Scanderoon,

Scanderoon, or ALEXANDRETTA (Islanderrun, 'Alexander's town'), the port of Aleppo, stands on the east shore of the Gulf of Scanderoon, in the extreme north-east of the Levant, 30 miles N. of Antioch, and 77 NW. of Aleppo. It is a poor and unhealthy place, of some 1500 inhabitants, with a large but neglected harbour. Nevertheless it has a transit trade worth £2,601,600 a year—£1,698,200 being for imports destined for Aleppo and the towns of northern Syria, and £903,400 for exports, chiefly wool, specie, native manufactures, cereals, leather and hides, cattle, butter, &c., galls and yellow berries, pistachio nuts and raisins, liquorice root, copper ore, and silk cocoons. The imports consist principally of manufactured goods (two-thirds of the total), cloth, groceries, indigo, specie, metals, leather and hides, silk, drugs, &c. Britain's share of the whole is 31½ per cent.; next comes Turkey with 19 per cent. Alexandretta was founded by Alexander the Great to commemorate his victory of Issus (333 B.C.). Off here Sir Kenelm Digby defeated a Franco-Venetian squadron (1628); and close by the Egyptian Mehmet Ali defeated the Turkish troops in 1832.