CHAP. VI.

THE TOWER OF BABEL.

"First from the ancient world those giants came,
With many a vain exploit, though then renowned:
The builders next of Babel on the plain

Of Sennaar, and still, with vain design,
New Babels, had they wherewithal, would build."

MILTON.

"Oh! that my words were even now written down;
Oh! that they were engraven upon a table;
With a pen of iron upon lead,

That my words were sculptured on a rock for ever!"

Јов.

PETER JONES one Sabbath at church fastened his eyes on the ornament which crowned the canopy of the pulpit. It was the figure of a dove, with outstretched wings, bearing the olive branch or leaf. While meditating on the antiquity of this beautiful emblem of Peace, the thought started in his mind, "Where did the dove get that olive leaf?"

Science and probability had established in his mind the conviction that the Deluge did not cover the entire globe; while the universality of its traditionary memorial amongst all the nations of the earth was completely explained by the fact that mankind had diverged from a common centre. But however limited might be the area covered by the Deluge, it was associated in the mind of Peter Jones with the idea of a violent disrupting convulsion. The "fountains of the great deep" had been broken up, in conjunction with the incessant forty days' rain from heaven. Even had the waters slowly accumulated, they could not have risen above the highest hills without leaving,

after their abatement, traces of rushing violence, that had swept everything before it. For, at the present day, when a river is swollen by the floods of winter, and overflows its boundaries, bridges, houses, and trees are carried away; the great "ocean-streams" of the globe are perpetually transmitting to the sea masses of earth, stones, and other diluvial deposits; while the Mississippi tears up the gigantic trees on its banks, many of which, in floating downwards, fixing their points in the bed of the river, become "snags," perilous to navigation.

Peter Jones opened his Bible, and refreshed his memory. The dove had been sent twice out of the ark On its first aërial voyage of discovery it had found no rest for the sole of its foot, although its predecessor, the raven, is described as having continued on the wing, going "to and fro, until the waters were dried up from off the earth." But after the lapse of a week, the dove was again sent forth on its mission, and in the evening it returned," and lo! in her mouth was an olive leaf pluckt off. So Noah knew that the waters were abated from off the earth." The leaf, therefore, was not found floating, a vagrant fugitive, on the waste of waters. It had been "plucked off" from a tree, revealed by the retreating flood; and by this sign, Noah knew that" the waters were abated," and that the period for his release was nigh.

Turning to the description of the olive tree, Peter Jones found that severe cold was fatal to it, as it flourished only in warm and dry situations. Yet the general tradition points to the lofty Ararat, whose summit rises above the line of perpetual snow, as the site where the ark reposed after its wanderings. It is true that the Biblical record speaks in the plural, "the mountains of Ararat," and therefore Peter Jones

thought that he might, in this case, set the eastern tradition aside, and with it the remark of travellers, that the summit of the lofty Ararat, when seen from a given point, has an appearance remarkably like that of a slip. But on whatever portion of the mountain range the ark settled, the flood must have been remarkably tranquil in its operation, at least in some spots, when it spared the trees with their foliage. And if it left trees in leaf still standing, would it not also have spared so far the memorials erected by man, as to allow some pillar or stone to indicate the character of antediluvian art? or were the antediluvians mere dwellers in tents, or other habitations, so fragile that a torrent could effectually sweep them away, or a shower dissolve the unbaked bricks of which they were composed? Once more Peter Jones felt the necessity of recurring to "the law and the testimony."

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Reading the fourth chapter of Genesis, he felt angry with himself for having forgotten the memorable facts, that Jubal was "the father of all such as handle the harp and the organ;" while Tubalcain was an instructor of every artificer in brass and iron." Here, at a very early period indeed, was man in a highly civilized condition. The arts must have reached no insignificant amount of perfection, when already there were PROFESSIONS OF TRADES, requiring metallic tools" artificers in brass and iron;" while social condition could not have been so backward, when MUSIC had so early asserted her sovereign power, and the antediluvian bards, handling the harp and organ, charmed surrounding listeners. But another fact arrested the attention of Peter Jones. The brother of Jubal was Jabal; and he was "the father of such as dwell in tents, and of such as have cattle."

Now, Peter Jones was not altogether ignorant of the peculiar force of the oriental phraseology here employed. It had been explained to him from the pulpit that "the father of the everlasting age" meant the head, the source, the origin, or the creator, of a new age or era. which was to endure for ever; and this having been illustrated by examples, he at once comprehended that Jabal, who was said to be "the father of such as dwell in tents, and such as have cattle," was the progenitor, or the first exemplar, of wandering shepherds, moving over vast plains with their flocks. But as the fact of the primary dwelling in tents was so signalized, in what kind of habitations did men previously reside? After the expulsion from Paradise, had the human race contented themselves with the shelter of outspreading trees, or the security of caves? Peter Jones again looked into his Bible, and there he found it recorded that Cain, the eldest son of Adam, had builty a CITY, which he called after the name of his son Enoch.

The curiosity of Peter Jones was now excited to a high pitch; for he had some confused fragmentary notion that man had emerged from a comparatively rude to a highly civilized condition, passing through the various grades of hunter, shepherd, and agriculturist, until he founded states and erected cities. But here was evidence that the human race had inhabited houses before they dwelt in tents;—that they were congregated in cities before they had been dispersed over plains. How rapid must have been human progress, when the eldest son of him who was nude in Paradise had built a city! Tubalcain was the seventh in succession from Cain; and it is not said of him, as of his brothers, that he was the "FATHER" of those who used metallic tools. He is

merely described as being an instructor of every artificer in brass and iron;" and may, therefore, have only been pre-eminent in his art. Indeed, the three sons of Lamech were evidently all remarkable men —Jabal, the first nomade Shepherd; Jubal, the first constructor of musical instruments; and his stepbrother, Tubalcain, the great proficient in the metallic arts. The use of native copper and of iron was doubtless known before Tubalcain became renowned for his skill, and was sought as a master, whose instructions were essential to the youthful artist: but even granting that he, of whom it is not said he was the "father" of those who worked in metals, was nevertheless the discoverer of their application, still the eldest son of Adam must have had tools, made of polished bones, or even of flints, with which to build his "city." If it had been erected of wood, there must have been the means of felling trees, and transporting them to the site; if of stone, a knowledge or power of excavation, unless rude boulders were used; if of clay, some skill in construction. Moreover, some little knowledge of the arts of design is implied in the building of a city; and granting Cain's capital to have been but a clumsy combination of buildings, the whole of the descendants of Adam's first-born must have been remarkable for scientific application and mechanical ingenuity, when, at the seventh remove, we find that Music and the Arts were classed into professions, and constituted distinct branches of human pursuit or industry.

Therefore, thought Peter Jones, during the eighteen centuries of the antediluvian era, vast progress must have been made. Great cities must have been built; vast monuments erected; and these must have withstood the Flood more effectually than the olive tree,