verdict can be given: on the contrary, it must be admitted that
the story may be true. And then, if certain strangely prevalent
canons of criticism are accepted, and if the evidence that an
event might have happened is to be accepted as proof that it did
happen, Assyriologists will be at liberty to congratulate one
another on the "confirmation by modern science" of the authority
of their ancient books.

It will be interesting, therefore, to inquire how far the
physical structure and the other conditions of the region in
which Surippak was situated are compatible with such a flood as
is described in the Assyrian record.

The scene of Hasisadra's adventure is laid in the broad valley,
six or seven hundred miles long, and hardly anywhere less than a
hundred miles in width, which is traversed by the lower courses
of the rivers Euphrates and Tigris, and which is commonly known
as the "Euphrates valley." Rising, at the one end, into a hill
country, which gradually passes into the Alpine heights of
Armenia; and, at the other, dipping beneath the shallow waters
of the head of the Persian Gulf, which continues in the same
direction, from north-west to south-east, for some eight hundred
miles farther, the floor of the valley presents a gradual slope,
from eight hundred feet above the sea level to the depths of the
southern end of the Persian Gulf. The boundary between sea and
land, formed by the extremest mudflats of the delta of the two
rivers, is but vaguely defined; and, year by year, it advances
seaward. On the north-eastern side, the western frontier ranges
of Persia rise abruptly to great heights; on the south-western
side, a more gradual ascent leads to a table-land of less