ASSYRIAN MONUMENTS. 87 



sizes. But as Lenormant has shown that both the wood 

 and cone of the cedar were considered to possess holy 

 properties, it would seem more Hkely that the cedar- 

 cone was the favorite sprinkler. Indeed, ordinary water 

 may have been supposed to become holy by being 

 sprinkled through the means of a holy object. 



Natives of India (Hindoos) would not for the world 

 drink water which is in a leather bag, made usually 

 of a cow or buffalo hide ; but they have a convenient 

 fiction to get over all other inconveniences, for they 

 tell you that the moment the water is poured out of 

 the leather bag into a water channel, it loses all taint, 

 for it becomes ^ ipso facto' purified by the earth, or the 

 air, or what not. So it would seem nothing out of 

 the way to credit the Assyrians with the fiction that 

 a holy-sprinkler would be enough to make ordinary 

 water holy. 



Those ancient pre-Chaldean people had innumerable 

 superstitions no doubt. Poor things ! What could they 

 do ? Their brains were emerging from lower stages, 

 from a struggle for existence with nature, and wild 

 animals and wild men, and evolving into some sort of 

 contemplation of their surroundings. It is no wonder 

 that the sun and moon, every star and planet, every 

 rock, every tree, every animal, had a supernatural sig- 

 nificance in their bothered brains. Yet, on the whole, 

 they do not appear to have been such consummate fools 



