yielded every year to Ptolemy Auletes, the father of Cleopatra, seven millions and a half of gold, though the traffic had then scarcely subsisted in that direction for twenty years[36].  After the reduction of Egypt and Alexandria under the power of the Romans, the customs are said to have advanced to double that amount; and the trade was so great, that 120 ships used to be sent yearly from Myos-Hormos to India.  The ships set sail every year from Myos-Hormos about the middle of July, and returned back within the year[37].  The merchandize they carried amounted to the value of one million two hundred thousand crowns; and the returns were an hundred for one; and through this prodigious increase of wealth, the matrons and noble ladies of those days in Alexandria, were exceedingly profuse in decorating themselves with purple, pearls, and precious stones, and in the use of musk, amber, and other rich perfumes of various kinds; of all which the historians and other writers of that age treat at great length[38].

Pliny[39], on the authority of Cornelius Nepos, says that one Eudoxus, flying from Ptolemy Lathyrus, passed by sea through the gulf of Arabia, and sailing along the eastern coast of Africa, doubled the cape of Bona Speranca arrived by the Atlantic at Cadiz; and it would appear that this navigation was as often used in those days as it now is.  Caius Caesar, the son of Augustus, going into Arabia, found in the Red Sea certain pieces of the ships which had gone thither from Spain.

Long after these days it was usual to pass to India by land.  This was done by the kings of the Sogdians, the princes of Bactria, and other famous captains and many merchants, who travelled thither and into Scythia by land.  Marcus Paulus Venetus writes largely of these countries; and though his book at first was reckoned fabulous, yet what he and others have reported is now found true, by the experience of travellers, and merchants who have since been to the same parts.

It is reported that the Romans sent an army by sea to India, against the great khan of Cathaia, 200 years before the Incarnation; which, passing through the Straits of Gibraltar, and running to the north-west, found ten islands opposite to Cape Finisterre; producing large quantities of tin, which perhaps may have been those afterwards called the Cassiterides.  Being come to 50 degrees of latitude, they found a strait passing to the west, through which they arrived in India, and gave battle to the king of Cathaia, after which they returned to Rome.  Whether this story may appear possible or not, true or false, I can only say that I give it as I found it written in the histories of these times.

In the year 100 after the incarnation of Christ, the emperor Trajan fitted out a fleet on the rivers Tigris and Euphrates, whence he sailed to the islands of Zyzara; and passing the straits of Persia, entered into the ocean, by which he sailed along the coast to India, till he came to the place where Alexander had been.  He there took some ships which came from Bengal, and learned the state of the country from the mariners.  But being in years, and weary of the sea, and because he found it difficult to procure necessaries for his army, he returned back to Assyria[40].