CONCERNING ANCIENT INDIA. 59

their natural productions or arts. Much as the SECT.manufactures of silk were admired, and often as 11.silk is mentioned by the Greek and Romanauthors, they had not for several centuries afterthe use of it became common , any certainknowledge either of the countries to which theywere indebted for this favorite article of elegance,or of the manner in which it was produced. Bysome, silk was supposed to be a fine downadhering to the leaves of certain trees or flowers;others imagined it to be a delicate species of woolor cotton; and even those who had learned thatit was the work of an insect, stow, by theirdescriptions, that they had no distinct idea of themanner in which it was formed 1S . It was in conse-quence of an event that happened in the sixthcentury of the Christian era, of which I shallhereafter; take notice, that the real nature of silkbecame 'Inown in Europe.

The other commodities usually imported fromIndia, will be mentioned in the account, whichI now proceed to give of the cargoes sent outand brought home in the ships employed in thattrade. For this we are indebted to the circumnavi-gation of the Erythraean sea, ascribed to Arrian ,a curious though short treatise, less known thanit deserves to be, and which enters into somedetails concerning commerce, to which there isnothing similar in any ancient writer. The first;

It

See NOTE XXIII.