me and you shall see all its riches and its glory. Sheshà has commanded
it.”
Rachel was too bewildered to wonder how it happened that she understood
the child, who was certainly not talking English. But, strange language
though it was, she seemed to know it as well as her native tongue.
There were besides, other and even stranger things to amaze her, for
before her, under the burning blue sky, was spread a gorgeous city,
or rather what looked like miles and miles of gardens and palaces and
temples, enclosed within huge walls.
From the slightly raised ground on which Rachel with her new companion
were standing, she could see these city walls—a double row of
them—stretching away to form a gigantic square enclosing the river,
the woods and gardens, and all the strange buildings which made up the
city.
“Oh look! look!” she cried suddenly, as all at once, actually on the
_top_ of one of the inner walls, she saw a brilliantly painted chariot
drawn by four horses, coming at a furious pace towards her. It was
driven by a long-haired man who stood upright within the car, urging on
his steeds—till he came so near the end of the wall that Rachel held
her breath, expecting to see chariot, horses and driver dashed to the
ground. But, before she could cry out, the man, with marvellous skill,
turned horses and chariot, and drove at full speed back again along the
wide top of the wall.
[Illustration]
“Just _think_ of a wall broad enough for four horses to gallop
along—and _turn_!” Rachel almost screamed the words in her excitement.
“That is Akurgal, the driver of the king’s chariot,” said the little
Babylonian girl, unconcernedly. “He drives like the wind for fury when
it pleases him.”
Rachel scarcely knew in which direction to look first, so glorious
was the view. She saw that each of the four sides of the wall was
pierced by gigantic gates made of bronze—all the gates opening upon
broad streets which crossed one another, so that the whole city was
divided into squares, filled with gardens and houses. The broad river
flowed through it from north to south, and over the river hung a mighty
bridge, at each end of which was a palace.
It was difficult for Rachel to make up her mind in which direction
to turn her eyes, but the sight of something that appeared like a
forest-covered mountain rising near one of the palaces, was so lovely
that she pointed to it and turned to Salome.
“What a beautiful mountain!” she exclaimed. “How funny there should be
only _one_—because the rest of the country is so flat. There isn’t
another hill as far as ever I can see,” she added, glancing over the
wide plain in which the city lay.
Salome smiled.
“That is no mountain,” she said. “It was made by human hands. It is the
great glory of our city, and, so my mistress says, in time to come, the
Hanging Gardens of Babylon will be called one of the Wonders of the
World.”
Rachel started. “There are seven Wonders of the World,” she began,
eagerly. “I’ve seen one of them already—the Great Pyramid, you know.
And now——”
“I have heard of the Pyramid in the land of Egypt,” Salome interrupted.
“But come now and see more closely _our_ wonder—the Garden that is
like no other in the world.”
She took Rachel’s hand, and in a few moments they had entered the city
through a gate which Rachel noticed was covered with tiles of blue
enamel as brilliant as the sky above them. And on either side of the
gate, like sentinels, stood huge winged bulls carved in stone. But how
different they looked here, she thought, in the golden sunshine, with
the wonderful blue tiles behind them, and their great shadows, black as
ink, stretching on either hand!
“This is one of the new gates built by our king,” Salome told her. “He
has caused inscriptions to be written about them so that all the world
may know what adornments he has added to our fair city of Babylon. Our
city that shall last for ever,” she added proudly.
Rachel glanced at her, and thought of a great rubbish heap she had
recently seen—“_the mound called Babil which covers the palace in
which dwelt King Nebuchadnezzar nearly three thousand years ago_”—she
remembered the very words of Sheshà.... How amazing it was to be
walking with this little girl in the very city that now lay under a
mound of earth! To be talking to a little girl who lived nearly three
thousand years ago, and had no idea that her home was even now being
dug up in fragments by men living in the world to-day!... For a moment
it all seemed too puzzling to be true. Rachel rubbed her eyes with her
disengaged hand, and half expected the whole vision to disappear. Yet
when she looked again, the lovely scene still lay before her, and she
could feel the warmth of Salome’s little brown hand within her own.
