62 
RURAL HOURS. 
that this common imjDression might possibly be eiToneous. The 
present desolation of the country about Babylon is -well kno\vn ; 
the whole region, once so fertile, appears now to be little better than 
a desert, stripped alike of its people, its buildings, and its vegetation, 
all of which made, in former times, its surpassing glory and its 
wealth. If at pne moment of a brief spring, grass and flowers 
are found upon those shapeless mins, a scorching sun soon blasts 
their* beauty ; as for trees, these are so few that they scarcely 
appear in the general view, though, on nearer obseiwation, some 
are found here and there. One of these, described by Mr. Rich, 
as an evergreen, like the lignum- vitae, is so old that the Arabs say 
it dates with the i*uins on which it stands, and it is thought that 
it may very possibly be a descendant of one of the same species 
in the hanging gardens of Nebuchadnezzar, which are supposed 
to have occupied the same site. Immediately on the banks of the 
i*iver, there is also said to be a fringe of jungle, and here willows 
are growing ; but they are not described as the weeping willow. 
Speaking of the Euphrates, Sir Robert Ker Porter says ; “ Its 
bimks were hoary Avith reeds, and the yray ozier willows were yet 
there, on Avhich the captives of Israel hung up their harps.” Now 
it is scarcely probable that a Avriter of the merit of Sir R. Porter, 
familiar Avith the Aveeping Avillow, as he must have been, would 
describe that beautiful tree as a gray ozier. Several other travel- 
lers also speak of the fringe of jungle on the Euphrates, and the 
ozier groAving there. Not one of seA^eral Ave have been looking 
over, mentions the noble Aveeping AvilloAv ; on the contrai*y, the 
impression is generally left that the trees are insignificant in size, 
and of an inferior A*ariety. If such be really the case, then, and 
the term gray ozier be correct — if Avillows are groAving to-day 
