew their best military accoutrements — 

 such as helmets, lances, swordblades, and coats-of- 

 mail, which had reached a perfection in that coun- 

 try unknown to the rest of Europe. The profits de- 

 rived from these successful speculations must have 

 been incalculable ; and, while abundantly remuner- 

 ating the merchant, they afforded a prodigious 

 source of revenue to the sovereign. 



In the fourteenth century the Arabs had an im- 

 mense marine ; the woods and forests of Spain fur- 

 nished them with timber, and they are said to have 

 possessed a fleet of more than 1000 merchant ves- 

 sels. From an Arabian waiter on commerce, of the 

 tenth century, it appears that the balance of trade 

 was decidedly in favour of the Moors, w^hom Cdairi, 

 from their maritime traffic and the distant voyages 

 they undertook by sea, compares to the ancient 

 Phenicians and Carthaginians. Gold, silver, cop- 

 per, raw and wrought silks, sugar, cochineal, quick- 

 silver, iron, olives, oil, myrrh, corals fished on the 

 coast of Andalusia, pearls on that of Catalonia, 

 rubies and amethysts from mines in the neighbour- 



