The Susianic streams, along with the Nile, may not improperly be styled the oldest rivers of the globe, because of their place in its most ancient traditions and histories; and however subordinate to the gigantic currents of the western hemisphere, those of the eastern, in general, present higher points of interest, in their long-known identification with the destinies of mankind. If not the actual birthplace of man, the great plains on the banks of the Tigris and the Euphrates were the abode of the founders of the diluvian race. There, the two greatest cities of the ancient world—Nineveh and Babylon—rose into magnificence. There, a supernatural finger traced the doom of the latter upon the palace wall of its trembling monarch, while an exiled Jew, in the majesty of inspiration, gave him the interpretation of the mystic writing. There, too, the splendid empire of the Medes and Persians fell a prey to the Macedonian on the field of Arbela, while, in later ages, the same neighborhood witnessed the catastrophe of Cunaxa, and the bold bearing of the indomitable ten thousand—the defeat and death of Crassus—the retreat of Mark Antony—the fall of the apostate Julian—and the short-lived glory of Bagdad. How different the associations connected with the Arkansas and the Osage to those of the Euphrates and Tigris!
WERE I BUT WITH THEE.
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BY CAROLINE F. ORNE.
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Hours of lonely musing
Sometimes thou must have,
When, of toil a-weary,
Rest thy soul doth crave.