orth west, is a numerous assemblage of mounds, the most onsiderable of which is thirty-five feet high. These mounds xtend three miles, and Ker Porter conceives that they are he ruins of the lesser and older palaces of the Babylonian nonarchs. A mile beyond this, the plain becomes sterile, nd presents, for more than half a mile in breadth, a multitude f minor mounds. About three miles onward, in the road to he Birs Nemroud, is another space covered with remains of uildings, extending nearly two miles, thereby establishing he fact, that the western plain of the Euphrates sustained its portion of the city of Babylon. Such are the remains of Babylon, and such its site, as idenified by travellers; and hence is shown that the vast dimensions assigned to the city by Herodotus may be correct. It must not be supposed, however, that an area of one hundred and forty-four square miles was inhabited. As stated in the former chapter, there was enclosed within the wall that surrounded it, a large space of ground devoted to cultivation. It was, indeed, a walled province or district, containing a number of detached squares or villages, with open areas on every hand, and within them circular spaces surrounded with walls. The streets, which are said to have let from gate to gate across the area, were probably only roads through cultivated lands, over which buildings were distributed in groups. Curtius records this as a fact: and Xenophon reports, that when Cyrus took the city, which event occurred by night, the inhabitants of the opposite quarter of the town were ignorant of it till the third hour of the day, that is, three hours after sunrise, which would arise from the distance of one cluster of houses from another. Besides, the cities of Asia are built very different from those of Europe; the houses being widely separate from each other, and having gardens, parks, and enclosures on the sides and behind, though the streets facing the houses are narrow. Taking these facts into consideration, and remembering that Babylon was the seat of royalty, and that a large part of the space enclosed was occupted by the royal palaces, parks and gardens, besides the Mujelibe, the Temple of Belus, etc., it may be safely conjectured, that not above one-third of the enclosure was occupied by habitations, or three times the space occupied by London, which is reckoned at sixteen square miles. On this reduced scale, the population would be enormous, amounting to between three and four millions of human beings; yet a num ber not beyond the bounds of belief. It remains now to trace out how far the aspect of the r of Babylon answers to the recorded predictions of Scripture The prophet says, "And Babylon shall become heaps."-Jer. li. 37. And what, it may be asked, are the mounds of the K:: the Mujelibe, the Amram, the Anana, the triangular mous east of the Birs, and the maiestic Birs itself, but immers heaps? Vast tumuli, and palaces of human habitations every description, buried in undistinguishable heaps, are a that remain of this once "golden city." From the summa the ruins of the Tower or Temple of Belus, 235 feet high. says Major Keppel, “we had a distinct view of the vast heap which constitute all that now remains of ancient Babyloni more complete picture of desolation could not well be imsgined. The eye wandered over a barren desert, in which the ruins were nearly the only indication that it had ever bee inhabited. It was impossible to behold this scene, and not to be reminded how exactly the predictions of Isaiah and Jere miah have been fulfilled," etc. The prophet says, "A drought is upon her waters-and they shall be dried up. And I will dry up her sea, and make her springs dry."-Jer. 1. 38; li. 36. "The ground, at the time we passed it," records Rich, "was perfectly dry." The prophet says, "The sea is come up upon Babylon: She is covered with the multitude of the waves thereof.”—Jer. li. 42. Thus apparently contradicting his previous denunciation. But the prophet does not intend the ocean by the term "sea," but an extensive body of water. And Rich says, "The ruins of Babylon are inundated, when the Euphrates is at its height, so as to render many parts of them inaccessible, by converting the valleys among them into morasses.” The prophet says, "Bel is confounded, Merodach is broken in pieces; Her idols are confounded, Her images are broken in pieces,"—Jer. 1. 2. "Therefore, behold, the days are come, That I will do judgment upon the graven images of Babylon." Jer. li. 47. Rich says: "We found the sculpture of a lion among the ruins.” And Ker Porter's work on Babylon exhibits several specimens of their idolatrous worship, as engraved on cylinders dug out of the ruins. The prophet says, "Yea, the wall of Babylon shall fall. The broad walls of Babylon shall be utterly broken, And her high gates shall be burned with fire.”—Jer. li. 44, 58. Kinnier says, that captain Frederic rode twenty-one miles in length, and twelve in breadth, but was unable to discover any thing that could admit of a conclusion that either wall o. ditch had ever existed within the area. Rich and Ker Porter bear the same testimony; but Buckingham, in his chapter entitled "Search after the Walls of Babylon," states, that he discovered, on the eastern boundary of the ruins, on the summit of a large ruinous heap, "a mass of solid wall, about thirty feet in length, by twelve or fifteen in thickness, yet evidently once of much greater dimensions each way; the work being, in its present state, broken and incomplete in every part;" "which heap of rubbish and ruins, he conjectures, on many plausible grounds, to be a part, and the only part that can be discovered, of the walls of Babylon, so utterly are they broken. The city of Babylon was situated in a perfect level: but the prophet says, "Behold, I am against thee, O destroying mountain, saith the Lord, Which destroyest all the earth: And I will stretch out mine hand upon thee, And roll thee down from the rocks, And will make thee a burnt mountain. And they shall not take of thee a stone for a corner, Nor a stone for foundations; But thou shalt be desolate for ever, saith the Lord.”