Perrysburg journal. (Perrysburg, Wood Co., O. [Ohio]) 186?-1965, 1875-01-01

wine-presses are empty and unused.
Here, in this fair garden, are the mighty
cities fit for habitation and the use of
men, yet given over to silence and DESC
lation.
Here are the towns, with their massive
walls for protection; their well-paved
streets with not q stone displaced their
long ranges of lofty-arched cisterns,
magnificent temples, beautiful theaters
and numberless houses of stone, whose
walls and ceilings, perfect and uninjured
as when last viewed by their architects,
stand unmarried by the hand of destroy
ing time.
These houses are built of black basalt,
hard as iron and hewn in large slabs or
square blocks, which are laid one upon
another-no lime or cement being used
They are often five feet thick and In
their massiveness have stood firm for ages.
The roofs are formed of the same stone
in large slabs regularly and closely
ointed together, and where the room be-
meath is of large proportions an arch
gives helping support. These slabs
often measure twelve feet in length
eighteen inches in width and six inches
in thickness. The ends rest on plain
stone cornice, which projects about a
foot from each side-wall The doors are
solid blocks of stone four feet wide, four
and half high and eight inches through,
and hang upon "pivots formed of pro.
jecting parts of the slab, which work in
sockets in the Intel and threshold"
Though they are ponderous they open
with ease and can be fastened with stone
bolts.
In these houses are several rooms; and
often, passing from one to another,
flight of stairs will lead you to one more
lofty and grand in its proportions
twenty-five feet square and twenty high.
In this room the doors are of finer work
manship, and even the window. blinds,
which everywhere are fashioned like
them, and swing open on stone hinges,
also are graced with carvings. These
large apartments must have been ban
quet-halls; and through their doorways,
many of which would easily admit a
camel, have passed the colossal guests.
What voices must have rung through
these chambers-laughter that would al
most have made these strong walls trem-
blel The dwellings are only a story
high; and in their courts are fountains
and reservoirs that might still well serve
the purposes for which they were built.
Arabian, Greek and Roman, and the
enormous Enim, have each in their turn
been master over these habitations, and,
departing, left behind them character
istics of their tastes and art.
A Roman temple rises by the side of
the simple but massive stone dwellings
of the first inhabitants-the latter unal-
tered by decay the former shattered, and
in its grand beauty all but fallen to
earth. The Roman power passing away,
the Greek conquers the land, and, dedi-
eating the temple to st. George, over a
beautiful sculptured doorway carves in
stone the record of that deed.
Again Islaim takes possession and
writes in glowing letters on the temples
wall: There is no God but God, and
Mohammed is the Prophet of God"
Spacious Roman arches form the gate
ways through the solid walls reared by
giant labor, and give unmolested ac-
cess now where entrance once was
haughtily denied all strangers. Five CEN
turies have passed since the last dwellers
in these walled towns vanished, and
since that time no human being has
made within them his home. Through
all these ages the stony streets, the inde-
structible houses and the temples have
slept in solitude and silence.
She that hath made the strength of towers her
trust,
Weeps by her dead, supremely desolatc.
Long streets, with vacant dwellings on
either side, and only the shadows of a
majestic past abiding in them. And a
silence over all, where once echoed the
mighty footsteps-a silence broken only
by the wing-beat of lone bird, of the
prowling step of fox and jackal, as they
walk up the well-paved streets into the
very heart of the cities.
Homes we'll built. that would accom-
modate many thousands of people, wait:
but only the brambles festoon their walls
and enter into their doorWays; only a
tree-bough bends out through the open
window And the wild vines clasp grace
full columns and illuminate in emerald
tracings the carvings OF Grecian artists.
Lichens, green and gray, wander in
blindness over Latin inscriptions-seek-
ing, by the sense of touch, to read the
eloquent words of a language that is
now like the walls on which it is written,
only the monument of olden glories.
Now and then flying Bedouins seek
shelter and rest for the night in these
stony mansions; but with the smorning
they are gone, and foxes in their place,
hungrily seek for some morsel they may
have left.
Here every prospect pleases, and only
man is wanting to bring life and action
into these habitations.
But curse rests on the land, and forti
fed towns and colossal architecture are
unused and uninjured through the swift
flight of many centuries. And about
stand as witnesses
The everlasting mountains, who seem to say,
am - and / shall never pass away.
=" r. W. r." in Chicago Tribune.