94, HORMUZD RASSAM, ESQ., 
It will also be seen from what is recorded in the 25th 
verse of the 37th chapter of Isaiah, when Sennacherib’s 
boasting was referred to, the mention of the “rivers” there 
evidently meant canals, and written in Hebrew jN5, Yaoree, 
and not 973, Nahrouth.* 
The Neel canal, which Professor Delitzsch identifies with 
the River Gihon, is of a recent construction. I mean it was 
dug since the Arabian conquest by one of the Arab caliphs 
who came from Egypt, and gave it the name of An-Neel, in 
remembrance of the African Nile, and this is the reason why 
it is called Shatt. It is the same as the Hindia canal, the 
source of the Pallacopas, which was repaired by an Indian 
prince, who gave it the name of India. On examining the 
Neel it would be found that it had been dug through and 
over other ancient canals, and im comparison to other 
cuttings, it looks quite a third-rate channel. All the great 
canals are blocked up, and their grandeur can only be known 
now from the huge embankments thrown up from the old 
diggings. 
‘he Pallacopas, which the same author identifies with 
the Pison, is partly artificial and partly natural. It is dug 
out of the right bank of the Euphrates, halfway between the 
Mahhaweel Canal and Mosayib. Atter it passes in a regular 
course for about fifteen miles, it pours into the lake which 
skirts Birs Nimroud, and reaches as far as Kufa, a distance of 
about 35 miles,and from what Arrian, the historian of 
Alexander the Great, says, even at his time it was not 
mistaken for a regular river. His account of it is as 
follows :-— 
“ But, in the meantime, while vessels are being constructed, 
and a harbour dug at Babylon, Alexander was conveyed by 
the Euphrates from Babylon to the river Pallacopas. This 
is distant from Babylon about 800 stadia. Moreover, this 
Pallacopas is a channel cut from the Euphrates, not a river 
rising from springs, for the Euphrates, flowing from the 
mountains of Armenia, flows durmg the winter between 
banks, inasmuch as it has not much water, but when spring 
sets in, and much more under the heat of summer, it increases 
greatly, and, overflowing its banks, mundates the plains of 
Assyria. For then the snows, melting in the mountains of 
Armenia, increase its waters ina wonderful manner, and thus 
* “ T have digged, and drunk water ; and with the sole of my feet have 
I dried up all the rivers of the besieged places,”-—or according to the revised 
version, “ with the sole of my feet will I dry up all the rivers of Egypt.” 
