Beyond the calm waters of the Propontis, they encountered an obstacle to their progress in another narrow channel, having more the character of a wide river than of a strait; it was with difficulty that they could make their way against the violence of its current, which either tended to drive their vessels on shore, or to dash them against the reefs which hampered the navigation of the channel.  When, however, they succeeded in making the passage safely, they found themselves upon a vast and stormy sea, whose wooded shores extended east and west as far as eye could reach.

[Illustration:  299.jpg ONE OF THE DAGGERS DISCOVERED AT MYCENAE, SHOWING AN IMITATION OF EGYPTIAN DECORATION]

     Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from the facsimile in Perrot-Chipiez.

From the tribes who inhabited them, and who acted as intermediaries, the Phoenician traders were able to procure tin, lead, amber, Caucasian gold, bronze, and iron, all products of the extreme north—­a region which always seemed,to elude their persevering efforts to discover it.  We cannot determine the furthest limits reached by the Phoenician traders, since they were wont to designate the distant countries and nations with which they traded by the vague appellations of “Isles of the Sea” and “Peoples of the Sea,” refusing to give more accurate information either from jealousy or from a desire to hide from other nations the sources of their wealth.

The peoples with whom they traded were not mere barbarians, contented with worthless objects of barter; their clients included the inhabitants of the iEgean, who, if inferior to the great nations of the East, possessed an independent and growing civilization, traces of which are still coming to light from many quarters in the shape of tombs, houses, palaces, utensils, ornaments, representations of the gods, and household and funerary furniture,—­not only in the Cyclades, but on the mainland of Asia Minor and of Greece.  No inferior goods or tinsel wares would have satisfied the luxurious princes who reigned in such ancient cities as Troy and Mycenae, and who wanted the best industrial products of Egypt and Syria—­costly stuffs, rare furniture, ornate and well-wrought weapons, articles of jewellery, vases of curious and delicate design—­such objects, in fact, as would have been found in use among the sovereigns and nobles of Memphis or of Babylon.  For articles to offer in exchange they were not limited to the natural or roughly worked products of their own country.  Their craftsmen, though less successful in general technique than their Oriental contemporaries, exhibited considerable artistic intelligence and an extraordinary manual skill.  Accustomed at first merely to copy the objects sold to them by the Phoenicians, they soon developed a style of their own; the Mycenaean dagger in the illustration on page 299, though several centuries later in date than that of the Pharaoh Ahmosis, appears to be traceable to this ancient source of