ior to an eunuch; and in the distance are soldiers, with
lions' skins, dancing to the vibrations of a guitar. The second slab
is a continuation of the first. Here men are mounted in war chariots,
while others holding the heads of their enemies in their hands are on
foot: and a bird, grasping in its claws a human head, soars above.
That slab marked 3, and placed against the window hereabouts, was
extracted from the centre of the great mound of Nimroud. Here camels,
preceded by a woman, are pourtrayed. The slab marked 5 bears the
representation of an Assyrian divinity, with four wings, the head
surmounted by the conical cap with two horns, and the left hand
holding a circlet of beads. A winged figure occurs also on the sixth
slab of this compartment, holding a bearded ear of corn in one hand,
and a goat in the other. The slabs of the ninth compartment have also
representations of winged figures. The fourth, with the eagle head,
and holding a fir-cone and a basket. This figure is thus described by
Mr. Layard: "A human body, clothed in robes similar to those of the
winged men already described, was surmounted by the head of an eagle
or of a vulture. The curved beak, of considerable length, was half
open, and displayed a narrow-pointed tongue, on which were still the
remains of red paint. On the shoulders fell the usual curled and bushy
hair of the Assyrian images, and a comb of feathers rose on the top of
the head. Two wings sprang from the back, and in either hand was the
square vessel and fir-cone. In a kind of girdle were three daggers,
the handle of one being in the form of the head of a bull. They may
have been of precious metal, but more probably of copper, inlaid with
ivory or enamel, as a few days before a copper dagger-handle,
precisely similar in form to one of those carried by this figure,
hollowed to receive an ornament of some such material, had been
discovered in the S.W. ruins, and is now preserved in the British
Museum. This effigy, which probably typified by its mythic form the
union of certain divine attributes, may perhaps be identified with the
god Nisroch, in whose temple Sennacherib was slain by his sons after
his return from his unsuccessful expedition against Jerusalem; the
word Nisr signifying, in all Semitic languages, 'an eagle.'"

The slabs arranged in the tenth compartment are interesting. On the
first, two horsemen, whose peaked helmets suggest that they are
Assyrians, are charging another hors