to unlade our goods,
and hired an hundred asses to carry our English merchandize to New
Babylon, or Bagdat, across a short desert, which took us eighteen hours
of travelling, mostly in the night and morning, to avoid the great heat
of the day.

In this short desert, between the Euphrates and Tigris, formerly stood
the great and mighty city of ancient Babylon, many of the old ruins of
which are easily to be seen by day-light, as I, John Eldred, have often
beheld at my good leisure, having made three several journeys between
Aleppo and New Babylon. Here also are still to be seen the ruins of the
ancient Tower of Babel, which, being upon plain ground, seems very large
from afar; but the nearer you come towards it, it seems to grow less and
less. I have gone sundry times to see it, and found the remnants still
standing above a quarter of a mile in circuit, and almost as high as the
stone-work of St Paul's steeple in London, but much bigger.[2] The
bricks remaining in this most ancient monument are half a yard thick,
and three quarters long, having been dried in the sun only; and between
every course of bricks there is a course of matts made of canes, which
still remain as sound as if they had only lain one year.

[Footnote 2: It is hardly necessary to observe, that this refers to the
old St Paul's before the great fire, and has no reference to the present
magnificent structure, built long after the date of this journey.--E.]

The new city of Babylon, or Bagdat, joins to the before-mentioned small
desert, in which was the old city, the river Tigris running close under
the walls, so that they might easily open a ditch, and make the waters
of the river, encompass the city.[3] Bagdat is above two English miles
in circumference. The inhabitants, who generally speak three languages,
Persian, Arabic, and Turkish, are much of the same complexion with the
Spaniards. The women mostly wear, in the gristle of the nose, a ring
like a wedding-ring, but rather larger, having a pearl and a turquoise
stone set in it; and this however poor they may be. This is a place of
great trade, being the thoroughfare from the East Indies to Aleppo. The
town is well supplied with provisions, which are brought down the river
Tigris from Mosul, in Diarbekir, or Mesopotamia, where stood the ancient
city of Nineveh. These provisions, and various other kinds of goods, are
brought down the river Tigris on rafts of wood, borne up by a great
number of goat-s