Now the sculpture upon the alabaster slabs with which the palace walls of Shalmaneser and Sargon, of Sennacherib and Assurbanipal, were covered, confines itself mainly to marches, combats, and sieves, it is more _realistic_ than the sculpture of Chaldaea, a country that had done less, especially upon fields of battle, but had invented more and done more thinking than its bellicose rival. We owe no small debt of gratitude to the swordsmen of Assyria, in spite of the blood they shed and the horrible cruelties they committed and delighted in seeing commemorated in the figured histories of their reigns. The works entrusted to their artists have left us precious documents and the elements for a restoration of a vanished world. Philologists may take their time over the decipherment of the texts inscribed on the reliefs, but the great people of prey who, for at least four centuries, pillaged all Asia without themselves becoming softened by the possession of so much accumulated wealth, live, henceforward, in the long series of pictures recovered for the world by Layard and Botta. The stern conquerors reappear, armed, helmeted, and cuirassed, as they passed before the trembling nations thirty centuries ago. They are short of stature, but vigorous and sturdy, with an exceptional muscular development. They were, no doubt, prepared for their military duties from infancy by some system of gymnastic exercises, such as have been practised by other nations of soldiers. Their noses are high and hooked, their eyes large, their features as a whole strongly Semitic (see Fig. 25). [Illustration: FIG. 26.--Bas-relief of Tiglath Pileser II.; from Nimroud. British Museum. Height 44 inches. Drawn by Saint-Elme Gautier.] [Illustration: FIG. 27.--Feast of Assurbanipal; from Kouyundjik. British Museum. Height 20-3/4 inches. No. 1, The servants of the feast.] [Illustration: FIG. 28.--Feast of Assurbanipal, _continued_. No. 2, The king and queen at table. Drawn by Saint-Elme Gautier.]