his sons killed
before his eyes, had then been cruelly blinded, and afterward carried
in chains to Babylon, and cast into prison. The last siege of the
city lasted eighteen months, and when it was finally taken by assault,
its ruin was complete. By previous deportations Jerusalem had been
deprived of her princes, her warriors, her craftsmen, and her smiths,
with all the treasure laid up in the palace of her kings, and all the
vessels of gold and silver consecrated to the worship of Jehovah.
Little then was left for her to suffer, when the punishment of her
latest rebellion came. Her walls were thrown down, her temple, her
chief glory, was destroyed, the greater part of the inhabitants who
had survived the prolonged siege were carried off to swell the crowd
of exiles already in Babylon, and only a few of the humbler sort of
folk, the vine-dressers and the small farmers, were left behind.

When Nebuchadnezzar rested after his conquests, secure in the
subjugation of his rivals, and in the possession of his vast kingdom,
he gave himself up to the material improvement of Babylon and the
surrounding country. The city as he left it, at the end of his reign
of forty-three years, was built on both sides of the Euphrates, and
covered a space of four hundred square miles, equal to five times the
size of London. It was surrounded by a triple wall of brick; the
innermost, over three hundred feet high, and eighty-five feet broad at
the top, with room for four chariots to drive abreast. The walls were
pierced by one hundred gate-ways framed in brass and with brazen
gates, and at the points where the Euphrates entered and left the city
the walls also turned and followed the course of the river, thus
dividing the city into two fortified parts. These two districts were
connected by a bridge of stone piers, guarded by portcullises, and
ferries also plied between the quays that lined the river-banks, to
which access was given by gates in the walls.

Nebuchadnezzar's palace was a splendid structure covering a large
space at one end of the bridge. In the central court were the Hanging
Gardens, the chief glory of the city, and reckoned one of the wonders
of the world. No clear idea can be formed of these gardens from any
description that has come down to us, but it would appear that arches
eighty feet high supported terraces of earth planted with all the
skill for which the gardeners of the East were famous. We are told
that they were buil