Great buildings like Ctesiphon near Baghdad or traces of the vast
irrigation works of the past are full of interest, but for romance and
mystery there is no piece of the world more fraught with meaning than
this site of the city of Nebuchadnezzar, nearly 200 square miles in
extent, and now, but for the comparatively small tract of irrigated
land, a desert.

"Babylon the great is fallen, is fallen, and is become the habitation of
devils."

[Illustration]




V

BY THE WATERS OF BABYLON

[Illustration: Ctesiphon.]

[Illustration]




BY THE WATERS OF BABYLON

The irrigation officers at Hillah were ideal hosts, not only from the