can only be
regarded as a conjecture. Possibly the excrescence does not so much mark
a vestibule as a second shrine, like that which is said to have existed
at the foot of the Belus Tower at Babylon. Till, however, additional
researches have been made, it is in vain to think of restoring the plan
or elevation of this part of the temple.

From the temples of the Babylonians we may now pass to their
palaces--constructions inferior in height and grandeur, but covering a
greater space, involving a larger amount of labor, and admitting of more
architectural variety. Unfortunately the palaces have suffered from the
ravages of time even more than the temples, and in considering their
plan and character we obtain little help from the existing remains.
Still, something may be learnt of them from this source, and where
it fails we may perhaps be allowed to eke out the scantiness of our
materials by drawing from the elaborate descriptions of Diodorus such
points as have probability in their favor.

The Babylonian palace, like the Assyrian, and the Susianian, stood upon
a lofty mound or platform. This arrangement provided at once for safety,
for enjoyment, and for health. It secured a pure air, freedom from the
molestation of insects, and a position only assailable at a few points.
The ordinary shape of the palace mound appears to have been square;
its elevation was probably not less than fifty or sixty feet. It was
composed mainly of sun-dried bricks, which however were almost certainly
enclosed externally by a facing of burnt brick, and may have been
further strengthened within by walls of the same material, which perhaps
traversed the whole mound. The entire mass seems to have been carefully
drained, and the collected waters were conveyed through subterranean
channels to the level of the plain at the mound's base. The summit
of the platform was no doubt paved, either with stone or burnt
brick--mainly, it is probable, with the latter; since the former
material was scarce, and though a certain number of stone pavement slabs
have been found, they are too rare and scattered to imply anything like
the general use of stone paving. Upon the platform, most likely towards
the centre, rose the actual palace, not built (like the Assyrian
palaces) of crude brick faced with a better material, but constructed
wholly of the finest and hardest burnt brick laid in a mortar of extreme
tenacity, with walls of enormous thickness, parallel to the s