lis, that an ox, under the name of Mnevis, was worshipped
as a god.(307) Cambyses, king of Persia, exercised his sacrilegious rage
on this city; burning the temples, demolishing the palaces, and destroying
the most precious monuments of antiquity in it. There are still to be seen
some obelisks which escaped his fury; and others were brought from thence
to Rome, to which city they are an ornament even at this day.

Alexandria, built by Alexander the Great, from whom it had its name, vied
almost in magnificence with the ancient cities in Egypt. It stands four
days' journey from Cairo, and was formerly the chief mart of all the trade
of the East. The merchandises were unloaded at Portus Murius,(308) a town
on the western coast of the Red-Sea;(309) from whence they were brought
upon camels to a town of Thebais, called Copht, and afterwards conveyed
down the Nile to Alexandria, whither merchants resorted from all parts.

It is well known that the trade of the East hath, at all times, enriched
those who carried it on. This was the chief source of the vast treasures
that Solomon amassed, and which enabled him to build the magnificent
temple of Jerusalem. David, by conquering Idumaea, became master of Elath
and Esiongeber, two towns situated on the eastern shore of the
Red-Sea.(310) From these two ports,(311) Solomon sent fleets to Ophir and
Tarshish, which always brought back immense riches.(312) This traffic,
after having been enjoyed some time by the Syrians, who regained Idumaea,
passed from them into the hands of the Tyrians. These got all their
merchandise conveyed, by the way of Rhinocolura (a sea-port town lying
between the confines of Egypt and Palestine) to Tyre, from whence they
distributed them all over the western world.(313) Hereby the Tyrians
enriched themselves exceedingly, under the Persian empire, by the favour
and protection of whose monarchs they had the full possession of this
trade. But when the Ptolemies had made themselves masters of Egypt, they
soon drew all this trade into their kingdom, by building Berenice and
other ports on the western side of the Red-Sea, belonging to Egypt; and
fixed their chief mart at Alexandria, which thereby rose to be the city of
the greatest trade in the world. There it continued for a great many
centuries after; and all the traffic which the western parts of the world
from that time had with Persia, India, Arabia, and the eastern coasts of
Africa, was wholly carried on throu