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 exchange of different commodities; and here the traders from the south met the merchants of Syria, and bartered the luxuries of the East for the manufactures of Tyre, and of the other cities of Phœnicia and Syria.

According to the testimony of Ezekiel, the whole of this trade was carried on by barter, being an exchange of merchandise for merchandise, in which even the precious metals were included.

Many of the caravans of the northern route unloaded their merchandise on the banks of the Euphrates, whence it was shipped for Babylon and Susa, or conveyed through the canals, some of which were of considerable magnitude.

Situated between the Indus and the Mediterranean, with a productive soil, and commanding, by means of the Euphrates and Tigris, every communication with the interior, and, by the Persian Gulf, with India and the eastern shores of Arabia, the Babylonians, until they were brought under the yoke of Persia, carried on a commercial intercourse with surrounding nations which for many ages was second only to that of the Phœnicians. Babylon stood in its relations with the East somewhat as Tyre in its dealings with the West. Hence the traffic between these two great centres of ancient commerce was necessarily of an important character. Nor indeed was it ever seriously interrupted, except when the ambition of Nebuchadnezzar vainly prompted him to attempt the capture, if not the destruction, of Tyre. Each*