Ptolemy
Philadelphus also pushed his discoveries by land as far as Meroc: he opened
the route between Coptus and Berenice, establishing ports and opening
wells; and from these and other circumstances he seems to have been
actuated by a stronger wish to extend commerce, and to have formed more
plans for this purpose, than any of his successors.
Ptolemy Euergetes directed his thoughts more to conquest than to commerce,
though he rendered the former, in some degree, useful and subservient to
the latter. After having passed the Nile, and subdued the nations which lay
on the confines of Egypt, he compelled them to open a road of communication
between their country and Egypt. The frankincense country was the next
object of his ambition: this he subdued; and having sent a fleet and army
across the Red Sea into Arabia, he compelled the inhabitants of the
district to maintain the roads free from robbers, and the sea from
pirates--a proof that these people had made some advances in seafaring
matters, and also of the attention paid by Euergetes to the navigation of
the Red Sea, as well as to the protection of land commerce. Indeed the
whole of his progress to Aduli, which we have more particularly mentioned
in another place, was marked as much by attention to commerce as by the
love of conquest; but though by this enterprize he rendered both the coasts
of the Red Sea tributary, and thus better adapted to commerce, there is no
proof that he passed the Straits of Babelmandeb.
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