Was the profit from these distant cruises so very considerable after all? After they had ceased, memory may have thrown a fanciful glamour over them, and magnified the treasures they had yielded to fabulous proportions: we are told that Solomon would have no drinking vessels or other utensils save those of pure gold, and that in his days “silver was as stone,” so common had it become.* * 1 Kings x. 21, 27. In Chronicles the statement in the _Book of Kings_ is repeated in a still more emphatic manner, since it is there stated that gold itself was “in Jerusalem as stones” (2 Chron. i. 15). [Illustration: 370.jpg MAP OF TYRE SUBSEQUENT TO HIRAM] Doubtless Hiram took good care to obtain his fall share of the gains. The Phoenician king began to find Tyre too restricted for him, the various islets over which it was scattered affording too small a space to support the multitudes which flocked thither. He therefore filled up the channels which separated them; by means of embankments and fortified quays he managed to reclaim from the sea a certain amount of land on the south; after which he constructed two harbours--one on the north, called the Sidonian; the other on the south, named the Egyptian. He was perhaps also the originator of the long causeway, the lower courses of which still serve as a breakwater, by which he transformed the projecting headland between the island and the mainland into a well-sheltered harbour. Finally, he set to work on a task like that which he had already helped Solomon to accomplish: he built for himself a palace of cedar-wood, and restored and beautified the temples of the gods, including the ancient sanctuary of Melkarth, and that of Astarté. In his reign the greatness of Phoenicia reached its zenith, just as that of the Hebrews culminated under David. [Illustration: 371.jpg THE BREAKWATER OF THE EGYPTIAN HARBOUR AT TYRE] Drawn by Boudier, from a photograph published by the Duc de Luynes. The most celebrated of Solomon’s works were to be seen at Jerusalem. As David left it, the city was somewhat insignificant. The water from its fountains had been amply sufficient for the wants of the little Jebusite town; it was wholly inadequate to meet the requirements of the growing-population of the capital of Judah. Solomon made better provision for its distribution than there had been in the past, and then tapped a new source of supply some distance away, in the direction of Bethlehem; it is even said that he made the reservoirs for its storage which still bear his name.* * A somewhat ancient tradition attributes these works to Solomon; no single fact confirms it, but the balance of probability seems to indicate that he must have taken steps to provide a water-supply for the new city. The channels and reservoirs, of which traces are found at the present day, probably occupy the same positions as those which preceded them.