384 
RUINS OF BABYLON 
never been near the remains of the city, and who, in other 
respects, has been shewn an inaccurate collector of facts ; while 
neither Herodotus, who had been on the very spot, nor any 
other ancient author on the subject, say one word decisive on 
the matter. But modern commentators appear to have some¬ 
thing more than a single testimony, to maintain the argument 
with them ; they can support the temple of Belus on the eastern 
shore, by the ocular evidences of those travellers who, though 
visiting Babylon, had never seen Birs Nimrood ; and taking it 
for granted, from the apparent long level of the opposite shore, 
that no considerable ruins could be there, they at once embrace 
the single assertion of Diodorus, and in harmony with it, pro¬ 
nounce the huge mass of Mujelibe to be that of Babel and 
Jupiter Belus : the palace they cannot fail recognising ; and thus, 
in fact, all the greatest objects of a city which covered nearly 
fifty miles of ground are crushed up into the comparatively 
narrow space which had only formed the acropolis of its palace. 
But since the judicious investigation of the Birs Nimrood by 
Mr. Bich, and the conclusions he thence draws in favour of its 
claim to the honours of the great temple, it appears to me that 
unprejudiced opinion must change to his view of the argument; 
and one inference in support of the temple having been in the 
western division of the town, and hence on this side of the 
Euphrates, I would deduce from a circumstance (which I am 
aware has been quoted to a different conclusion) that took 
place when Babylon was taken by Darius Hystaspes, through 
the treachery of Zopyrus, who opened the Belidian and Cissian 
(or Susa) gates, to admit the Persian soldiers. The gates were 
near to each other, that is, on the same side of the town ; and 
the Cissian or Susa gate, pointing to the celebrated Persian 
