ENGRAVED ROCKS IN THE OUADI MOKATTAH.-LABORDE. graven with an iron pen and lead in the rocks forever." Job xix. 24. which, long before the birth of Jesus Christ, were sculptured in these rocks by the Chaldeans or some other persons." This account excited profound attention in Europe: and it was thought by many that the inscriptions might have been framed by the Israelites during their stay in this region, and probably contained irrefragable evidence for the truth of the Mosaic history. Hence copies of them have been anxiously sought and secured. But, with the exception of a few in Greek, the character and language remain unknown. "Before they can be all deciphered," says Laborde, "greater progress than has yet been attained must be made in the paleography and ancient languages of the East. The most general opinion is that they were the work of pilgrims who visited Sinai about the sixth century." This seems to us very doubtful. The Greek inscriptions and the crosses on which this conclusion chiefly rests, may indeed have been of that or a later age; but it does not follow that those in the unknown characters necessarily were so too. However, this is of no consequence for our purpose, which is merely to illustrate by example, the practice of charging the living rock with inscriptions; and that example is the more interesting from being taken from a region of so much scriptural interest, and not far from the land of Uz. Although these inscriptions should prove not to be of high antiquity, and only to record the names and prayers of Jewish and Christian pilgrims to Sinai; the rude manner in which they are exhibited, may well be supposed to be such as belonged to the time when men first began to inscribe on rocks their abiding memorials. It only remains to add that among the inscriptions appear sometimes extremely rude figures of men and animals (camels, goats, &c.); some of which seem to be of the same date as the original characters, while others seem to belong to a more recent period. NINEVEH. NINEVEH, the mighty capital of the Assyrian empire, was a very extensive and populous city. Its walls were 100 feet in height, 60 miles in compass, with 1,500 towers, each 200 feet high. This "exceeding great city" having repented at the preaching of Jonah, its destruction was averted for a time; but relapsing into iniquity it was swept away, so that there are now but slight vestiges of it to be seen. The Assyrians grievously oppressed the Israelites, took Samaria, and carried the ten tribes into captivity, 2 Kings xvii. 5, 6; xviii. 10-13, 34; Ezra iv. 2. They took also all the fenced cities of Judah, and exacted a heavy tribute from the Jews. But the glory and the power of Assyria, and of its capital city, are departed; like that of the mighty host of Sennacherib, its king, when smitten, in a night, by an angel of the Lord. A Greek historian, who repeatedly alludes to an ancient prophecy concerning it, as known to the Ninevites, relates that the Assyrian |