[Illustration]
“I must be getting used to the Past,” she reflected. “Because now I can
_feel_ as well as see the people. They didn’t seem quite real when I
was with Sheshà in Egypt. But now it’s different. Is it because _these_
people didn’t live quite so far back into the Past as King Cheops and
his slaves, I wonder?”
She glanced again at the grave, strangely clad little girl at her side,
who talked as though she were quite grown up.
“I mustn’t say anything about the rubbish mound, or tell her anything
about the sort of world _I_ belong to,” she reflected hurriedly. “She
wouldn’t understand. I suppose she thinks I’m living in her times,
but have just never happened to see Babylon before. And that’s quite
true!” she added to herself, with a little inward chuckle.
While such thoughts as these were hurrying through her mind, she was
looking right and left, full of eager curiosity, for the bridge she was
crossing was thronged with amazing figures.
Men with black, curling beards, bare-legged, and bare-armed, wearing
tunics of brilliant colours, passed her. Some of these were seated
upon the backs of camels following one another in long lines. The
soft-footed, grey beasts were loaded with merchandise, and the bales
on either side of their humped backs swayed as they moved. They were
decked fantastically with trappings of plaited scarlet wool, hung with
tassels of brilliant colour. After such a procession of camels and
their drivers, would come perhaps a chariot with four horses abreast,
driven by a fierce-looking man in a gorgeous fringed robe, whose dark
eyes flashed like jewels in his bronzed face. Following one such
chariot, she saw a group of girls in gauzy tunics, bracelets on their
arms, tinkling anklets above their feet, dancing as they came, and
singing a wild song as they tossed their arms above their heads.
“They are going to the Temple of Belus,” explained Salome, as Rachel
stood still to look at them.
She turned round and pointed with her little brown forefinger to a
great building at the other end of the bridge.
“Later, if there is still time, you shall see the temple of the great
God. But let us hasten now towards the gardens, for there, in the
cool of the day, the queen walks with her maidens, and I must be in
attendance.”
Rachel was torn between her longing to be actually within the wonderful
Hanging Garden and her desire to linger on the bridge which afforded
such a magnificent view. She gazed with delight upon the broad shining
river which divided the city, and upon the ships with gracefully curved
sails which, rowed by almost naked slaves, moved to and fro over its
surface.
Some of these ships were drawn up against the quays which lined the
river, as far as eye could reach, and Rachel saw a swarming multitude
of men staggering under corded chests of wood which the ships had
brought to be unloaded.
Salome stopped to watch the slaves at their work.
“That is merchandise for the palace, I trust,” she observed. “We have
awaited it too long, and the queen grows angry.”
“What sort of things are in those boxes?” Rachel asked.
“Ivory and ebony for the thrones, and for the couches and the chariots,
emeralds and fine linen, and coral and agate. Spices from Arabia and
precious stones and gold,” answered Salome, in a sort of chanting voice.
[Illustration]
Rachel gasped. It sounded like a fairy tale. Yet she remembered
something like it—Where was it? In the Bible, surely!
Just as the thought of the Bible crossed her mind, a group of men
passed close to her. They were dressed rather differently from the
other people around her, their faces, too, looked different, and their
eyes were very sad.
“Who are those men?” she enquired, looking back over her shoulder.
“They look so unhappy—and _homesick_, somehow.” Rachel knew what it
was to be homesick!
Salome glanced at them carelessly. “They are Hebrews who
call themselves the Children of Israel. Our king, the great
Nebuchadnezzar—may he live for ever—conquered their country and took
their treasures from Jerusalem, their chief city, and brought many of
them here to Babylon to live. They hate us, and we despise them.”
Rachel started as the words of the psalm darted into her mind. “_By
the rivers of Babylon, there we sat down.... We hanged our harps upon
the willows_....” She had heard this sung in church, and it had meant
nothing to her but just “a psalm.” Yet, here before her very eyes now,
was one of “the rivers.” There were “the willows” fringing streams
which flowed through the innumerable gardens, and she had just met some
of the captive Jews! Rachel gasped again as all these things became
“real” to her—something that had actually happened—was, in fact,
happening before her eyes.
“It’s awful to be homesick,” she murmured, rather to herself than to
Salome, who, without replying, ran on in front of her to a flight of
steps at the end of the bridge.
