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first settlements of the human race.' ." Dr. Layard believed these lofty mounds to be none other than the ruined heaps of the great city to which the prophet Jonah bare the message of God's threatened wrath.

We have already referred to the opinion of another distinguished eastern traveller, Major Rawlinson, on this subject. He conceives the name still traditionally attached to it to be its original designation, and points to another tumular heap in the same vast plain, through which the river Tigris rolls its waters, as the true site of Nineveh. The tenacity of popular tradition is often wonderful. There, too, is preserved the name of the prophet Jonah, still associated with the presumed scene of his succesful ministrations. It will be a remarkable example of the endurance of local tradition, if it shall be found that the latter is indeed the great capital of the empire which Assur founded when he went forth from the land of Shinar. The magnificent monuments, and, perhaps still more, the inscribed cuneiform tablets already referred to, promise to furnish trustworthy answers to these inquiries. Of these remarkable sculptures, contemporaneous, it may be, with the sculptures of Thebes and Memphis, the indefatigable traveller has already had the satisfaction of seeing the first instalment deposited in the British Museum, before returning to the scene of his singularly interesting excavations on the banks of the Tigris, where he is now once more busied in disinterring the evidences of history from the graves of the world's elder cities. Within the vast mounds to which a faithful tradition has attached the name of Nimrod the mighty hunter, our persevering countryman discovered monuments of ancient art and imperial magnificence which amply justify the title that has for ages associated it with one of the earliest settlements of the human race. Though completely distinct in character and style from the monuments of Egypt, these relics of old Assyrian art still present such affini

ties to them as might be anticipated from the productions of contemporaneous races and creeds somewhat similarly situated as to climate and locality. Like the ibis and hawk-headed deities of Egypt, the Assyrian marbles present frequent repetitions of the eagle or vulture-headed god-a human form conjoined with the head of a bird of prey. In like manner, among the sculptures of both countries, the sphinx occurs. Not greatly dissimilar in character, and akin to it, are those most remarkable monuments of Assyrian arts and mythology-the colossal human-headed lions and bulls-which the wild Arab sheik, who witnessed their exhumation, pronounced to be "the idols which Noah cursed before the flood!" On the discovery of the winged human-headed lions, Layard was filled with admiration and delight. "These magnificent specimens of Assyrian art," he remarks, were in perfect preservation; the most minute lines of the details of the wings, and in the ornaments, had been retained with their original freshness. I used," adds the enthusiastic traveller, "to contemplate for hours these mysterious emblems, and muse over their intent and history. What more noble forms could have ushered the people into the temples of their gods? What more sublime images could have been borrowed from nature by men who sought, unaided by the light of revealed religion, to embody their conception of the wisdom, power, and ubiquity of a Supreme Being? They could find no better type of intellect and knowledge than the head of the man; of strength than the body of the lion; of ubiquity than the wings of the bird. These winged human-headed lions were not idle creations, the offspring of mere fancy; their meaning was written upon them. They had awed and instructed races which flourished three thousand years ago!" Such reflections, however, must not mislead us into the false spirit of admiration for the poetical elements discoverable even in very gross forms of idolatry, which has proved a

frequent stumbling block to recent writers, especially in treating of the mythology of ancient Egypt. In one of the most striking visions of Ezekiel, the idolatry of Aholah, with the Assyrians her neighbours," is prefigured in terms which exhibit it as grossly sensual, and only comparable to the vilest of personal vices. Dr. Layard was himself struck with the wonderfully vivid and truthful reference in that ancient prophecy, to the sculptured tablets discovered by him in the ruined palaces of Nimroud, many of them still retaining the traces of vermillion die, such as the prophet describes in his remarkable vision:-" When she saw men pourtrayed upon the wall, the images of the Chaldeans pourtrayed with vermillion; girded with girdles upon their loins, exceeding in dyed attire upon their heads, all of them princes to look to, after the manner of the Babylonians of Chaldea, the land of their nativity."

