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Discovery of the Great Lions at Nimroud.

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1857 his former constituents declined to re-elect him, but he soon re-entered Parliament as member for the borough of Southwark. At the present time (1869) Mr. Layard holds the office of Commissioner of Works and Buildings in Mr. Gladstone's Ministry.]

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IN the morning I rode to the encampment of Sheikh Abd-ur-rahman, and was returning to the mound, when I saw two Arabs of his tribe urging their mares to the top of their speed. On approaching me they stopped. Hasten, O Bey," exclaimed one of them, "hasten to the diggers, for they have found Nimrod himself. Wallah, it is wonderful, but it is true! we have seen him with our eyes. There is no God but God!" and both joining in this pious exclamation, they galloped off, without further words, in the direction of their tents.

On reaching the ruins, I descended into the new trench, and found the workmen who had already seen me as I approached-standing near a heap of baskets and cloaks. Whilst Awad advanced and asked for a present to celebrate the occasion, the Arabs withdrew the screen they had hastily constructed, and disclosed an enormous human head sculptured in full out of the alabaster of the country. They had uncovered the upper part of a figure, the remainder of which was still buried in the earth. I saw at once that the head must belong to a winged lion or bull, similar to those of Khorsabad and Persepolis. It was in admirable preservation. The expression was calm, yet majestic, and the outline of the features showed a freedom and knowledge of art scarcely to be looked for in the works of so remote a period. The cap had three horns, and, unlike that of the human-headed bulls hitherto found in Assyria, was rounded and without ornament at the top.

I was not surprised that the Arabs had been amazed and terrified at this apparition. It required no stretch of the imagination to conjure up the most strange fancies. This gigantic head, blanched with age, thus rising from the bowels of the earth, might well have belonged to one of those fearful beings which are pictured in the traditions of the country as appearing to mortals slowly ascending from the regions below. One of the workmen, on catching the first glimpse of the monster, had thrown down his basket and run off towards Mosul as fast as his legs could carry him. I learned this with regret, as I anticipated the consequences.

Whilst I was superintending the removal of the earth, which still clung to the sculpture, and giving directions for the continuation of the work, a noise of horsemen was heard, and presently Abd-urrahman, followed by half his tribe, appeared on the edge of the trench. As soon as the two Arabs had reached the tents, and published the wonders they had seen, every one mounted his mare and rode to the mound, to satisfy himself of the truth of these inconceivable reports. When they beheld the head, they all cried together, "There is no God but God, and Mahommed is His prophet!" It was some time before the Sheikh could be prevailed upon to descend into the pit, and convince himself that the image he saw was of stone. "This is not the work of men's hands," exclaimed he,

"but of those infidel giants of whom the Prophet (peace be with him!) has said that they were higher than the tallest date-tree; this is one of the idols which Noah (peace be with him!) cursed before the flood." In this opinion, the result of a careful examination, all the bystanders concurred.

I ascertained by the end of March the existence of a second pair of winged human-headed lions, differing from those previously discovered in form, the human shape being continued to the waist, and furnished with arms. In one hand each figure carried a goat or stag, and in the other, which hung down by the side, a branch with three flowers. They formed a northern entrance into the chamber of which the lions previously described were the southern portal. I completely uncovered the latter, and found them to be entire. They were about twelve feet in height, and the same number in length. The body and limbs were admirably portrayed; the muscles and bones, although strongly developed to display the strength of the animal, showed at the same time a correct knowledge of its anatomy and form. Expanded wings sprung from the shoulder and spread over the back; a knotted girdle, ending in tassels, encircled the loins. These sculptures, forming an entrance, were partly in full and partly in relief. The head and fore-part, facing the chamber, were in full; but only one side of the rest of the slab was sculptured, the back being placed against the wall of sun-dried bricks. That the spectator might have both a perfect front and side view of the figures, they were furnished with five legs; two were carved on the end of the slab to face the chamber, and three on the side. The relief of the body and three limbs was high and bold, and the slab was covered, in all parts not occupied by the image, with inscriptions in the cuneiform character These magnificent specimens of Assyrian art were in perfect preservation; the most minute lines in the details of the wings and in the ornaments had been retained with their original freshness. Not a character was wanting in the inscriptions.

I used to contemplate for hours these mysterious emblems, and muse over their intent and history. What more noble forms could have ushered the people into the temple of their gods ? What more

sublime images could have been borrowed from nature by men who sought, unaided by the light of revealed religion, to embody their conception of the wisdom, power, and ubiquity of a Supreme Being? They could find no better type of intellect and knowledge than the head of the man; of strength, than the body of the lion; of rapidity of motion, than the wings of the bird. These winged human-headed lions were not idle creations, the offspring of mere fancy; their meaning was written upon them. They had awed and instructed races which flourished three thousand years ago. Through the portals which they guarded, kings, priests, and warriors had borne sacrifices to their altars, long before the wisdom of the East had penetrated to Greece, and had furnished its mythology with symbols long recognised by the Assyrian votaries. They may have been buried, and their existence may have been unknown, before the foundation

Discovery of the Great Lions at Nimroud.

