Explorations in Bible lands during the 19th century - H. V. Hilprecht

DURING ID CENTURY : ASSYRIA AND BABYLONIA 279
guide and some workmen, and walked for a few days every
morning the three miles from the embankment of the canal
to the site of Tello. The large statue in dolerite discovered
and reburied by the French explorer had been exposed
again by the Arabs after De Sarzec's departure in the previous
year. It naturally attracted Rassam's attention first.
Having cleared it entirely, and taken a squeeze of its inscription
for the British Museum, he opened trenches in
different parts of the ruins. Antiquities were often found
almost directly below the surface. The verv first day he
came upon the remains of a temple [?] and discovered two
inscribed door sockets of Gudea at its entrance.
In another
place he unearthed a large number of unbaked clay tablets,
while still other trenches yielded several inscribed maceheads
in red granite, and many of those mushroom-shaped
clay objects {phalli) with the names of Ur-Bau and Gudea
upon them, in which the ruins of Tello abound. If Rassam
had continued his researches one day longer in the highest
mound and driven his trenches only two or three feet
deeper, he could not have missed those fine statues in dolerite
which now adorn the halls of the Louvre. But kismet
(fate) — to quote an Oriental phrase — was this time decidedly
against him. The threatening attitude of the Arabs
in the neighborhood, the inclemency of the weather, and
his own conscience, which told him that he was " carrying
on his work under false pretences," drove him away
from the ruins after three days' successful trial. He expected
to return later,
as soon as he had managed to obtain
the necessary permit from the Porte. But De Sarzec was
on the alert and quicker of action than Victor Place. While
Rassam was meditating and planning in Babylonia, the
French representative took decisive steps at Paris and Constantinople
which secured for his nation the much-coveted
ruins of Tello, and through them those priceless treasures
with which we have occupied ourselves in the previous
chapter.