The Phœnicians were the great trading nation of antiquity. Situated at so convenient a point on the Mediterranean, it devolved on them to transport to the sea-shore the commodities of the East, brought to them overland by Arabian and Egyptian caravans, and from the sea-shore to distribute them among the expecting nations of the west. Nor were they without valuable products of their own. The sand of their coasts was particularly suitable for the manufacture of glass; their bays abounded in species of fish which produced a fine purple dye――the celebrated Tyrian purple of antiquity; and in various parts of the country there were excellent mines of iron and copper. It was, in fact, essential for the general interests of the race that the people inhabiting that portion of the Mediterranean coasts should devote themselves to commerce. In anticipation of this, as it might seem, the mountains of Libanus, which separated the narrow Phœnician territory from Syria, were stocked with the best timber, which, transported over the short distance which intervened between these mountains and the sea, abundantly supplied the demands of the Phœnician dockyards. There was something in the Phœnician character, also, which suited the requirements of their geographical position. Skillful, enterprising, griping in their desire for wealth, and in other respects resembling much their neighbors the Jews, to whom they were allied in race, and whose language was radically identical with their own――theirs was essentially the merchant type of character. Standing as the Phœnicians did as the people by whom the exchange between the East and the West was managed, a complete view of their life and manner of activity should embrace _first_, their relations with the East――that is, their overland trade with Assyria, Arabia, Egypt, Persia, and India; _secondly_, their relations with the West――that is, their maritime trade with the various nations of the Mediterranean and Atlantic coasts; and _thirdly_, the peculiar character of mind which either accompanied or resulted from the consciousness of such a position in the great family of mankind.