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of the eternal city. For twenty-five centuries they had been hidden from the eye of man, and now they stood forth once more in their ancient mystery. But how changed was the scene around them! The luxury and civilization of a mighty nation had given place to the wretchedness and ignorance of a few half-barbarous tribes. The wealth of temples, and the riches of great cities, had been succeeded by ruins and shapeless heaps of earth. Above the spacious hall in which they stood, the plough had passed and the corn now waved. Egypt has monuments no less ancient and no less wonderful; but they have stood forth for ages to testify her early power and renown; whilst those before me had but now appeared to bear witness, in the words of the prophet, that once, "the Assyrian was a cedar in Lebanon, with fair branches and with a shadowing shroud of an high stature; and his top was among the thick boughs his height was exalted above all the trees of the field, and his boughs were multiplied; and his branches became long, because of the multitude of waters when he shot forth. All the fowls of heaven made their nests in his boughs, and under his branches did all the beasts of the field bring forth their young, and under his shadow dwelt all great nations;" for now is "Nineveh a desolation and dry like a wilderness, and flocks lie down in the midst of her: all the beasts of the nations, both the cormorant and bittern, lodge in the upper lintels of it; their voice sings in the windows; and desolation is in the thresholds."

READINGS IN POETRY.

1.-LYCIDAS.

JOHN MILTON.

[John Milton was born 1608. At fifteen he was a pupil of St. Paul's School, London, and two years afterwards we find him at Christ College, Cambridge. At the age of twenty-one he had written his grand "Hymn on the Nativity." In 1632 he took the degree of M.A.; in 1634 his masque of "Comus" was presented at Ludlow Castle. In 1649 Milton was appointed Latin secretary to the Council of State, and he served Cromwell when he had assumed the protectorate. In 1665 "Paradise Lost" was completed, at a cottage at Chalfont, in Bucks, whither the poet had gone to escape the great plague. It was sold to Simmons, a bookseller, for 5l. Of his three wives, his "unkind daughters," his blindness, and his career, never chequered by extreme poverty, it is not in accordance with the plan of this work to dilate. He died 1674.]

YET once more, O ye laure.s, and once more,
Ye myrtles brown, with ivy never sere,
I come, to pluck your berries harsh and crude;
And, with forced fingers rude,

your

Shatter leaves before the mellowing year.
Bitter constraint and sad occasion dear,
Compels me to disturb your season due :
For Lycidas is dead, dead ere his prime,
Young Lycidas, and hath not left his peer:
Who would not sing for Lycidas? he knew,
Himself, to sing, and build the lofty rhyme.
He must not float upon his watery bier
Unwept, and welter to the parching wind,
Without the meed of some melodious tear.
Begin, then, sisters of the sacred well,
That from beneath the seat of Jove doth spring;
Begin, and somewhat loudly sweep
the string;
Hence with denial vain, and coy excuse:

So may some gentle muse

With lucky words favour my destined urn;
And, as he passes, turn,

And bid fair peace be to my sable shroud.

For we were nursed upon the self-same hill,
Fed the same flock, by fountain, shade, and rill.
Together both, ere the high lawns appear'd
Under the opening eyelids of the morn,

Lycidas.

We drove a-field, and both together heard
What time the gray-fly winds her sultry horn,
Battening our flocks with the fresh dews of night,
Oft still the star, that rose at evening bright,

Toward heaven's descent had sloped his westering wheel.
Meanwhile the rural ditties were not mute,

Temper'd to the oaten flute;

Rough satyrs danced, and fauns with cloven heel
From the glad sound would not be absent long:
And old Damotas loved to hear our song.

But, oh! the heavy change, now thou art gone,
Now thou art gone and never must return!
Thee shepherd, thee the woods, and desert caves,
With wild thyme and the gadding vine o'ergrown,
And all their echoes, mourn:

The willows and the hazel copses green,
Shall now no more be seen

Fanning their joyous leaves to thy soft lays.'
As killing as the canker to the rose,

Or taint-worm to the weanling herds that graze,
Or frost to flowers, that their gay wardrobe wear,
When first the white-thorn blows;

Such Lycidas, thy loss to shepherd's ear.

Where were ye, nymphs, when the remorseless deep Closed o'er the head of your loved Lycidas?

For neither were ye playing on the steep,

Where your old bards, the famous Druids, lie,
Nor on the shaggy top of Mona high,

Nor yet where Deva spreads her wizard stream:
Ah me! I fondly dream,

:

Had ye been there for what could that have done ?
What could the Muse herself that Orpheus bore,
The Muse herself, for her enchanting son,

Whom universal nature did lament,

When, by the rout that made the hideous roar,
His gory visage down the stream was sent,
Down the swift Hebras to the Lesbian shore ?
Alas! what boots it with incessant care
To tend the homely, slighted, shepherd's trade,
And strictly meditate the thankless Muse?
Were it not better done, as others use,

To sport with Amaryllis, in the shade,
Or with the tangles of Neæra's hair?

Fame is the spur that the clear spirit doth raise
(That last infirmity of noble minds)

To scorn delights and live laborious days :
But the fair guerdon when we hope to find,
And think to burst out into sudden blaze,

Comes the blind Fury with the abhorred shears,
And slits the thin-spun life. “But not the praise,"

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