quarried, by Israelite workmen;[1464] but all the delicate work, whether in the one material or the other, was performed by the servants of Hiram.  Stone-cutters from Gebal (Byblus) shaped and smoothed the “great stones, costly stones” employed in the substructions of the “house;"[1465] Tyrian carpenters planed and polished the cedar planks used for the walls, and covered them with representations of cherubs and palms and gourds and opening flowers.[1466] The metallurgists of Sidon probably supplied the cherubic figures in the inner sanctuary,[1467] as well as the castings for the doors,[1468] and the bulk of the sacred vessels.  The vail which separated between the “Holy Place” and the Holy of Holies—­a marvellous fabric of blue, and purple, and crimson, and white, with cherubim wrought thereon[1469]—­owed its beauty probably to Tyrian dyers and Tyrian workers in embroidery.  The master-workman lent by the Tyrian monarch to superintend the entire work—­an extraordinary and almost universal genius—­“skilful to work in gold and in silver, in brass, in iron, in stone, and in timber; in purple, in blue, in fine linen, and in crimson; also to grave any manner of graving"[1470]—­who bore the same name with the king,[1471] was the son of an Israelite mother, but boasted a Tyrian father,[1472] and was doubtless born and bred up at Tyre.  Under his special direction were cast in the valley of the Jordan, between Succoth and Zarthan,[1473] those wonderful pillars, known as Jachin and Boaz, which have already been described, and which seem to have had their counterparts in the sacred edifices both of Phoenicia and Cyprus.[1474] To him also is specially ascribed the “molten sea,” standing on twelve oxen,[1475] which was perhaps the most artistic of all the objects placed within the Temple circuit, as are also the lavers upon wheels,[1476] which, if less striking as works of art, were even more curious.

The partnership established between the two kingdoms in connection with the building and furnishing of the Jewish Temple, which lasted for seven years,[1477] was further continued for thirteen more[1478] in connection with the construction of Solomon’s palace.  This palace, like an Assyrian one, consisted of several distinct edifices.  “The chief was a long hall which, like the Temple, was encased in cedar; whence probably its name, ‘The House of the Forest of Lebanon.’  In front of it ran a pillared portico.  Between this portico and the palace itself was a cedar porch, sometimes called the Tower of David.  In this tower, apparently hung over the walls outside, were a thousand golden shields, which gave to the whole place the name of the Armoury.  With a splendour that outshone any like fortress, the tower with these golden targets glittered far off in the sunshine like the tall neck, as it was thought, of a beautiful bride, decked out, after the manner of the East, with strings of golden coins.  This porch was the gem and centre of the whole empire; and was so much thought of that a smaller