“This is one of the entrances to the Hanging Garden,” she explained,
looking back. “We must hasten, lest my mistress calls for me.”
Rachel followed her from terrace to terrace, too overwhelmed with
delight at the glimpses of beauty she caught right and left to say a
word. She saw that the whole garden was supported, tier above tier, by
gigantic arches, and Salome told her each terrace was made of plates
of lead, holding earth so deep that great forest trees could grow in
it. If she had not known this, the whole place would have seemed to
Rachel as though blossoming by magic in the heart of a forest growing
in mid-air. She could scarcely believe it was not the work of some
magician.
By the time they reached the uppermost terrace, on a level with the
city wall, she was not only breathless, but struck dumb by the beauty
and wonder of everything round her.
Mighty cedar trees spread their layers of branches between her and
the burning blue sky. The air was perfumed with the scent from groves
of lemon trees. Fountains tossed their sparkling drops high into the
sunshine. Red roses swept in cascades from her feet down the slope
to the terraces below. Along paths paved with tiles of sapphire-blue
enamel, peacocks walked delicately with outspread tails, and far below,
within its four-square walls, the city of Babylon lay glittering in
such brilliant sunshine as in her own country she had never dreamt of,
nor faintly imagined.
And now, before she had time to recover from her amazement, a new sight
was presented, for, coming slowly in her direction, but as yet in the
distance, a group of people approached. In the midst of them, as the
little procession drew nearer, Rachel saw a lovely woman leaning back
in a litter slung between ivory poles and borne by four slaves. The
litter was covered with silk hangings of a rich purple, and a fringed
canopy of the same material supported on poles also of ivory, was held
above the swinging couch by four dark-skinned girls.
“The Queen Amytis,” whispered Salome, and Rachel drew back in sudden
fright. “She will wonder who I am—and I shan’t know what to say,” she
began, hurriedly. “I don’t know how to talk to queens.”
“Have no fear, she will not see you. No one here sees you but me.
That is the work of Sheshà, who is greatest of all magicians and has
entrusted you to me, why I know not—nor do I know with any certainty
who you are. But he has commanded me to be your guide here in Babylon.
No one sees, no one hears you but I alone.”
Wondering greatly, but feeling much relieved, Rachel watched the slaves
as very carefully they set down the litter close to a throne-like seat,
covered with silken pillows. The arms of the chair she noticed, were
two-winged bulls in stone, and the back of it shone with enamelled
tiles and plates of gold. The maidens now surrounded their mistress,
helping her to rise from the litter, and, as she sank into the great
chair, Rachel gazed at her wonderful robe, made of stuff like gossamer,
clasped with a great jewel at the waist. Her slim, olive-coloured feet
were bare, and, to Rachel’s amazement, she saw the gleam of emeralds in
rings upon her toes! On her bare arms and neck there were jewels, also,
and there were emeralds in the fillet that bound her beautiful black
hair.
Never had Rachel ever dreamt of such a vision! Never indeed could she
have imagined such luxury and magnificence as she had seen since she
entered Babylon.
“It’s like—like the stories in the Arabian Nights,” she thought,
confusedly. Presently the queen spoke in that language which sounded
strange to her ears, but which with her _mind_ she somehow understood
quite well.
“Listen! One can hear the singing from the Temple of Belus.”
“To-day is a high festival. They offer sacrifices to the God,” answered
one of her maidens. “There has been great stir in the city since
sunrise.”
“But when the darkness falls there will be silence, and the wise men on
the topmost tower will watch the stars.”
Queen Amytis said this as though to herself. Her great dark eyes were
fixed upon the shining city below, and Rachel thought she looked sad
and anxious.
“The most high God will protect our lord the king on his perilous
journey,” one of her maidens declared consolingly. “And the wise men
will surely learn good tidings from the stars,” added another.
The queen did not reply, and Rachel looked enquiringly at Salome, who
was lying full length on a great tiger-skin stretched in front of her
mistress’s chair.
“Sit near me,” said the little maid, making room for her. “No one else
sees or hears you. What is it you would ask?”
“Tell me about the temple,” whispered Rachel. “That temple of Belus.”
