Professor Haddock's style is remarkable for purity and correctness. His sentences are all finished sentences, never subject to an injurious verbal criticism, without a mistake of any kind, or a grammatical error.
We have not written of Dr. Haddock as a politician; but he is a thoroughly informed statesman, profoundly versed in public law, and familiar with all the policy and aims of the American government. He is of course a Whig. He has been educated, politically, in the school of his illustrious uncle, and probably no man living is more thoroughly acquainted with Mr. Webster's views, or more capable of their application in affairs. It is therefore eminently suitable that he should be on the list of our representatives abroad, while the foreign department is under Mr. Webster's administration. The Whig party in New Hampshire have not been insensible of Dr. Haddock's surpassing abilities, of his sagacity, or his merits. Could they have done so, they would have made him Governor, or a senator in Congress, on any of the occasions in many years in which such officers have been chosen. Considered without reference to party, we can think of no gentleman in the country who would be likely to represent the United States more worthily at foreign courts, or who by his capacities, suavity of manner, or honorable nature, would make a more pleasing and desirable impression upon the most highly cultivated society. Those who know him well will assent to the justness of a classification which places him in the same list of intellectual diplomats which embraces Bunsen, Guizot, and our own Everett, Irving, Bancroft and Marsh.
No. I.—WINGED HUMAN-HEADED BULL.
DR. LAYARD'S RECENT GIFTS FROM NIMROUD.
The researches of no antiquary or traveler in modern times have excited so profound an interest as those of Austen Henry Layard, who has summoned the kings and people of Nineveh through three thousand years to give their testimony against the skeptics of our age in support of the divine revelation. In a former number of The International we presented an original and very interesting letter from Dr. Layard himself, upon the nature and bearing of his discoveries. Since then he has sent to London, where they have arrived in safety, several of the most important sculptures described in his work republished here last year by Mr. Putnam. Among them are the massive and imposing statues of a human-headed bull and a human-headed lion, of which we have engravings in some of the London journals. The Illustrated London News describes these specimens of ancient art as follows:
"No. I. is the Human-Headed and Eagle-Winged Bull. This animal would seem to bear some analogy to the Egyptian sphynx, which represents the head of the King upon the body of the lion, and is held by some to be typical of the union of intellectual power with physical strength. The sphynx of the Egyptians, however, is invariably sitting, whereas the Nimroud figure is always represented standing. The apparent resemblance being so great, it is at least worthy of consideration whether the head on the winged animals of the Ninevites may not be that of the King, and the intention identical with that of the sphynx; though we think it more probable that there is no such connection, and that the intention of the Ninevites was to typify their god under the common emblems of intelligence, strength and swiftness, as signified by the additional attributes of the bird. The specimen immediately before us is of gypsum, and of colossal dimensions, the slab being ten feet square by two feet in thickness. It was situated at the entrance of a chamber, being built into the side of the door, so that one side and a front view only could be seen by the spectator. Accordingly, the Ninevite sculptor, in order to make both views perfect, has given the animal five legs. The four seen in the side view show the animal in the act of walking; while, to render the representation complete in the front view, he has repeated the right fore leg again, but in the act of standing motionless. The countenance is noble and benevolent in expression; the features are of true Persian type; he wears an egg-shaped cap, with three horns and a cord round the base of it. The hair at the back of the head has seven ranges of curls; and the beard, as in the portraits of the King, is divided into three ranges of curls, with intervals of wavy hair. In the ears, which are those of a bull, are pendent ear-rings. The whole of the dewlap is covered with tiers of curls, and four rows are continued beneath the ribs along the whole flank; on the back are six rows of curls, and upon the haunch a square bunch, ranged successively, and down the back of the thigh four rows. The hair at the end of the tail is curled like the beard, with intervals of wavy hair. The hair at the knee joints is likewise curled, terminating in the profile views of the limbs in a single curl of the kind (if we may use the term) called croche cœur. The elaborately sculptured wings extend over the back of the animal to the very verge of the slab. All the flat surface of the slab is covered with cuneiform inscription; there being twenty-two lines between the fore legs, twenty-one lines in the middle, nineteen lines between the hind legs, and forty-seven lines between the tail and the edge of the slab. The whole of this slab is unbroken, with the exception of the fore-feet, which arrived in a former importation, but which are now restored to their proper place.
