Layard’s early training was in the line of preparation for his life’s work.  Much of his boyhood was spent in Italy, where he acquired a taste for the fine arts, and as much knowledge of them as a child could obtain who was constantly in the society of artists and connoisseurs.  At about the age of sixteen he was sent to England to study the law, for which he was destined by his parents.  After six years in the office of a solicitor, and in the chambers of an eminent conveyancer,—­for that is the way that lawyers were educated then,—­he determined to leave England and seek a career elsewhere.  He had a relative in Ceylon, who gave him hopes of securing a position there, and for Ceylon he started.  A friend of his, ten years older, was bound for the same destination, both fond of adventure, and they agreed to go together, and to go as far as they could by land instead of taking the long sea journey around the Cape of Good Hope.  Across Europe they passed to Constantinople, through Austria, Dalmatia, Montenegro, Albania, and Bulgaria; thence across Asia Minor to Syria and Palestine; thence to Aleppo and down the Tigris to Baghdad.  It was an extraordinary and adventurous journey, often dangerous; but greater danger was to follow.  Layard had learned some Turkish, and now he spent the long weeks in Baghdad in the study of Persian; his companion was quite familiar with Arabic.  Before they left England they had received good advice from Sir John MacNeill, the British representative at the court of the Shah:  “You must either travel as important personages, with a retinue of servants and an adequate escort, or alone, as poor men, with nothing to excite the cupidity of the people amongst whom you will have to mix.  If you cannot afford to adopt the first course, you must take the latter.”  The latter they were forced to take.

Many a young man has the gift to acquire languages—­almost any Oriental can talk three or four—­and the ability to rough it and live on the fare of the people, though barbarous; and many a man has the spirit of adventure; but this young man had one peculiar and unusual qualification that directed him to his future career.  As a child, he had read the “Arabian Nights” with intense delight, with their stories centred about Baghdad.  Then every book of Eastern adventure, every bit of travel in Syria, Arabia, or Persia that he could find he had eagerly devoured.  It was his day and night’s longing that he might visit strange lands of history and make explorations and discoveries.  So wherever he was, he visited every ruin and tried to copy every inscription.  If his companion would not turn aside to visit some region of renown and danger, he would go alone and join him later.  As they came down the river Tigris in their boat, they passed the immense mound of Nimroud, and so impressed was Layard by it that he then, scarce twenty-three years old, resolved that some day he would search and learn what was hidden under it; but little did he imagine what wonderful monuments he was to find there only a few years later.