d her soil had never yet been carried. The produce of
Ethiopia and the Sudan passed through her emporia on its way to attract
customers in the markets of Tyre, Sidon, Babylon, and Susa, and the
isthmus of Suez and Kosseir were the nearest ports through which Arabia
and India could reach the Mediterranean. Darius therefore resumed the
work of Necho, and beginning simultaneously at both extremities, he cut
afresh the canal between the Nile and the Gulf of Suez. Trilingual
stelae in Egyptian, Persian, and Medic were placed at intervals along its
banks, and set forth to all comers the method of procedure by which the
sovereign had brought his work to a successful end. In a similar manner
he utilised the Wadys which wind between Koptos and the Red Sea, and
by their means placed the cities of the Said in communication with the
"Ladders of Incense," Punt and the Sabaeans.*

* Several of the inscriptions engraved on the rocks of the
Wady Hammamat show to what an extent the route was
frequented at certain times during the reign. They bear the
dates of the 26th, 27th, 28th, 30th, and 36th years of
Darius. The country of Saba (Sheba) is mentioned on one of
the stelae of the isthmus.

He extended his favour equally to the commerce which they carried on
with the interior of Africa; indeed, in order to ensure the safety of
the caravans in the desert regions nearest to the Nile, he skilfully
fortified the Great Oasis. He erected at Habit, Kushit, and other
places, several of those rectangular citadels with massive walls of
unburnt brick, which resisted every effort of the nomad tribes to break
through them; and as the temple at Habit, raised in former times by the
Theban Pharaohs, had become ruinous, he rebuilt it from its foundations.

[Illustration: 220.jpg WALLS OF THE FORTRESS OF DITSH-EL-QALAA]

Drawn by Boudier, from the engraving by Cailliaud. Dush is
the Kushit of the hieroglyphs, the Kysis of Graeco-Roman
times, and is situated on the southern border of the Great
Oasis, about the latitude of Assuan.

He was generous in his gifts to the gods, and even towns as obscure as
Edfu was then received from him grants of money and lands. The Egyptians
at first were full of gratitude for the favours shown them, but the news
of the defeat at Marathon, and the taxes with which the Susian court
burdened them in order to make provision for the new war with Greece,
aroused a deep-seated