his servants, and his princes, and his officers." The historian thus makes the melancholy train pass before us, in which we specially single out for pity the venerable old Jewess, weeping over her son decrowned and doomed to exile. We fancy it is some alleviation to her that she is to accompany him. Warriors too, in large numbers, (there were seven thousand of them,) according to the Book of Chronicles, swelled the procession of captives; craftsmen and smiths also, on the same authority, amounting to a thousand, ac companied their brethren; perhaps specially included by Nebuchadnezzar, with an eye to the progress of the works going on in his new city. Zedekiah, the uncle of Jehoiachin, was placed on the throne by the conqueror, to serve him, of course, as his liege lord. But he rebelled-encouraged to do so by the king of Egypt. This was in the year 588. Nebuchadnezzar, accordingly, again marched against Jerusalem and besieged it. An Egyptian army came to its succor. These allies, however, were repelled by the hosts of SIEGE OF JERUSALEM BY THE ASSYRIANS. Babylon, who, immediately after chastising them, returned to the siege. : In connection with this fresh calamity, we have graphic details in the biblical annals. "The city was besieged unto the eleventh year of king Zedekiah. And on the ninth day of the fourth month the famine prevailed in the city, and there was no bread for the people of the land. And the city was broken up, and all the men of war fled by night by the way of the gate between two walls, which is by the king's garden: (now the Chaldees were against the city round about:) and the king went the way toward the plain. And the army of the Chaldees pursued after the king, and overtook him in the plains of Jericho and all his army were scattered from him. So they took the king, and brought him up to the king of Babylon to Riblah." What a series of stirring pictures pass before us as we ponder these few strong graphic words! Famine in the city-no bread-men, women, and children pinched with hunger-their countenances thin and pallid, and their bodies wasting away with disease and want. Anxious inquiries are heard in the streets: "How long will the siege last?" while despair, and tears, and death lurk within doors. The child is breathing its last in its mother's bony arms, or she is lifeless with her little one on her cold breast. Then there is the hurried night escape; the old gate; the walls by the king's garden; palace-like houses; trees mapped in shadow under the bright stars; and the monarch and his men creeping stealthily along, and going round to avoid being seen by the sentinels of the Assyrian camp. And then we have the surprise, perhaps in the morning, the fugitives pursued, and, fleeing from the face of the brave soldiers of Babylon, hiding in clefts of the rocks and concealing themselves among trees on the Mount of Olives; the poor miserable monarch in the mean time captured and dragged in chains to Riblah, to receive upon his neck the foot of his enraged master. And then, to finish the military drama, his eyes are put out, and his sons are slain. We think, involuntarily, while all this is going on, of one holy man within the walls, who weeps day and night for the slain of the daughter of his people. The destruction of the temple and city speedily followed. Nebuzar-adan, the Babylonish general, "burnt the house of the Lord, and the king's house, and all the houses of Jerusalem, and every great man's house burnt he with fire; and the army brake down the walls." All who remained of any account, after these sanguinary measures, were carried off by the conquerors; and only a few poor vinedressers and husbandmen were left scattered over the land, to sit and mourn over the desolations, and to gather a scanty subsistence from the fields and vineyards which war had spared. Such was the third grand deportation, signalized, too, by the abundance of spoil which was conveyed to Babylon; for it was on this occasion that the golden vessels of the temple, and the pillars and ornaments of brass, and even the great brazen laver itself, were piled up and carried off. As to the siege of Jerusalem, we may gather illustrations of it from Ninevitish sculptures, Babylonish coins, and Egyptian monuments, in which we have abundantly represented the common oriental methods of fortification and modes of attack prevalent in those days. We see battlemented walls and towers, with parapets, crowded with men, bow and spear and shield in hand, while a banner crowns the lofty keep. We have barred gates and fosses both without and within the walls, filled with water and crossed by bridges. Then we notice the assailants placing their scaling ladders against the fortifications, and some swimming over the ditch, to be met by a party sallying from the gates. The besiegers are provided with large shields to ward off the missiles shot from the walls. There are also testudos-large frames to cover and protect the advancing soldiers. Battering rams are also employed. Men may be seen climbing up rocks by the aid of metal spikes; doors are being hewn down with axes; while heralds are seen coming out to treat with the enemy. The brief notice in the Bible of the fall of Jerusalem, under the army of Nebuchadnezzar, when read in the light of these curious military antiquities, suggests to us some such picture of engineering tactics, of strife and violence, of battle and death, as must really have constituted the scene of misery and desolation at that awful period in Jewish history. In our next we shall notice the location and condition of the captives. (To be continued.) A LUNATIC ASYLUM, BLACKWELL'S ISLAND. MONG the many public buildings testifying to the greatness and benevolence of the city of New-York, there is none to which she can point with a juster pride than to her Lunatic Asylum on Blackwell's Island, a representation of which is given above. This noble edifice, commenced in 1835, was completed in July, 1839, at a cost of about half a million of dollars. The material is of the common blue building stone taken from the quarries of the island. The plan, as may be seen above, is that of a main octagonal building, eighty feet in