From the Damascene Syrians we are told that Phoenicia imported “wine of Helbon” and “white wool.”[954] The “wine of Helbon” is reasonably identified with that {oinos Khalubonios} which is said to have been the favourite beverage of the Persian kings.[955] It was perhaps grown in the neighbourhood of Aleppo.[956] The “white wool” may have been furnished by the sheep that cropped the slopes of the Antilibanus, or by those fed on the fine grass which clothes most of the plain at its base. The fleece of these last is, according to Heeren,[957] “the finest known, being improved by the heat of the climate, the continual exposure to the open air, and the care commonly bestowed upon the flocks.” From the Syrian wool, mixed perhaps with some other material, seems to have been woven the fabric known, from the city where it was commonly made,[958] as “damask.” According to the existing text of Ezekiel,[959] Syria Proper “occupied in the fairs” of Phoenicia with cotton, with embroidered robes, with purple, and with precious stones. The valley of the Orontes is suitable for the cultivation of cotton; and embroidered robes would naturally be produced in the seat of an old civilisation, which Syria certainly was. Purple seems somewhat out of place in the enumeration; but the Syrians may have gathered the _murex_ on their seaboard between Mt. Casius and the Gulf of Issus, and have sold what they collected in the Phoenician market. The precious stones which Ezekiel assigns to them are difficult of identification, but may have been furnished by Casius, Bargylus, or Amanus. These mountains, or at any rate Casius and Amanus, are of igneous origin, and, if carefully explored, would certainly yield gems to the investigator. At the same time it must be acknowledged that Syria had not, in antiquity, the name of a gem-producing country; and, so far, the reading of “Edom” for “Aram,” which is preferred by many,[960] may seem to be the more probable. The commerce of the Phoenicians with Egypt was ancient, and very extensive. “The wares of Egypt” are mentioned by Herodotus as a portion of the merchandise which they brought to Greece before the time of the Trojan War.[961] The Tyrians had a quarter in the city of Memphis assigned to them,[962] probably from an early date. According to Ezekiel, the principal commodity which Egypt furnished to Phoenicia was “fine linen”[963]--especially the linen sails embroidered with gay patterns, which the Egyptian nobles affected for their pleasure-boats. They probably also imported from Egypt natron for their glass-works, papyrus for their documents, earthenware of various kinds for exportation, scarabs and other seals, statuettes and figures of gods, amulets, and in the later times sarcophagi.[964] Their exports to Egypt consisted of wine on a large scale,[965] tin almost certainly, and probably their peculiar purple fabrics, and other manufactured articles.