the desert
to defeat the labours of the disheartened husbandmen; and the Greek
language, which had hitherto followed and marked the route of commerce
from Alexandria to Syene, and to the island of Socotra, was now but
seldom heard in Upper Egypt. The Alexandrians were sorely harassed by
Haephasstus, a lawyer, who had risen by court favour to the chief post
in the city. He made monopolies in his own favour of all the necessaries
of life, and secured his ill-gotten gains by ready loans of part of
it to Justinian. His zeal for the emperor was at the cost of the
Alexandrians, and to save the public granaries he lessened the supply
of grain which the citizens looked for as a right. The city was sinking
fast; and the citizens could ill bear this loss, for its population,
though lessened, was still too large for the fallen state of Egypt.

The grain of the merchants was shipped from Alexandria to the chief
ports of Europe, between Constantinople in the east and Cornwall in the
west. Britain had been left by the Romans, as too remote for them to
hold in their weakened condition; and the native Britons were then
struggling against their Saxon invaders, as in a distant corner of the
world, beyond the knowledge of the historian. But to that remote country
the Alexandrian merchants sailed every year with grain to purchase tin,
enlightening the natives, while they only meant to enrich themselves.
Under the most favourable circumstances they sometimes performed the
voyage in twenty days. The wheat was sold in Cornwall at the price of a
bushel for a piece of silver, perhaps worth about twenty cents, or for
the same weight of tin, as the tin and the silver were nearly of equal
worth. This was the longest of the ancient voyages, being longer than
that from the Red Sea to the island of Ceylon in the Indian Ocean; and
it had been regularly performed for at least eight centuries without
ever teaching the British to venture so far from their native shores.

The suffering and riotous citizens made Alexandria a very unpleasant
place of abode for the prefect and magistrates. They therefore built
palaces and baths for their own use, at the public cost, at Taposiris,
about a day's journey to the west of the city, at a spot yet marked
by the remains of thirty-six marble columns, and a lofty tower, once
perhaps a lighthouse. At the same time it became necessary to fortify
the public granaries against the rebellious mob. The grain was brought
from