Now the deluge terminated A. M. 1657, and Noah lived after the deluge 350 years[13], and therefore died A. M. 2007; and as Fohi is said to have reigned 114 years, before Eohi Chun or Chinun succeeded him, he was contemporary, at least, with Noah. The ark rested on Mount Ararat, which is generally allowed to be one of the mountains of Armenia, to the east of the head of the Tigris. And here the same author remarks, that “in rather less than a century and a half, after the birth of Peleg, it is supposed that Noah, being then about his 840th year, _wearied with the growing depravity of his descendants, retired with a select company to a remote corner of Asia, and there began what in after ages has been termed the Chinese monarchy_.”[14] This view of the subject, we believe, coincides perfectly with the reputable testimonies presented by Mairan, Bailly, Guignes, and Sir William Jones, and demonstrates that the transit of more central aborigines, since the deluge, to the extremes of China, was perfectly feasible,[15] and a matter of even high probability. [13] Gen. ix. 28. [14] Clarke’s “Treatise on the Mulberry-tree, and Silk-worm,” pp. 14, 18, 20, 21, 27, and 34. [15] See chap. iv. p. 67. Also Plate VII. (Map.) The first ancient author, who affords any evidence respecting the use of silk, is Aristotle. He does not, however, appear to have been accurately acquainted with the changes of the silk-worm; nor does he say, that the animal was bred or the raw material produced in Cos. He only says, “Pamphile, daughter of Plates, is reported to have first woven it in Cos.” (See Chapters ii. iii. and iv. of this Part.) Long before the time of Aristotle a regular trade had been established in the interior of Asia, which brought its most valuable productions, and especially those which were most easily transported, to the shores opposite this flourishing island. Nothing therefore is more likely than that the raw silk from the interior of Asia was brought to Cos and there manufactured. We shall see hereafter from the testimony of Procopius, that it was in like manner brought some centuries later to be woven in the Phœnician cities, Tyre and Berytus.