Political Changes. 297 
Tivers as they usually do in such countries similar to 
our arid plains, form cafions and arroyos, and, being 
uncertain in their water stages, none of them are navi- 
gable although hundreds of miles long, but useful for 
irrigation, on which agriculture relies. The great min- 
eral wealth had made Spain the California of the 
Carthaginians and Romans, and it is still its most 
valuable resource. 
Spain awakened to civilization through the visits of 
Phoenicians and Carthaginians followed by the 
Romans. During the first centuries of the Christian 
era there occurred one of the several periods of extreme 
prosperity, when a supposed population of 40 million 
exploited the country. After the dark days of the 
Gothic domination, a second period of prosperity was 
attained for the portion which came under the sway of 
the industrious and intelligent Moors or Saracens 
(711 to 1000 A. D.), who made the desert bloom, and 
whose irrigation works are still the mainstay of agricul- 
ture at present. Centuries of warfare and carnage to 
re-establish Christian kingdoms still left the country 
Tich, when in 1479 the several kingdoms were united 
into one under Ferdinand and Isabella, and the Moors 
were finally driven out altogether (1492). This king- 
dom persisted in the same form to the present time 
with only a short period as a republic (1873). Spain 
was among the first countries to have a constitution. 
After the conquest of the Moors, and with the dis- 
covery of America, again a period of prosperity set in 
for the then 20 million people, but, through oppression 
by State and Church (Inquisition), which also led to 
the expulsion of the Jews and large emigration to 
