"Babylonian and Assyrian letters were treated much as ours are when they are put into a post-bag to which the seals of the post-office are attached. There were excellent roads all over Western Asia, with post-stations at intervals where relays of horses could be procured. Along these all letters to or from the king and the government were carried by royal messengers. It is probable that the letters of private individuals were also carried by the same hands.... The civilized and oriental world was bound together by a network of postal routes over which literary intercourse was perpetually passing. They extended from the Euphrates to the Nile and from the plateau of Asia Minor to the confines of Arabia. These routes followed the old lines of war and trade along which armies had marched and merchantmen had traveled for unnumbered generations. The Tell-el-Amarna tablets show that letter-writing was not confined to Assyria and Babylonia on the one hand, or to Egypt on the other. Wherever the ancient culture of Babylonia had spread, there had gone with it not only the cuneiform characters and the use of clay as a writing material, but the art of letter-writing as well."[4] Fifteen hundred and seventy-five letters alone were found in the library of Asshurbanipal, unearthed by Layard. This great Assyrian king sent scribes throughout Babylonia to visit ancient temples and copy tablets on which were preserved ancient writings. Some thirty thousand were collected before his death and they treated of all subjects known at that time. It was remarkable that when this splendid palace fell into ruins, many of these tablets remained uninjured, and, having laid undisturbed for twenty-five hundred years, were finally brought to light some fifty years ago to give the world of today their old-time messages. DELUGE STORY--COLUMN III. "The surface of the land like fire they wasted; they destroyed all life from the face of the land; to battle against men they brought the waters. Brother saw not his brother; men knew not one another. In heaven the gods feared the flood and hastened to ascend to the heaven of Anu. The gods, like dogs in the kennel, crouched down in a heap. Six days and nights ... the wind, the flood, and the storm go on overwhelming. The seventh day, when it approached, the flood subsided, the storm which had fought against men like an armed host was quieted. The sea began to dry, and the wind and the flood ended. I beheld the sea and uttered a cry, for the whole of mankind was turned to clay; like trunks the corpses floated. I opened the window, and light smote upon my face; I stopped and sat down; I wept; over my face flowed my tears. I beheld a shore beyond the sea; a district rose twelve times distant. On the mountain of Nizir the ship grounded; the mountain of Nizir stopped the ship, and it was not able to pass over it.