CONCERNING ANCIENT INDIA. 51

navigation in the ancient world, and opened the SECT,best communication by sea between the East and li-West that was known for fourteen hundred years,it merits a particular description. Fortunately Plinyhas enabled us to give it with a degree of accuracy,which can seldom be attained in tracing the navalor commercial operations of the ancients. FromAlexandria (he observes) to Juliopolis is two miles;there the cargo destined for India is embarked on theNile, and is carried to Coptos, which is distantthree hundred and three miles, and the voyage isusually accomplished in twelve days. From Coptosgoods are conveyed to Berenice on the ArabianGulf, halting at different stations regulated accord-ing to the conveniency of watering. The distancebetween these cities is two hundred and fifty-eightmiles. On account of the heat, the caravan travelsonly during the night, and the journey is finishedon the twelfth day. From Berenice, ships take theirdeparture about midsummer, and in thirty days reachOcelis (Gella) at the mouth of the Arabian Gulf,or Cane (Cape Fartaquej on the coast of ArabiaFelix. Thence they fail in forty days to Musiris,the first emporium in India. They begin theirvoyage homewards early in the Egyptian monthThibi, which answers to our December; they failwith a north-east wind, and when they enter theArabian Gulf meet with a south or south-westwind, and thus complete the voyage in less thana year 7 .

Plin. Nat. Hist. lib. vi. c. 2;. See NOTE XIX.

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