CHA P. naturalized in those countries; and at length car

Flax.

II.

Artificial grass.

General plenty.

ried into the heart of Spain and Gaul The timid errors of the ancients, that it required a certain degree of heat, and could only flourish in the neighbourhood of the sea, were insensibly exploded by industry and experience*. 4. The cultivation of flax was transported from Egypt to Gaul, and enriched the whole country, however it might impoverish the particular lands on which it was sownstr5. The use of artificial grasses became familiar to the farmers both of Italy and the provinces, particularly the Lucerne, which derived its name and origin from Media. The assured supply of wholesome and plentiful food for the cattle during winter, multiplied the number of the flocks and herds, which in their turn contributed to the fertility of the soil. To all these improvements may be added an assiduous attention to mines and fisheries, which, by employing a multitude of laborious hands, serve to increase the pleasures of the rich, and the subsistence of the poor. The elegant treatise of Columella describes the advanced state of the Spanish husbandry, under the reign of Tiberius; and it may be observed, that those famines, which so frequently afflicted the infant republic, were seldom or never experienced by the extensive empire of Rome. The accidental scarcity, in any single province, was immediately relieved by the plenty of its more fortunate neighbours.

*Plin. Hist. Natur. 1. xv.

+ Plin. Hist. Natur. 1. xix."

Agri

See the agreeable Essays on Agriculture by Mr Harte, in which he has collected all that the ancients and moderns have said of Lucerne.

II.

Arts of

luxury.

Agriculture is the foundation of manufactures; c H A P. since the productions of nature are the materials of art. Under the Roman empire, the labour of an industrious and ingenious people was variously but incessantly employed, in the service of the rich. In their dress, their table, their houses, and their furniture, the favourites of fortune united every refinement of conveniency, of elegance, and of splendour, whatever could soothe their pride, or gratify their sensuality.

Such

refinements, under the odious name of luxury, have been severely arraigned by the moralists of every age; and it might perhaps be more conducive to the virtue, as well as happiness, of mankind, if all possessed the necessaries, and none the superfluities, of life. But in the present imperfect condition of society, luxury, though it may proceed from vice or folly, seems to be the only means that can correct the unequal distribution of property. The diligent mechanic, and the skilful artist, who have obtained no share in the division of the earth, receive a voluntary tax from the possessors of land; and the latter are prompted, by a sense of interest, to improve those estates, with whose produce they may purchase additional pleasures. This operation, the particular effects of which are felt in every society, acted with much more diffusive energy in the Roman world. The provinces would soon have been exhausted of their wealth, if the manufactures and commerce of luxury had not insensibly restored to the industrious subjects, the sums which were exacted from them by the arms

CH A P. and authority of Rome. As long as the circulation was confined within the bounds of the empire, it impressed the political machine with a new degree of activity and its consequences, sometimes beneficial, could never become pernicibus. 19vi tedt babasɔesb bad bar el bai

Foreign

trade.

But it is no easy task to confine luxury within the limits of an empire. The most remote countries of the ancient world were ransacked to supply the pomp and delicacy of Rome. The forest of Scythia afforded some valuable furs. Amber was brought over land from the shores of the Baltic to the Danube; and the barbarians were astonished at the price which they received in exchange for so useless a commodity *. There was a considerable demand for Babylonian carpets and other manufactures of the East; but the most important and unpopular branch of foreign bio trade was carried on with Arabia and India. Every year, about the time of the summer solstice, a fleet of an hundred and twenty vessels sailed from Myos-hormos, a port of Egypt on the Red Sea. By the periodical assistance of the Monsoons, they traversed the ocean in about forty days. The coast of Malabar, or the island of Ceylon†, was the usual term of their navigation, and it was in those markets that the merchants

from

*Tacit. Germania, c. 45. Plin. Hist. Nat. xxxviii. 11. The latter observed, with some humour, that even fashion had not yet found out the use of amber. Nero sent a Roman knight to purchase great quantities on the spot where it was produced; the coast of modern Prussia.

+ Called Taprobana by the Romans, and Screndib by the Arabs. It was discovered under the reign of Claudius, and gradually became the principal mart of the East.

f

II.

from the more remote countries of Asia expected c HAP. their arrival. The return of the fleet of Egypt was fixed to the months of December of January; d and as soon as their rich cargo had been transported on the backs of camels, from the Red Sea to the Nile, and had descended that river as far as Alexandria, it was poured, without delay, into the capital of the empire The objects of oriental traffic were splendid and trifling: silk, a pound of which was esteemed not inferior in value to a pound of gold †; precious stones, among which the pearl claimed the first rank after the diamond and a variety of aromatics, that were consumed in religious worship and the pomp of funerals. The labour and risk of the voyage was rewarded with almost incredible profit but the profit was made upon Roman subjects, and a few individuals were enriched at the expence of the. Public. As the natives of Arabia and India were Gold and content with the productions and manufactures silver. of their own country, silver, on the side of the Romans, was the principal, if not the only instrument of commerce. It was a complaint worthy of the gravity of the senate, that in the pursuit of female ornaments, the wealth of the state

Plin. Hist. Natur. 1. vi. Strabo, 1. xvii.

+ Hist. August. p. 224. A silk garment was considered as an ornament to a woman, but as a disgrace to a man.

The two great pearl fisheries were the same as at present, Ormuz and Cape Comorin. As well as we can compare ancient with modern geography, Rome was supplied with diamonds from the mine of Jumelpur, in Bengal, which is described in the Voy. ages de Tavernier, tom, ii. p. 281,

T

CHAP. was irrecoverably given away to foreign and hostile nations. The annual loss is computed, by a writer of an inquisitive but censorious temper, at upwards of eight hundred thousand pounds sterlings, Such was the style of discontent, brooding over the dark prospect of approaching poverty. And yet if we compare the proportion between gold and silver as it stood in the time of Pliny, and as it was fixed in the reign of Constantine, we shall discover within that period a very considerable increase t. There is not the least reason to suppose that gold was become more scarce; it is therefore evident that silver was grown more common; that whatever might be the amount of the Indian and Arabian exports, they were far from exhausting the wealth of the Roman world; and that the produce of the mines abundantly supplied the demands of com

General felicity.

merce.

66

Notwithstanding the propensity of mankind to exalt the past, and to depreciate the present, the tranquil and prosperous state of the empire was warmly felt, and honestly confessed, by the provincials as well as Romans. They acknowledged that the true principles of social life, laws, agriculture, and science, which had been first "invented by the wisdom of Athens, were now firmly established by the power of Rome, "under

66

86

*Tacit. Annal. iii. 52. In a speech of Tiberius.

+ Plin. Hist. Natur. xii. 18. In another place he computes half hat sum; Quingenties H. S. for India exclusive of Arabia. The proportion which was 1 to 10, and 12, rose to 14, the legal regulation of Constanine. See Arbuthnot's Tables of ancient Coins, c. v.