310 



TABLE-TALK AND VARIETIES. 



There is monumental evidence 

 that of the various buildings which 

 he excavated, that of the palace of 

 Nimroud was older by several cen- 

 turies than the edifices of Khorsa- 

 bad and Kouyunjik, which he also 

 uncovered, and which he proves by 

 the same undoubted evidence to 

 have been built by a later dynasty 

 of kings. The palace of Nimroud 

 represents the original site of Ni- 

 neveh. To this, the first palace, 

 the son of its founder added a 

 second ; subsequent additions are 

 recorded in the inscriptions ; and 

 the place at last attained the di- 

 mensions ascribed to it by Jonah 

 and Diodorus. " If (says Mr. Layard) 

 we take the four great mounds of 

 Nimroud, Kouyunjik, Khorsabad, 

 and Karamles, as the angle of a 

 square, it will be found that its four 

 sides corresponded pretty accu- 

 rately with the 480 stadia, or GO 

 miles of the geographer, which 

 makes the three days' journey of 

 the prcphet." Within this space 

 there are many mounds, ruins of 

 edifices, vestiges of streets and gar- 

 dens ; and the face of the country is 

 strewed with fragments of pottery 

 and bricks. As to the number of 

 inhabitants, mentioned in the book 

 of Jonah to be above 120,000, a 

 number apparently incommensu- 

 rate with a city of such magnitude, 

 Mr. Layard remarks that cities in 

 the East are not like those in Eu- 

 rope ; for a place like London or 

 Paris would not contain above a 

 third of the number of their inha- 

 bitants. The women have separate 

 apai-tments from the men ; there is 

 a separate house for each family ; 

 and gardens and arable land are 

 inclosed by the city walls. Hence 

 it is mentioned in Jonah that there 

 was " much cattle" within the walls, 

 and of course there was pasture for 

 them. Damascus. Ispahan, and 

 other Eastern cities are thus built 

 at the present day. The existing 

 ruins, our author adds, " show that 



Nineveh acquired its greatest extent 

 in the time of the kings of the se- 

 cond dynasty, that is, of the kings 

 mentioned in Scripture ; it was then 

 that Jonah visited it, and that re- 

 ports of its magnificence were car- 

 ried to the west, and gave rise to 

 the traditions from which the Greek 

 authors mainly derived the infor- 

 mation which has been handed 

 down to us." 



At different periods between the 

 years 1812 and 1820, the late Mr. 

 Rich, the East India Company's 

 resident at Bagdad, partially ex- 

 amined some of the mounds on the 

 site of Nineveh, and to his investi- 

 gations we owe the little knowledge 

 we possessed of these ruins up till 

 the present time. Mr. Layard com- 

 menced his explorations in 1845 

 his education, his indomitable ener- 

 gy, his knowledge of eastern man- 

 ners and languages, acquired during 

 prolonged journeyings in Asia Mi- 

 nor and Syria, and his strong anti- 

 quarian tastes, all qualifying him 

 for the task he had undertaken. 



In one respect the monuments of 

 Assyria appear in striking contrast 

 to those of Egypt. On the banks 

 of the Nile rise the stupendous 

 structures of the Pyramids, the only 

 edifices built by the hand of man 

 which appear likely to last as long 

 as time lasts. The vast plains of the 

 Tigris and the Euphrates only ex- 

 hibit at distant intervals green and 

 shapeless mounds, the ruins of an- 

 cient towns and villages. Mr. Lay- 

 ard counted, from the walls of an up- 

 land fort, "above a hundred mounds 

 throwing their dark and lengthen- 

 ing shadows across the plain ; 

 these were the remains of Assyrian 

 civilization and prosperity." The 

 difference between the monumental 

 remains of the Egyptians and the 

 Assyrians, shows how much a na- 

 tion's architectural taste may be 

 modified by the geological features 

 of a country. The Egyptians em- 

 bodied their conceptions in granite 



