eproduce, on a larger scale, a part of the slab already illustrated at
page 240, so that the merits of its workmanship may be better appreciated.

[Illustration: FIG. 135.--Fragment of a threshold; from Khorsabad. Louvre.
Drawn by Bourgoin.]

[Illustration: FIG. 136.--Door ornament; from Kouyundjik. After Rawlinson.]

The painter also made use of this motive. In a bas-relief from the palace
of Assurbanipal we find the round-headed doorway illustrated in Fig. 136.
Its rich decoration must have been carried out in glazed bricks, similar to
those discovered by M. Place on one of the gates of Khorsabad. Here,
however, the figures of supernatural beings are replaced by rosettes and by
two lines of the knop and flower ornament.

[Illustration: FIG. 137.--Palmette; from Layard.]

[Illustration: FIG. 138.--Goats and palmette; from Layard.]

Vegetable forms brought luck to the Assyrian decorator. Even after taking a
motive from a foreign style of ornament he understood, so to speak, how to
naturalize a plant and to make its forms expressive of his own
individuality. Our only difficulty is to make a choice among the numerous
illustrations of his inventive fertility; we shall confine ourselves to
reproducing the designs embroidered upon the royal robes of Assurnazirpal.
We need hardly say that these robes do not now exist, but the Ninevite
sculptor copied them in soft alabaster with an infinite patience that does
him honour. He has preserved for us every detail with the exception of
colour. The lotus is not to be found in this embroidery; its place is taken
by the palmette or tuft of leaves (Fig. 137), through which appear stems
bending with the weight of the buds they bear. Animals, real and imaginary,
are skilfully mingled with the fan-shaped palmettes; in one place we find
two goats (Fig. 138), in another two winged bulls (Fig. 139). Bulls and
goats are both alike on their knees before the palmette, which seems to
suggest that the latter is an abridged representation of that sacred tree
which we have already encountered and will encounter again in the
bas-reliefs, where it is surrounded by scenes of adoration and sacrifice.
This motive has the double advantage of awakening religious feeling in the
spectators, and of provoking a momentary elegance of line and movement in
the two pairs of animals. On the other hand we can hardly explain the
motive represented in our Figs. 140 and 141--a motive already met with in
the figured