ON THE GARDEN OF EDEN. 10] 
would make any difference to the course of the Tigris. 
There is no doubt that the writer meant to say that the third 
river, after having separated from the river of Eden, flowed 
down in front of Assyria, the same as an Englishman might 
say that the river Thames runs in front or towards the east 
of Middlesex. 
The Assyria of the Hebrews had a limited sense; that is 
to say to that part of the country which was immediately in 
the neighbourhood of Nineveh. It is surprising to me how 
any one can find it difficult in understanding the passage 
with regard to the flow of the Tigris in front of Assyria. At 
all events this is one of the rivers of the Garden of Eden, 
the existence of which, together with the Euphrates, already 
alluded to, is not doubted. 
The river Pison, which, as I said before, I identify with 
the great Zab, was said to compass “the whvule land of 
Havilah, where there is gold; and the gold of that land is 
good”; there was also “ bdellium and the onyx stone.” So 
far as the land of Havilah is concerned, it is now quite im- 
possible to say exactly where it lay, and what were its 
limits; but from the description of its productions we might 
fix upon the upper part of the Zab for its locality. Those 
mountain regions abound with all kinds of metallic mines, 
whether of copper, iron, or lead. Sir Henry Layard, who 
visited that vountry in 1846, discovered an old copper mine 
in the neighbourhood of Asheetha, and not far from Hairamoon 
and Gairamoon, into which he and I penetrated for some 
distance.* His opinion is that, according to sacred and 
profane authors, it was collected in such extraordinary 
quantities in Nineveh and Babylon that as it is generally 
included in the Egyptian inscriptions amongst metals 
brought from that part of Asia, so it is to be presumed that 
mines of it were once worked within the Assyrian dominions. + 
* Sir Henry Layard’s account of that mine is so interesting that I must 
quote his own words in full. He says: “ Ata distance from the entrance 
copper ores were scattered in abundance amongst the loose stones. I 
descended with some difficulty, and discovered many passages running in 
various directions, all more or less blocked up with rubbish and earth, 
much of which we had to remove before I could explore the interior of 
the mine. The copper runs in veins of bright blue, in small crystals, in 
compact masses, and in powder, which I could scrape out of the cracks of 
the rocks with a knife. I recognized at once in the latter the material 
used to colour the bricks and ornaments in the Assyrian palaces ” (Vineveh 
and its Remains, vol. i, 223). 
+ Sardanapalus is said to have placed one hundred and fifty golden beds, 
and as many tables of the same metal, on his funeral pile, besides gold and 
