A King of Tyre

eparted, when it fell conquered by the Babylonian Nebuchadnezzar. The dangers of its exposed position on the mainland, as compared with the safety of the island which the Great Sea guarded as

fortress. Shanties stood upon the dismantled foundations, and scattered among the ruins were the black tents of traders. A new market-place had been

n their gigantic temples, loaded the ground; and concealed beneath them were subterranean passage-ways, which the priests of old had used in going from one part of the sacred edifice to another, unseen by the worshippers. These were now the abode of jackals, whose

like a miniature sunset. Sidonian glass-makers furnished great globes, covered with vitreous glazing, for the eyes which glared from the bull's head that surmounted the human shoulders of the monster. Pipes from the fire-pit were to convey the smoke through the nostrils. Piles of wood were brought from the Lebanons, and casks of inflammable oil were placed in readiness near by. Various enclosures were set up for singers, drum-beaters, and trumpeters. Elevated platforms awaited the guilds of civil dignitaries. Lines were drawn within which the priests could congregate

e rays were intense and burning; suggestive of the wrath of Moloch, who drank up the springs of water, withered vegetation, and threatened

oppa-vying with one another in the splendor of the devices by which they exalted their various local divinities, while they attested their common faith in the dread majesty of Baal-Moloch. Trading vessels f

e mainland, included a procession around the entire island, starting from the Egyptian harbor, on the south, curving westward and

er homes, her arts, her commerce, as well as upon her temples and priests. Along this prescribed course the Ph?nician ships were anchored sid

s each valuable piece was marked ostentatiously with the name of the donor, a sceptic might have thought that the sinful trait of vanity lay deeper than the soft raiment had touched. Jars of precious dyes were so placed that their dripping contents stained the sea in the wake of the barges, attesting the piety of the makers of such stuffs. Great sacks of ground spices were the offering of a ship-owner whose vessel had gone around Africa and entered

to which they had been sometimes tempted in order to escape the care of their offspring. Others among them were honest, but abjectly poor, and had been persuaded by the priests thus to give their children back to the All-giving Baal. A few made the sacrifice with bleeding hearts. These sat in utter misery, staring as if for relief towards the burning heavens, that

of purple silk, the same that Trypho had dyed for Hiram's gift to Zillah. The king sat on his throne as if he commanded the pageant. His face was white, his lips compressed, his eye steady: a king still, though seemingly done in marble. On his head he wore the ancient crown of Tyre.

in handling the long oars that were affixed to the sides. The tall prows of the vessels that lined the course, as a guard of honor, were surmounted with figure