How Layard, with £60, uncovered a lost civilization—A wild boar hunt which was not quite what it seemed—Finding the great winged bull—Deserts that were once the Garden of Eden—Hardships and adventures among the Arabs—Mining a way into Nineveh—Difficulty of transporting the mighty Assyrian statues—Ancient letters like modern puppy biscuits—The clever Sumerian canal builders—Rise and fall of Babylon, and the doom of Nineveh 129 CHAPTER XII A mussel shell which proved that scientists were wrong—The forerunner of modern Manchester in the heart of ancient Mesopotamia—Finding the treasure of the Moon God at Ur—The Tower of Babel—When Nebuchadnezzar reigned in Babylon and Daniel saw the writing on the wall—The Code of Hammurabi and the Ten Commandments 149 CHAPTER XIII Discovery of Troy by Heinrich Schliemann—His amazing life—The grocer’s boy who wept over Homer, starved himself to buy books, and eventually made a fortune to carry out his boyish dream of finding the city of which Homer sang—How scientists laughed at him—The astounding treasure of Troy and the wealth of Mycenæ 161 CHAPTER XIV Schliemann vindicated and honoured—His 100,000 relics from Troy—The Greek sculpture of Apollo—Glories of ancient Greece—When Phidias, the world’s greatest sculptor, carved the most beautiful statues ever seen—Turks who smashed them for sport—Romance of the Elgin Marbles—Lord Elgin’s fight for the matchless relics 176 CHAPTER XV Did ancient Crete dominate the world like modern Britain?—The Mediterranean civilization—Brilliant discoveries of Sir Arthur Evans—The Throne Room at Knossos—Some Cretan cameos—The problem of the unknown writing of Minoa and what we may learn from it 183 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS Excavating at Thebes _Frontispiece_ FACING PAGE The Rosetta Stone 4 Temple of Karnak 12 The Tomb of Tutankhamen 24 Temple of Luxor 26 The Avenue of Sphinxes at Karnak 36 A Scene from the Book of the Dead 50 The Pyramids of Gizeh 56 The Colossi of Memnon 69 A partly-hewn Obelisk in a Quarry 73 The Noble Ruins of Philæ 77 Temple of Queen Hatshepsut at Thebes 88