She could see it very distinctly from where she sat, a wonderful
building with a number of storeys piled up one above the other, each
storey covered with glazed tiles of a colour different from that above
and below.
“It is the Tower of the Seven Planets—the Temple of Belus, who is the
God of our city,” Salome told her. “Our great king has lately built it
where once stood, so they say, the Tower of Babel.”
“The Tower of Babel? That’s in the Bible!” But a glance at Salome’s
face showed her that she didn’t know anything about the Bible—and she
remembered that the gods Salome and all the people here worshipped were
those the Bible called “false gods.”
“Of the Tower of Babel I know nothing but its name,” said Salome,
shrugging her shoulders. “It stood doubtless long ago. But this is a
new temple built, as they say, on its ruins. It is of seven colours,
because each of the seven planets has a different colour, so the wise
men who study the stars declare. And within the temple there stands
a golden image of the god Belus, and a golden altar upon which the
priests burn frankincense and all sweet scents in honour of the god.”
“But the queen said the wise men watch the stars there?”
“Even so. At night on the topmost storey of the tower, the priests
study the sky. They are great astronomers, and have learnt wonderful
things about the heavenly bodies, all of which are written down so that
their knowledge may not be lost to people who live after them.”
“Then I suppose that’s how _we_ began to know about the stars,” thought
Rachel. “Through these people who lived here in Babylon thousands of
years ago.” It was very strange to think of this, and strange also,
and sad, to remember that what Salome called “the new temple” was now
nothing but a heap of half-buried ruins! And, yet, there in some magic
way lay Salome before her eyes, her anklets tinkling when she moved,
and her little face full of life. And there sat the lovely queen,
surrounded by her maidens in their transparent robes! And the cedar
trees murmured overhead, and from the groves of lemon trees sweet
scents were blown, and below lay the marvellous city.
Rachel grew so confused that it was with difficulty she could prevent
herself from saying aloud all she was feeling. And this, as somehow she
knew, would be the greatest possible mistake.
“The queen is sad because the king is away, isn’t she?”
The question was put hurriedly, in case she should betray herself.
“Yes. Our great King Nebuchadnezzar is in Egypt, fighting against his
enemies. May he be preserved! The queen longs for tidings of him.”
Just at that moment the sound of quick footsteps on the blue tiled
path, behind the queen’s chair, made Rachel turn her head. A slave was
running in haste along an upper terrace.
The queen also turned and half rose from her throne-like seat as the
messenger, drawing near, threw himself face downward on the ground
before her, and then, rising and bowing low, put something into her
hand.
“A letter, perchance, from the king,” whispered Salome eagerly.
“A letter?” repeated Rachel, looking with curiosity at the strange
object.
It certainly bore no resemblance to the letters she knew, for it looked
something like a thin square brick, and though it had an envelope, that
envelope was made of _clay_ instead of paper, and had a seal upon it.
[Illustration]
Feeling quite sure by now that she was invisible to all but the eyes
of Salome, she ran to the back of the queen’s chair and watched her
break the seal, and take out what it contained. This proved to be a
small brick tablet. Upon it was carved some writing that was like, yet
unlike, the hieroglyphics she had seen in Egypt, for the letters of
which the writing was composed were wedge-shaped, with curious dots and
arrow-heads every here and there between them.
And then, smiling happily, the queen began to read the brick aloud.
“_Unto Amytis, my queen whom I love, who loveth me_, say, _It is well
with me._ With thee also may it be well.... Let the wife of the king,
my lady, be of good cheer, for a messenger of good luck from Belus
walketh beside the king of the world....”
Still smiling, she looked round her at her maidens, who all bowed low
and murmured together.
“Our lord the king, may he live for ever.”
“The great god Belus, as you hear, protects him!” exclaimed Salome,
turning to Rachel.
Suddenly the queen clapped her hands, and at the signal, her maidens
snatched up the musical instruments they had laid aside, and their
brown fingers began to sweep the strings of curiously shaped harps and
lyres as they sang a chant of rejoicing....
