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Croesus reigned from 560 B.C. to 546. It was several times destroyed, the last time by Tamerlane. Assyria contains many large cities; but of these Babylon, to which, after the destruction of Nineveh, the seat of government was removed, is by far the most renowned and the most strongly fortified. Babylon is situated in an extensive plain. It is surrounded by a trench, deep, wide, and full of water.
Think of the grim figure of this foreign man, with his piercing voice and half-intelligible speech, dropped from the clouds as it were, and stalking through Nineveh, pealing out his confident message, like that gaunt fanatic who walked Jerusalem in its last agony, crying, 'Woe! woe unto the bloody city! or that other, who, with flaming fire on his head and madness in his eyes, affrighted London in the plague.
"So Jonah arose and went unto Nineveh, according to the word of the Lord." Jonah iii.. 3. "And he cried, and said, Yet forty days, and Nineveh shall be overthrown." Jonah iii. 4. "So the people of Nineveh believed God." Jonah iii. 5. "And God saw their works, that they turned from their evil way; and God repented of the evil that he had said he would do unto them, and he did it not."
Around the tradition of Jonah, the son of Amittai, a prophet of whom we know nothing in other writings, some forgotten author has woven a story, to point a lofty moral. Jonah feels himself called to go to Nineveh and cry against it, because of its wickedness. Quite naturally he does not relish such an errand.
In his last verse he informs us that the city contained "more than six score thousand persons that cannot discern between their right hand and their left." Jonah obeyed the Lord this time and began to preach. "Yet forty days," cried he, "and Nineveh shall be overthrown." How the prophet made himself understood is an open question!
We have nothing more to say; and it is with a sort of terror that we look on, at the bottom of that sea which is called the past, behind those colossal waves, at the shipwreck of those immense vessels, Babylon, Nineveh, Tarsus, Thebes, Rome, beneath the fearful gusts which emerge from all the mouths of the shadows. But shadows are there, and light is here.
There is abundant evidence to show that there was a time in the centuries before Christ when prostitution was held as a most sacred vocation. We learn of this practice from many sources. It appears that temples in a number of ancient cities of the East, in Babylonia, Nineveh, Corinth and throughout India, were erected for the worship of certain deities.
And to-day the very skies above it were leaden, as though Nature herself had turned atheist. In spite of the vigour with which he was endowed, in spite of the belief in his own soul, doubts assailed him of his ability to cope with this problem of the modern Nineveh at the very moment when he was about to realize his matured ambition of a great city parish.
But I shall not yield a drachma; I may add, at most, a few sheep to let them celebrate a solemn service. The heavenly Astaroth will appear then, and will free thee from vows if I add a gold chain or a goblet." While listening to these statements Kama bit her lips to restrain laughter; and he continued, "If Thou go with me to Nineveh, Thou wilt be a great lady.
She picked out two of the most presentable-looking of the beasts and had them dusted and made as tidy as was possible at short notice, and set out for the Nineveh mansion. You may imagine the sensation that her small but imposing caravan created when she arrived at the hall door. The entire garden-party flocked up to gape.
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