But “The River,” “The Great River,” as the Jews called the Euphrates, was more celebrated in profane than in sacred history. This is particularly true of that stretch of the stream between the modern towns of Bir and Rakka. It was at Carchemish, which adjoins Djerabis, where the Hittites had the great capital and the powerful fortress which enabled them so long to control the commerce between Assyria and Babylonia on the east, and Phœnicia and Egypt on the west. It was at the same famous stronghold that Nebuchadnezzar II won a signal victory over Pharaoh-Necho and his Greek and Asiatic allies. It was here also that Chosroes I crossed the river by building a bridge of boats at the time of his third campaign against the Byzantines as he had crossed it at Obbanes in his first expedition against Justinian. It was at Bir, formerly known as Zeugma--the Bridge--that Crassus and Seleucus Nicator passed into Mesopotamia, where the Roman general met such a tragic fate. It was at Thapsacus that Xenophon and Cyrus the Younger crossed the great waterway in the campaign that terminated so disastrously for the Persian Monarch at Cunaxa. It was here also, nearly a hundred years later, that Darius crossed “fleeing headlong eastwards with his broken army after the battle of Issus, with Alexander headlong at his heels.” It was in the waters of the same famed river that Trajan and Julian the Apostate slaked their horses’ thirst. It was the same waters that witnessed the brilliant campaigns of Heraclius, the splendid triumphs of the Caliphs, and the devastating hordes of Timur and Jenghiz Khan. Tradition informs us that it was down these tawny waters that a frail craft carried Herodotus in his memorable visit to Babylon. And long before this date it was up the Euphrates, that Gisdhubar, the mythical hero of the great Babylonian epic, proceeded on his homeward voyage after having “by a suitable sacrifice,” secured the good will of heaven for his undertaking.[296] But, what has already been said is more than enough to show that the rolling waters of the Euphrates are, in truth, “charged with the history of the ancient world.” And, judging by the railroads and steamer lines that are planned or in operation, and the great irrigation works that are under construction for restoring to the vast Babylonian plain its old-time fertility, the day is not far distant when “The Great River” of the Jews will witness achievements which shall rival the glories of Babylon and its hanging gardens in the days of the city’s greatest splendor and power.