The legend which they bear shows that the quay was constructed by Nabonidus.
[PLATE XIII.] [Illustration: PLATE XIII.] Such then are the ruins of Babylon--the whole that can now with certainty be assigned to the "beauty of the Chaldees' excellency"-- the "great Babylon" of Nebuchadnezzar.

Within a space little more than three miles long and a mile and three quarters broad are contained all the undoubted remains of the greatest city of the old world.

These remains, however, do not serve in any way to define the ancient limits of the place.

They are surrounded on every side by nitrous soil, and by low heaps which it has not been thought worth while to excavate, but which the best judges assign to the same era as the great mounds, and believe to mark the sites of the lesser temples and the other public buildings of the ancient city.

Masses of this kind are most frequent to the north and east.