—Jer. li. 25, 26. This notion of a mountain, it has been said, in the midst of a perfect flat, visited in all parts by the waters of the river, or by pools thence derived, is exceedingly strange and unnatural. * But evidence of the fulfilment of the prediction is clearly afforded by the Birs Nemroud. Rich relates: "I visited it under circumstances peculiarly favourable to the grandeur of its effect. The morning was at first stormy, and threatened a severe fall of rain; but as we approached the object of our journey, the heavy clouds separating, discovered the Birs frowning over the plain, and presenting the appear ance of a circular hill crowned by a tower, with a high ridge extending along the foot of it. It being entirely concealed from our view during the first part of our ride, prevented our acquiring the gradual idea so generally prejudicial to effect, and so particularly lamented by those who have seen the Pyramids. Just as we were in the proper distance, it burst at once upon our sight, in the midst of rolling masses of dark thick clouds partially obscured by that kind of haze whose indistinctness is one great cause of sublimity, whilst a few strong catches of stormy light, thrown upon the desert in the back ground, served to give some idea of the immense extent and dreary solitude of the wastes by which this venerable ruin stands." Here, then, is a great mountain, and this traveller, in describing the appearance of the Birs Nemroud, says: "The other parts of the summit of this hill are occupied by immense fragments of brickwork, of no determinate figure, tumbled together, and converted into solid vitrified masses, as if they had undergone the fiercest fire, or been blown up with gunpowder, the layers of brick being perfectly discernible-a curious fact, and one for which I am utterly unable to account." Ker Porter also states; "At the foot of this piece of wall lay several immense unshapen masses of brickwork, some entirely changed to a state of the hardest vitrification; the lines of the cement are visible, and so hardened, in common with the bricks, that, when the masses are struck, they ring like glass. The heat of the fire, which produced such amazing effects, must have burnt with the heat of the strongest furnace." Here, then, is a "burnt mountain," and the prophecy is seen to be accomplished. The prophet says, "And Babylon, the glory of kingdoms, The beauty of the Chaldees' excellency, Shall be as when God overthrew Sodom and Gomorrah. Neither shall it be dwelt in from generation to generation: Neither shall the Arabian pitch tent there; Neither shall the shepherds make their fold there. But wild beasts of the desert shall lie there; And their houses shall be full of doleful creatures; And owls shall dwell there, And satyrs shall dance there. And the wild beasts of the islands shall cry in their desolate houses, Ker Porter testifies: "As for the abundance of the coun try, it has vanished as clean away as if the besom of desola on had indeed swept it from north to south; the whole land, from the outskirts of Bagdad to the farthest stretch of sight, ying a melancholy waste." The curse has fallen, in all its tremendous weight, upon Babylon. Not a blade of grass grows there. The same author, speaking of his excursion from Hillah, north-east to the mound of Al Hymer, says: Now there was not a drop of water in any of the canals. Every spot of ground in sight was totally barren, and on several tracts appeared the common marks of former building. In like manner, the decomposing materials of a Babylonian ructure doom the earth on which they perish to a lasting sterility. On this part of the plain, both where traces of buildag were left, and where none had stood, all seemed equally naked of vegetation; the whole ground appearing as if it had been washed over and over again, by the coming and receding waters, till every bit of genial soil was washed away; its half clay, half sandy surface being left in ridgy streaks, like what is often seen on the flat shores of the sea after the retreating of the tide." Hence it is that the Arab does not pitch his tent, nor the shepherd make his fold there; hence it is that Babylon is now uninhabited. With reference to the second division of this prophecy, the testimony of travellers also attests its accomplishment. Rich states: "There are many dens of wild beasts in various parts: in one of which I found the bones of sheep and other animals, and perceived a strong smell like that of a lion." And again: "All the people of this country assert, that it is extremely dangerous to approach the Kasr, or Palace, after night-fall, on account of the multitude of evil spirits by which it is haunted." A more emphatic illustration of the accomplishment of this prediction is found in the works of Ker Porter. He says: In this my second visit to the Birs Nemroud, while passing rapidly over the last tracts of the ruin-spread ground, at some little distance from the outer bank of its quadrangle boundary, my party suddenly halted, having descried several dark objects moving along the summit of its hill, which they con strued into dismounted Arabs on the lookout, while their armed brethren must be lying concealed under the southern brow of this mound. Thinking this very probable, I took out my glass to examine, and soon distinguished that the causes of our alarm were two or three majestic lions, taking the air upon the heights of the pyramid. Perhaps I had never seen so sublime a picture to the mind as well as to the eye. These were a species of enemy which my party were accustomed to |