n of
marriageable virgins had most likely a similar intention. If we may
believe Curtius, strangers might at any time purchase the gratification
of any passion they might feel, from the avarice of parents or husbands.

The luxury of the Babylonians is a constant theme with both sacred
and profane writers. The "daughter of the Chaldaeans" was "tender and
delicate," "given to pleasures," apt to "dwell carelessly." Her young
men made themselves "as princes to look at--exceeding in dyed attire
upon their heads,"--painting their faces, wearing earrings, and clothing
themselves in robes of soft and rich material. Extensive polygamy
prevailed. The pleasures of the table were carried to excess.
Drunkenness was common. Rich unguents were invented. The tables groaned
under the weight of gold and silver plate. In every possible way
the Babylonians practised luxuriousness of living, and in respect of
softness and self-indulgence they certainly did not fall short of any
nation of antiquity.

There was, however, a harder and sterner side to the Babylonian
character. Despite their love of luxury, they were at all times brave
and skilful in war; and, during the period of their greatest strength,
they were one of the most formidable of all the nations of the East.
Habakkuk describes them, drawing evidently from the life, as "bitter and
hasty," and again as "terrible and dreadful--their horses' hoofs swifter
than the leopard's, and more fierce than the evening wolves." Hence they
"smote the people in wrath with a continual stroke"--they "made the
earth to tremble, and did shake kingdoms"--they carried all before them
in their great enterprises, seldom allowing themselves to be foiled by
resistance, or turned from their course by pity. Exercised for centuries
in long and fierce wars with the well-armed and well-disciplined
Assyrians, they were no sooner quit of this enemy, and able to take an
aggressive attitude, than they showed themselves no unworthy successors
of that long-dominant nation, so far as energy, valor, and military
skill constitute desert. They carried their victorious arms from the
shores of the Persian Gulf to the banks of the Nile; wherever they went,
they rapidly established their power, crushing all resistance, and fully
meriting the remarkable title, which they seem to have received from
those who had felt their attacks, of "the hammer of the whole earth."

The military successes of the Babylonians were accompanied