In striking contrast to the enthusiastic idealism of Dr. Layard, were the feelings which their discovery excited in his wild Arab workmen. "The Arabs," says he,

marvelled at these strange figures. As each head was uncovered they showed their amazement by extravagant gestures, or exclamations of surprise. If it was a bearded man, they concluded at once that it was an idol or a Jin, and cursed or spat upon it. If an eunuch, they declared that it was the likeness of a beautiful female, and kissed or patted the cheek. They soon felt as much interest as I did in the objects discovered, and worked with renewed ardour when their curiosity was excited by the appearance of a fresh sculpture. On such occasions they would strip themselves almost naked, throw the kerchief from their heads, and letting their matted hair stream in the wind, rush like madmen into the trenches, to carry off the baskets of earth, shouting, at the same time, the war cry of the tribe."

Still more vivid is the traveller's description of a visit

paid to him by Tahyar Pasha, while he was engaged in the anxious task of despatching his first freight of sculptures on the frail rafts of sticks and skins, with which he floated them down the Tigris. "The Pasha," says he, 66 was accompanied, for his better security, by a large body of regular and irregular troops, and three guns. His Diwan Effendesi, seal-bearer, and all the dignitaries of the household, were also with him. I entertained this large company for two days. The Pasha's tents were pitched on an island in the river, near my shed. He visited the ruins, and expressed no less wonder at the sculptures than the Arabs; nor were his conjectures as to their origin and the nature of the subjects represented, much more rational than those of the sons of the desert. The gigantic human-headed lions terrified as well as amazed, his Osmanli followers. 'La Illahi il Allah (there is no God but God),' was echoed from all sides. 'These are the idols of the infidels,' said one more knowing than the rest. 'I saw many such when I was in Italia with Reshid Pasha, the ambassador. Wallah, they have them in all the churches, and the Papas (priests) kneel and burn candles before them.' 'No, my lamb,' exclaimed a more aged and experienced Turk. 'I have seen the images of the infidels in the churches of Beyoglu; they are dressed in many colours; and although some of them have wings, none have a dog's body and a tail; these are the works of the Jin, whom the holy Solomon, peace be upon him! reduced to obedience and imprisoned under his seal.' 'I have seen something like them in your apothecaries' and barbers' shops,' said I, alluding to the well-known figure, half woman and half lion, which is met with so frequently in the bazars of Constantinople.' 'Istafer Allah (God forbid),' piously ejaculated the Pasha; 'that is the sacred emblem of which true believers speak with reverence, and not the handywork of infidels.' 'There is no infidel living,' ex

claimed the engineer, who was looked up to as an authority on these subjects, 'either in Frangistan or in Yenghi Dunia (America), who could make any thing like that; they are the work of the Majus (Magi), and are to be sent to England to form the gateway to the palace of the queen.' 'May God curse all infidels and their works!' observed the Cadi's deputy, who accompanied the Pasha; 'what comes from their hands is of Satan: it has pleased the Almighty to let them be more powerful and ingenious than the true believers in this world, that their punishment and the reward of the faithful may be greater in the next.'

Nimroud, as we have already shown, is regarded by Major Rawlinson, as the old Biblical city of Calah, or Hala, the latter form assimilating very closely, according to his reading of it, with the cuneiform orthography of the name. He also identifies it with Xenophon's Larissa. Thus restoring some of the earliest, and other most remarkable associations of history, to a locality, which for ages has presented to the eye nothing but a barren heap of mouldering rubbish. Khorsabad he describes as a city specially named after the ruler who founded it; while the true Nineveh, probably an older city than either of them, is yet to be exumed by zealous explorers from beneath the heaps at Nebi-Yunas, opposite Mosul. Such excavations, whensoever they shall be made, cannot fail to be regarded with the deepest interest. Few pictures of the prophetic history are more touching than that of the prophet Jonah, commissioned to go to Nineveh, that great city, and cry against it. The rebellious prophet went not, but fled, if it might be, from the presence of the Lord. And then, after his strange and unparalled dwelling in the deep, the word of the Lord came again to Jonah, the second time, "Arise, go unto Nineveh,” an exceeding great city of three days journey. And he went and entered the city, and as he walked through its streets he proclaimed the message committed to him:

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