buildings, the most remarkable being a huge gateway or propylaeum,
through which the entrance lay to the palace from the city. Beyond and
below this, on the level of the city, the first or outer portals were
placed, giving entrance to a court in front of the lower terrace.

A visitor approaching the palace had in the first place to pass through
these portals. They were ornamented with colossal human-headed bulls on
either side, and probably spanned by an arch above, the archivolte being
covered with enamelled bricks disposed in a pattern. Received within the
portals, the visitor found himself in front of a long wall of solid
stone masonry, the revetement of the lower terrace, which rose from the
outer court to a height of at least twenty feet. Either an inclined-way
or a flight of steps--probably the latter--must have led up from the
outer court to this terrace. Here the visitor found another portal or
propylaeum of a magnificent character. [PLATE XLIII., Fig. 1.] Midway in
the south-east side of the lower terrace, and about fifty feet from its
edge, stood this grand structure, gateway ninety-feet in width, and at
least twenty-five in depth, having on each side three winged bulls of
gigantic size, two of them fifteen feet high, and the third nineteen
feet. Between the two small bulls, which styled back to back, presenting
their sides to the spectator, was a colossal figure, strangling a
lion--the Assyria Hercules, according to most writers. The larger bulls
stood at right angles to these figures, withdrawn within the portal, and
facing the spectator. The space between the bulls, which is nearly
twenty feet, was (it is probable) arched over. Perhaps the archway led
into a chamber beyond which was a second archway and an inner portal, as
marked in Mr. Fergusson's plan: but this is at present uncertain.

Besides the great portal, the only buildings as yet discovered on this
lower platform, are a suite of not very extensive apartments. They are