In August 1904 the French and Spanish governments agreed to supplement this trade-route by building a railway from Oloron in the Basses Pyrenees to Jaca.
The old trade route to Bulawayo, which skirts the eastern edge of the Kalahari, is now rarely used.
There were indeed vassal states on every hand, but the actual possessions of the kingsthe provinces governed by their satrapsconsisted of a rather narrow strip of land, stretching from the Euphrates and north Babylonia through southern Media and Parthia as far as Arachosia (north-west Afghanistan), and following the course of the great trade-route which from time immemorial had carried the traffic between the west of Asia and India.
In the Adriatic he helped Hellenic extension, desiring no doubt to secure the important trade route into central Europe.
He was the first to attempt to open a trade route with Tibet, and to organize a survey of Bengal and of the eastern seas.