The sun was setting, and as she lay stretched out upon the tiger skin,
Rachel saw the city below her glowing like a heap of jewels within
the casket of its walls. The broad river was washed with gold, and
reflected in its depths she saw the purple and embroidered sails of
the ships passing and repassing, as they brought gold and ivory, fine
linen and precious stones, to enrich still further the magnificence of
Babylon. The long line of quays formed a white, glittering fringe on
either side of the river. In the gardens and open courtyards between
the houses the palms and cedar trees and masses of flowers shone like
coloured fire, and the great temple of Belus towering towards the sky,
with its seven storeys of seven colours, might have been the enchanted
palace of a magician. Rachel gazed and gazed as though she wanted to
fix the vision of so much loveliness upon her mind for ever.
But her last look after all was for the beauty of the garden in which
she sat—the Hanging Garden that might well, she thought, be called one
of the World’s Wonders! For the sun’s last rays lent an even greater
magic to the lemon groves, to the leaping cascades which flowed from
the upper terrace and were lost among the forest trees beneath; to
the pyramids of gorgeous flowers and to the group of singing girls
surrounding their lovely queen. Their gauzy robes were dyed with
crimson light, the jewels on the queen’s head-dress and on the brown
hands touching the harp-strings gleamed dazzlingly, and the voices of
the singers mingled with the deep hum of voices floating upwards from
the swarming multitudes below.
“Is not our Babylon well called ‘_the lady of kingdoms_’?” whispered
Salome. “It shall endure for ever, and in ages to come men will
travel hither to see its glories, and to gaze upon this our Hanging
Garden—one of the Wonders of the World.”
Rachel turned to look at the grave little girl who spoke like a woman,
yet was perhaps no older than herself.
For a moment she saw her great dark mournful eyes, and then, the whole
scene, the garden, the great city below with its towers and palaces,
disappeared. For yet another moment she saw the dreary desert, the
three great mounds of earth under the blue sky, and almost at the same
instant, she was walking in a gallery lined with cases, containing
stones, bricks, and various other dull-coloured objects.... “These
don’t look much like the letters the postman brings every morning, do
they?” Mr. Sheston was saying. “Yet they are the sort of letters the
Babylonians wrote to one another. These marks on the bricks were made
with a metal stick, when the clay was still moist and soft, and then
the tablet was baked, so that the writing should last practically for
ever.”
“I know!” cried Rachel. “The queen had a letter from the king
Nebuchadnezzar, and it was in a sort of clay envelope. And she read it
out, and—”
But Mr. Sheston only smiled, and went on telling her about the “brick
letters” hundreds of which had already been discovered in the ruins
that cover Babylon!
It was a curious smile, and in some way it told Rachel that she must
not talk much to Mr. Sheston about Sheshà—even though they were one
and the same person.... “Why, even the beginnings of their names are
alike!” she thought, suddenly.
“Yes, the Babylonians were wonderful people,” the old man exclaimed.
“They were astronomers as well as sculptors and metal workers, you
know. They built high towers from which they studied the stars. You
may imagine what a splendid view of the sky they would have from these
towers rising out of a flat country into air so absolutely clear that
the stars look enormously big and bright.”
“And they told fortunes by the stars, didn’t they?” Rachel asked,
remembering the king’s letter.
“Yes, they were _astrologers_, too—that is they believed that certain
planets had an effect on people’s lives. But, putting that on one
side, we have to thank them for the beginning of all the marvellous
discoveries that later astronomers have made.... Well, now, my dear,”
he went on, presently, just like any other kind old gentleman, “I’m
sure you’re ready for tea and buns.”
Rachel was quite ready, and she also quite understood that “Mr.
Sheston” and “Sheshà” wished to have very little to do with one another.
So she only said, when, half an hour later, the old man left her at
Aunt Hester’s door:
“Thank you _ever_ so much. I shall never forget Babylon, and—and—the
Hanging Garden, you know. But there are five more Wonders of the World,
aren’t there?” She could not help adding this, nor could she help a
beseeching glance at Mr. Sheston.
He laughed. “We’ll see about them, perhaps,” he said. But Rachel ran
into the house quite satisfied.
[Illustration]
THIRD WONDER
[Illustration: THE COLOSSUS OF RHODES]
One morning, several days later, Rachel received a long letter from
her father, in answer to one she had written to him before making the
acquaintance of Mr. Sheston. (Though, indeed, as she remembered, she
had even then met him without knowing it!)