so excellent is the cement, which appears to be lime mortar, that
it is nearly impossible to extract one whole. 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 action of the fiercest
fire, or had been blown up by gunpowder, the layers of brick being
perfectly discernible. These ruins surely proclaim the divinity of the
Scriptures. Layard says the discoveries amongst the ruins of ancient
Babylon were far less numerous and important than could have been
anticipated. No sculptures or inscribed slabs, the paneling of the
walls of palaces, appear to exist beneath them, as in those of
Nineveh. Scarcely a detached figure in stone, or a solitary tablet,
has been dug out of the vast heaps of rubbish. "Babylon is fallen, is
fallen; and all the graven images of her gods he hath broken unto the
ground." (Isaiah xxi. 9.)

The complete absence of such remains is to be explained by the nature
of the materials used in the erection of even the most costly edifices
of Babylon. In the vicinity there were no quarries of alabaster, or of
limestone, such as existed near Nineveh. The city was built in the
midst of an alluvial country, far removed from the hills. The deposits
of the mighty rivers which have gradually formed the Mesopotamian
plains consist of a rich clay. Consequently stone for building
purposes could only be obtained from a distance. The black basalt, a
favorite material amongst the Babylonians for carving detached
figures, and for architectural ornaments, as appears from fragments
found amongst the ruins, came from the Kurdish Mountains, or from the
north of Mesopotamia.

The Babylonians were content to avail themselves of the building
materials which they found on the spot. With the tenacious mud of
their alluvial plains, mixed with chopped straw, they made bricks,
whilst bitumen and other substances collected from the immediate
neighborhood furnished them with an excellent cement. A knowledge of
the art of manufacturing glaze, and colors, enabled them to cover
their bricks with a rich enamel, thereby rendering them equally
ornamental for the exterior and interior of their edifices. The walls
of their palaces and temples were also coated, as we learn from
several passages in the Bible, with mortar and plaster, which, judging
from their cement, must have been of very f