it stands as a marvel. It was built about 3,000 years ago,
but did not reach the summit of its magnificence until about 570 years
Before Christ, when Nebuchadnezzar lavished almost an endless amount
of wealth upon it.

Its magnitude was 480 furlongs, or sixty miles, in compass. It was
built in an exact square of fifteen miles on each side, and was
surrounded by a brick wall eighty-seven feet thick and 350 feet high,
on which were 250 towers, or, according to some writers, 316. The top
of the wall was wide enough to allow six chariots to drive abreast.
The materials for building the wall were dug from a vast ditch or
moat, which was also walled up with brickwork and then filled with
water from the River Euphrates. This moat was just outside of the
walls, and surrounded the city as another strong defence.

The city had 100 brass gates, one at the end of each of its fifty
streets. The streets were 150 feet wide and ran at right angles
through the city, thus forming 676 great squares. Herodotus says
besides this there was yet another wall which ran around within, not
much inferior to the other, yet narrower, and the city was divided
into two equal parts by the River Euphrates, over which was a bridge,
and at each end of the bridge was a palace. These palaces had
communication with each other by a subterranean passage.

To prevent the city from suffering from an overflow of the river
during the summer months, immense embankments were raised on either
side, with canals to turn the flood waters of the Tigris. On the
western side of the city an artificial lake was excavated forty miles
square, or 160 miles in circumference, and dug out, according to
Megasthenes, seventy-five feet deep, into which the river was turned
when any repairs were to be made, or for a surplus of water, in case
the river should be cut off from them.

Near to the old palace stood the Tower of Babel. This prodigious pile
consisted of eight towers, each seventy-five feet high, rising one
upon another, with an outside winding staircase to its summit, which,
with its chapel on the top, reached a height of 660 feet. On this
summit is where the chapel of Belus was erected, which contained
probably the most expensive furniture of any in the world. One golden
image forty feet high was valued at $17,500,000, and the whole of the
sacred utensils were reckoned to be worth $200,000,000. There are
still other wonderful things mentioned. One, the subterraneous
ba