Merodach having been once convinced by this evidence that he had the power of doing everything and of undoing everything at his pleasure, the gods handed to him the sceptre, the throne, the crown, the insignia of supreme rule, and greeted him with their acclamations: “Be King!--Go! Cut short the life of Tiamat, and let the wind carry her blood to the hidden extremities of the universe.” * He equipped himself carefully for the struggle. “He made a bow and placed his mark upon it;” ** he had a spear brought to him and fitted a point to it; the god lifted the lance, brandished it in his right hand, then hung the bow and quiver at his side. He placed a thunderbolt before him, filled his body with a devouring flame, then made a net in which to catch the anarchic Tiamat; he placed the four winds in such a way that she could not escape, south and north, east and west, and with his own hand he brought them the net, the gift of his father Anu. “He created the hurricane, the evil wind, the storm, the tempest, the four winds, the seven winds, the waterspout, the wind that is second to none; then he let loose the winds he had created, all seven of them, in order to bewilder the anarchic Tiamat by charging behind her. And the master of the waterspout raised his mighty weapon, he mounted his chariot, a work without its equal, formidable; he installed himself therein, tied the four reins to the side, and darted forth, pitiless, torrent-like, swift.” * Sayce was the first, I believe, to cite, in connection with this mysterious order, the passage in which Berossus tells how the gods created men from a little clay, moistened with the blood of the god Belos. Here there seems to be a fear lest the blood of Tiamat, mingling with the mud, should produce a crop of monsters similar to those which the goddess had already created; the blood, if carried to the north, into the domain of the night, would there lose its creative power, or the monsters who might spring from it would at any rate remain strangers to the world of gods and men. ** “Literally, he made his weapon known; “perhaps it would be better to interpret it, “and he made it known that the bow would henceforth be his distinctive weapon.” [Illustration: 008.jpg BEL-MERODACH, ARMED WITH THE THUNDERBOLT, DOES BATTLE WITH THE TUMULTUOUS TIAMAT.] Drawn by Faucher-Gudin from the bas-relief from Nimrud preserved in the British Museum.