Although we were always interested in listening to the folklore of the Mussulmans of the Near East, we preferred on this occasion to stroll over the mounds beneath which were buried the remains of one of antiquity’s most celebrated cities and to inspect the localities where Botta and Layard and Ormuzd Rassam had made those famous finds which contributed so greatly to our knowledge of Assyria and Babylonia. Most of the excavations whence they drew such priceless treasures had been refilled with earth, but this did not matter. We had in various museums seen the valuable monuments that had been taken from them and were, therefore, freer to indulge in day-dreams than we had been when we visited Homer’s Troy. Aided by the drawings of Place and Fergusson we found it easy to reconstruct in fancy the superb palaces of Sargon and Eserhaddon and Tiglath-pileser, whose names and achievements had so impressed us in our youth. In imagination we contemplated the colossal statues of winged lions with human heads, which stood at the portals of the palace of Sennacherib, and fixed our gaze on the marvelous bas-relief and sculptures--reminders of the frieze of the Parthenon--which adorned the vast halls and exhibited the monarch’s exploits in the chase and in wars innumerable.[363] We could observe Sennacherib himself standing on an elevated outlook of his palace and watching “the marching forth of the hosts of Assur and the smoke of their holocausts spreading over all the lands,” or pensively pacing a lofty tiled terrace which overlooked the swift-flowing waters of the Tigris and the broad expanse of the western desert illumined by the crimson glow of the setting sun. But a more fascinating scene engages our attention. It recalls one described in the book of Esther,[364] in which King Assuerus is represented as having his annalists and wise men read for him “the histories and chronicles of former times.” Before us is Asurbanipal--the Grand Monarch of Assyria--surrounded by his scribes and sages and intent on the examination of a recent addition to the royal library. For, after many years spent in military campaigns in Syria, Palestine, Egypt, Susiana, and elsewhere, he resolved to devote the remainder of his life to the arts and avocations of peace. Numerous temples and palaces in many parts of Assyria and Babylonia bear witness to his activity as a builder and to the magnificence of the structures erected to his own glory and to that of his gods.