42
MINES OF
CHAP. II.
know too from the history of Joseph, that hisfather sent from Arabia for food for his family.It is also well ascertained that cotton, silk,and linen cloth was made by the Egyptians.This is asserted by ancient history, and confirmedby recent proofs ; for cloth of those substanceshas been found in the mummies taken from theroyal sepulchres by Belzoni and others.
The chief sources of the wealth of the Pha-raohs , however, were the mines of the neigh-bouring countries of Nubia and Ethiopia ,which were productive of copper or brass ingreat abundance, before iron was known inAfrica . According to the testimony of Aga-tharchidas of Cnidus , who wrote about 170 or180 years before our era, the abundance of brasswas such, that it formed the chief parts of thedomestic furniture, as well as of the chariots,the swords, the bows, and the arrows, in use ina prior age. The mines which produced thecopper yielded also gold, which the Africansseparated from the less valuable metal. Thereis an exact and almost technical description ofthose mines by an eyewitness, who visited themin the reign of the fourth Ptolemy 1 . “ Theyare,” he says, “ near the mountain Altahi, notfar from the ancient Berenice Panchrysos, in