Juniata sentinel and Republican. [volume] (Mifflintown, Juniata County, Pa.) 1873-1955, 1895-01-30

| cooling and refreshing for twelve centuries.
Ruins more suggestive than Melrose and
Kenflworth. Ceylonian karnaks and Luxors.
Ruins retaining much of grandeur, though
| wars bombarded them, and Time put his
i chisel on every block, and, more than all,
| vegetation put Its anchors and pries and
| wrenches In all the crevices. Dagobas, or
places where relics Of saints Of dieties are
kept-dae obas 400 feet high and their fallen
| material burying precious things, for the
sight of which modern curiosity has digged
/! and blasted in vain. Procession OF ele-
plants In imitation, wrought into lustrous
marble. Troops OF horses In iuil run.
Shrines, chapels, cathedrals wrecked on the
| mountain side, Stairs of moonstone. Ex-
quisite scrolls rolling up more mysteries
than will ever be unrolled. Over sixteen
square miles the ruins of ono city strewn.
Thronerooms on which at different times sat
l65 kings, resigning in authority they in
herited. Walls that witnessed coronntions,
assassinations, subiugations, triumphs. Al
tars at which millions bowed ages before the
orchestras celestial woke the sheperds with
midnight overture.
When Lieutenant Skinner in 1882 discov-
xed the site of some of these cities, he foun
cOngregated in them undisturbed ASSEM-
blages of leopards, porcupines, famin GOES
and pelicans; reptiles summing themselves
on the affairs, prima donnas rendering
archaeological chant from deserted music
halls. One king restored much OF the grand
eur, rebuilt 1900 residences, but ruin soon
resumed its scepter. But all IS down-the
spires down, the pillars down, the tablets
down, the glory OF splendid arches down.
What killed those cities? Who slew the New
York and London of the year 500 B. c.? Was
II unhealthed with a host OF plaques? Was
1t foreign armies laying seige? Was il whole
generations weakened by their own vices?
Mystery sits amid the monoliths and brick
dust, finger on lip in eternal silence, while
the centuries guess and guess in vain. We
simply know that genius planned those
cities, and immense populations inhabited
them. An eminent writer estimates that
pile of bricks in one ruin OF Ceylon would be
enough to build "A wall ten feet high from
Edinburgh to Lon ion. Sixieap hundred
pillars with carved capitals are standing
sentinel for ten miles.
You can Judge somewhat of the size OF the
cities by the reservoirs that were required
to SLACK their thirst. Judging the size of the
city from the size of the cup out of which it
drank. Cities crowded with inhabitants
not like American or English cities, but
packed together as only barbaric tribes can
pack them. But their knell was sounded,
their light went out. Giant trees are the
only royal family now occupying those
palaces. The growl of wild beasts where
once the guffaw Of wassail assembled. Anuraj-
anpura and Pollonarna will never be re-
builded. Let all the living cities OF tho
earth take warning. Cities are human, hav-
ing a time to be born and time to die. No
more certainly have they cradle than q
grave. last judgment is appointed for in-
dividuals, but cities have their last judg.
ment in this world. They bless, they curse,
they worship, they blaspheme. they suffer
hey are rewarded, they are overthrown.
Preposterous says some one, to think
that any OF our American or European cities
which have stood so long can ever come
through vice to extinction. But New York
and London have not stood as long as those
Ceylonese cities stood. Where Is the throne
outside OF Ceylon on which 165 successive
kings reigned for a lifetime. Cities and ma
tions that have lived far longer than our
present cities or nation have been sepul-
.hered. Let all the great municipalities OF
his and other lands ponder. 1t Is as true
now as when the psalmist wrote it and as
rue OF cities and nations as of individuals,
1.-THE Lord knoweth the way of the righ-
:eous, but the way OF the ungodly shall
oerish"