of two sources, either general probability, or the single passage in a sacred author which gives us a certain amount of authentic information.  From the passage in question, which has been already quoted at length, we learn that the chief of the Assyrian exports to Phoenicia were textile fabrics, apparently of great value, since they were most carefully packed in chests of cedar-wood secured by cords.  These fabrics may have been “blue cloaks,” or “embroidery,” or “rich dresses” of any kind, for all these are mentioned by Ezekiel; but we cannot say definitely which Assyria traded in, since the merchants of various other countries are joined in the passage with hers.  Judging by the monuments, we should conclude that at least a portion of the embroidered work was from her looms and workshops; for, as has been already shown, the embroidery of the Assyrians was of the most delicate and elaborate description.  She is also likely to have traded in rich apparel of all kinds, both such as she manufactured at home, and such as she imported from the far East by the lines of traffic which have been pointed out.  Some of her own fabrics may possibly have been of silk, which in Roman times was a principal Assyrian export.  Whether she exported her other peculiar productions, her transparent and colored glass, her exquisite metal bowls, plates, and dishes, her beautifully carved ivories, we cannot say.  They have not hitherto been found in any place beyond her dominion, so that it would rather seem that she produced them only for home consumption.  Some ancient notices appear to imply a belief on the part of the Greeks and Romans that she produced and exported various spices.  Horace speaks of Assyrian nard Virgil of Assyrian amomuum, Tibullus of Assyrian odors generally.  AEschylus has an allusion of the same kind in his Agamemnon.  Euripide, and Theocritus, who mention respectively Syrian myrrh and Syrian frankincense, probably use the word “Syrian” for “Assyrian.”  The belief thus implied is not, however, borne out by inquiry.  Neither the spikenard nor the amonmum, nor the myrrh tree, nor the frankincense tree, nor any other actual spice, is produced within the limits of Assyria, which must always have imported its own spices from abroad, and can only have supplied them to other countries as a carrier.  In this capacity she may very probably, even in the time of her early greatness, have conveyed on to the coast of Syria the spicy products of Arabia and India, and thus have created an impression, which afterwards remained as a tradition, that she was a great spice-producer as well as a spice-seller.