and disgraceful tribute for the corn which was absolutely necessary
for the support of his capital. But a sudden and most extraordinary change
took place in the character of Heraclius: he roused himself from his sloth,
indolence and despair; he fitted out a large fleet; exerted his skill, and
displayed his courage and coolness in a storm which it encountered; carried
his armies into Persia itself, and succeeded in recovering Egypt and the
other provinces which the Persians had wrested from the empire.

The very early commerce of the Arabians, by means of caravans, with India,
and their settlements on the Red Sea and the coasts of Africa and India at
a later period, for the purposes of commerce, have been already noticed.
Soon after they became the disciples of Mahomet, their commercial and
enterprizing spirit revived, if indeed it had ever languished; and it
certainly displayed itself with augmented zeal, vigour, and success, under
the influence of their new religion, and the genius and ambition of their
caliphs. Persia, Syria, Egypt, Africa, and Spain, were successively
conquered by them; and one of their first and most favourite objects, after
they had conquered a country, was the amelioration or extension of its
commerce. When they conquered Persia, the trade between that country and
India was extensive and flourishing: the Persian merchants brought from
India its most precious commodities. The luxury of the kings of Persia
consumed a large quantity of camphire, mixed with wax, to illuminate their
palaces; and this must have been brought, indirectly, through India, from
Japan, Sumatra, or Borneo, the only places where the camphire-tree grows: a
curious and striking proof of the remote and extensive influence of the
commerce and luxury of Persia, at the time it was conquered by the
Arabians. The conquerors, aware of the importance of the Indian commerce,
and of the advantages which the Tigris and Euphrates afforded for this
purpose, very soon after their conquest, founded the city of Bassora: a
place, which, from its situation midway between the junction and the mouth
of these rivers, commands the trade and navigation of Persia. It soon rose
to be a great commercial city; and its inhabitants, directing their
principal attention and most vigorous enterprize to the East, soon pushed
their voyages beyond Ceylon, and brought, directly from the place of their
growth or manufacture, many of those articles which hitherto they h