[Illustration:  Plate 27]

There is reason to believe that two other animals, which have now altogether disappeared from the country, inhabited at least some parts of Assyria during its flourishing period.  One of these is the wild bull-often represented on the bas-reliefs as a beast of chase, and perhaps mentioned as such in the inscriptions.  This animal, which is sometimes depicted as en-gaged in a contest with the lion, must have been of vast strength and boldness.  It is often hunted by the king, and appears to have been considered nearly as noble an object of pursuit as the lion.  We may presume, from the practice in the adjoining country, Palestine, 96 that the flesh was eaten as food.

[Illustration:  Plate 28]

The other animal, once indigenous, but which has now disappeared, was called by the Assyrians the mithin, and is thought to have been the tiger.  Tigers are not now found nearer to Assyria than the country south of the Caspian, Ghilan, and Mazanderan; but as there is no conceivable reason why they should not inhabit Mesopotamia, and as the mithin is constantly joined with the lion, as if it were a beast of the same kind, and of nearly equal strength and courage, we may fairly conjecture that the tiger is the animal intended.  If this seem too bold a theory, we must regard the mithin as the larger leopard, an animal of considerable strength and ferocity, which, as well as the hunting leopard, is still found in the country. [Plate XXVI., Fig. 2.]

The birds at present frequenting Assyria are chiefly the following:  the bustard (which is of two kinds—­the great and the middle-sized), the egret, the crane, the stork, the pelican, the flamingo, the red partridge, the black partridge or francolin, the parrot, the Seleucian thrush (Turdus Seleucus), the vulture, the falcon or hunting hawk, the owl, the wild swan, the bramin goose, the ordinary wild goose, the wild duck, the teal, the tern, the sand-grouse, the turtle dove, the nightingale, the jay, the plover, and the snipe.  There is also a large kite or eagle, called “agab,” or “the butcher,” by the Arabs, which is greatly dreaded by fowlers, as it will attack and kill the falcon no less than other birds.

We have little information as to which of these birds frequented the country in ancient times.  The Assyrian artists are not happy in their delineation of the feathered tribe; and though several forms of birds are represented upon the sculptures of Sargon and elsewhere, there are but three which any writer has ventured to identify—­the vulture, the ostrich, and the partridge.  The vulture is commonly represented flying in the air, in attendance upon the march and the battle—­sometimes devouring, as he flies, the entrails of one of Assyria’s enemies.  Occasionally he appears upon the battle-field, perched upon the bodies of the slain, and pecking at their eyes or their vitals. [Plate XXVIII.,