This difficulty tantalizes our curiosity. Herodotus, who travelled so much, speaks neither of Noah, or Shem, Reu, Salah, or Nimrod. The name of Nimrod is unknown to all profane antiquity; there are only a few Arabs and some modern Persians who have made mention of Nimrod in falsifying the books of the Jews. Nothing remains to conduct us through these ancient ruins, unknown to all the nations of the universe during so many ages, but faith in the Bible, and happily that is an infallible guide. Herodotus, who has mingled many fables with some truths, pretends that in his time, which was that of greatest power of the Persian sovereigns of Babylon, all the women of the immense city were obliged to go once in their lives to the temple of Mylitta, a goddess who was thought to be the same as Aphrodite, or Venus, in order to prostitute themselves to strangers, and that the law commanded them to receive money as a sacred tribute, which was paid over to the priesthood of the goddess. But even this Arabian tale is more likely than that which the same author tells of Cyrus dividing the Indus into three hundred and sixty canals, which all discharged themselves into the Caspian Sea! What should we say of Mézeray if he had told us that Charlemagne divided the Rhine into three hundred and sixty canals, which fell into the Mediterranean, and that all the ladies of his court were obliged once in their lives to present themselves at the church of St. Genevieve to prostitute themselves to all comers for money? It must be remarked that such a fable is still more absurd in relation to the time of Xerxes, in which Herodotus lived, than it would be in that of Charlemagne. The Orientals were a thousand times more jealous than the Franks and Gauls. The wives of all the great lords were carefully guarded by eunuchs. This custom existed from time immemorial. It is seen even in the Jewish history that when that little nation wished like the others to have a king, Samuel, to dissuade them from it and to retain his authority, said "that a king would tyrannize over them and that he would take the tenths of their vines and corn to give to his eunuchs." The kings accomplished this prediction, for it is written in the First Book of Kings that King Ahab had eunuchs, and in the Second that Joram, Jehu, Jehoiakim, and Zedekiah had them also. The eunuchs of Pharaoh are spoken of a long time previously in the Book of Genesis, and it is said that Potiphar, to whom Joseph was sold, was one of the king's eunuchs. It is clear, therefore, that there were great numbers of eunuchs at Babylon to guard the women. It was not then a duty for them to prostitute themselves to the first comer, nor was Babylon, the city of God, a vast brothel as it has been pretended.