Here the workmen descend abreast in a broad line down a slanting incline to the prescribed verge. Having reached it, they draw back to a distance of 5 metres and recommence work. In this way sloping layers of earth are successively peeled off and the walls gradually emerge. By means of a field railway the earth is removed some distance to a site which provisionally we decide to be unimportant. When one of these slopes reaches the lowest level, which is generally the water-level, the workmen face in the opposite direction and remove the remainder in a similar fashion, only leaving a portion of the slope on the edge of each excavation available for transport. At this point the ends of two parallel walls came to light running south, which we shall describe later with the fortification walls. Between them is a broad street or roadway, which leads direct to the Ishtar Gate, made by Nebuchadnezzar as a processional road for the God Marduk, to whose temple of Esagila it eventually leads. It still possesses the brick pavement covered with asphalt which formed a substratum for the immense flagged pavement. The central part was laid with mighty flags of limestone measuring 1.05 metres each way, and the sides with slabs of red breccia veined with white, 66 centimetres square. The bevelled edges of the joints were filled in with asphalt. On the edges of each slab (Fig. 14), which, of course, were not visible, was an inscription, “Nebuchadnezzar, King of Babylon, son of Nabopolassar, King of Babylon, am I. The Babel Street I paved with blocks of shadu stone for the procession of the great Lord Marduk. Marduk, Lord, grant eternal life.” On the flags of breccia the word _Turminabanda_, breccia, has been substituted for _Shadu_, mountain. The fine hard limestone may have been brought from the neighbourhood of Hit or Anah, where a similar stone is quarried, and transport by river would present little difficulty; of the provenance of the turminabanda I have not been able to acquire any knowledge. The great white paving-stones give the impression of being intended for wheeled traffic, but those that are still _in situ_ do not show the slightest traces of being used for any such purpose, they are merely polished and slippery with use. [Illustration: FIG. 14.—Paving block of the Procession Street. ]