sequently committed upon them in the building of Hellah, and other similar places, satisfactorily account for their having totally disappeared: for, though it is evident they would have been the first object to attract the attention of those who searched after bricks, yet, when they had been thoroughly dilapidated, the mass of rubbish, which most probably formed the heart or substance of them, together with the very deep ditch, would alone have left traces sufficiently manifest at the present day." p. 44.

The accumulation of soil, however, from perpetual inundations of the river, when its embankments had once been suffered to go to decay, and the Euphrates itself having perhaps altered its course during the revolution of so many ages, may, in some degree, account for this disappearance of

the walls in a country, which originally was little better than a vast morass. What indefatigable labour, therefore, what unwearied toil, must the fabricators of these stupendous works have undergone, to construct, on such a soil, such immense edifices? To such toil the labour of erecting the pyramids appears trifling---but I will not anticipate the reflections which will naturally and more forcibly suggest themselves after a perusal of their unequalled efforts in architecture, detailed in the following pages.

While the reader is engaged with Major Rennel in the geographical survey of Babylon, and in measuring the remains of these gigantic fabrics, he may not be displeased, perhaps, to have near him a publication like the present, that goes pretty much at large into the history and progress in

science of the wonderful race who gave them being. Their high advance in chemical knowledge, in particular, though unfortunately applied to promote the purposes of a degrading superstition, the Sabian fire-worship, will undoubtedly excite his admiration and surprise.

From the ability of the Chaldæans to execute, as well as to plan, the great works under consideration, it would seem they were a race not less vigorous in bodily than in mental capacity; and on this head Major Rennel judiciously remarks, that

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from the great weight of the bricks, it may be inferred that the workmen were very strong, ablebodied, men."

Though these pages are intended principally for the eye of the astronomer and mythologist, yet I

should hope they may contain matter not wholly uninteresting to other classes of readers. To the real judge and lover of classical antiquities, I need make no apology for having entered thus largely into mythological details; for HE well knows the truth of the position advanced in the beginning of this Preface, that, in respect to these very early periods of the world, all that remains of genuine history, except that contained in the sacred annals, is only to be obtained through the mazes of

MYTHOLOGY.