diameter, with two wings two hundred and forty-five feet each in length running from it at right angles westerly and southerly. The height of the octagon and cupola is seventy-two feet, and that of the wings forty-three feet-the latter are occupied by lunatics, the former mostly by the officers of the institution. In each wing upon each of the three floors is a corridor, ten feet wide, running the entire length of the wing, opening into which, on either side, are the rooms for the patients, bathing, dining-rooms, &c. Croton water is distributed to all parts of the building, being carried from the main shore by means of a gutta percha pipe laid in the bed of the river. The heating, washing, and culinary arrangements are | located at the extremity of the western wing. It is in contemplation to erect a separate building adjacent to the main one, to be devoted especially to these objects. The substitution lately effected of hired and responsible persons, instead of prisoners transferred from the penitentiary and workhouse, to do the necessary in and out door labor of the institution, and to attend to the patients, as had previously been the system, is one, the good effects of which are already strongly marked in the better order, better care, and higher moral tone that now obtain throughout the institution. At the distance of about one hundred and fifty feet from the main building stands "the Lodge," a building fifty-nine by ninety feet, with a veranda on either side of ten by eighty-seven feet, inclosed by glass. In this building are placed all patients of a noisy, violent, or unmanageable character, who, as they improve, are transferred to the different halls in the main building, regard being had to a proper classification. The asylum, a branch of the alms-house department, under the control of the "ten governors," has been for the last nine years under the immediate medical superintendence of Dr. M. H. Ranney, who is aided in his duties by two assistant-physicians, Drs. Lansing and Smith. About six thousand patients have been admitted into this charity since 1839. During the term of office of the present resident physician, there have been received three thousand eight hundred and eighty-two insane persons, and one thousand eight hundred and twenty discharged recovered, showing the amount of recovery to be nearly fifty per cent. At present the inmates number six hundred, being a much larger number than in any other hospital for the insane in this country. Five-sixths of this number are foreigners. Much reliance is placed on medical treatment during the first year of the existence of insanity; but after that period, the principal hope of recovery is from moral treatment. This last consists mainly in the correction of improper habits, a healthy occupation of mind and body by properly selected labor, reading, and amusements, such as dancing, music, games, &c. To one who has drawn his ideas of a lunatic asylum from works of fiction, or from accounts of systems followed in such institutions years ago, it would be a matter of wonder to find among so large a number of insane as are here gathered together so few requiring confinement or restraint. In fact, it may be stated as a general rule, that the greater the personal liberty enjoyed, consistent with good judgment and safety to the patient, the more quiet, manageable, and orderly he will be. No healthier or more beautiful location for an asylum could have been chosen than the one occupied by the subject of our sketch. Good air, good drainage, easy access to the city, seclusion from the outside world, a flowing river on each side, enlivened by passing steamboats and white-winged sailing vessels, a surrounding country made picturesque by green woods and jutting river points and growing villages, render it all in this respect that could be desired. The same remark made by a celebrated engineer that lakes and rivers were made for canals, might be extended to Blackwell's Island, that it was made for the public institutions of New-York city. The city government is exceedingly fortunate in having at the head of this important institution, so capable and gentlemanly a superintendent as Dr. M. H. Ranney. NIGHT VIEWS FROM MY WINDOW. As LUNAR SCENERY. SI draw back the curtain, a flood of pale, silvery light streams into the quiet room where I take my post for a good portion of the night,-to me ever a period of the purest, the most peaceful, and, I may add, profitable enjoyment. And now the window is open, and there is nothing between me and heaven but the dark sky, and the brilliant moon and stars, the work of God's fingers, unobscured by a cloud. It is strange what a difference there is between an open and a closed window. When thus gazing upward, glasseven the clearest and the purest-always gives a sensation of restraint, more or less. You feel there is something material still between you and the boundless depths above, the mighty expanse into which you look, and where you would fain wander; but, that once removed, and an undefinable sense of liberty-freedom from all physical restraint-is experienced, and you may soar away at will. The mind becomes endowed, as it were, with an angelic power and desire, which, although it is for the present denied to the body, will, no doubt, be one day permitted to both to exercise far more fully than at present; such a sensation, possibly, as St. Paul experienced in anticipation when he "caught up to the third heavens," with feelings so strange that, as he avers, he could not tell whether he was "in the body or out of the body." was With a telescope for at once my guide and my bark, I launch forth through the silent night into the dark ocean of space above me. I strike out into the remotest regions of the universe-I transport myself at will to worlds whose light would never reach the retina of my eye, save through the wonderful instrument whose field it illumines. Thus prepared, then, I take my post, I keep my watch to-night. There is something at once soothing and exciting in this midnight, breathless stillness of the terrestrial world, and the calm, divine repose of the celestial regions, whither I am about to journey. The air is so still that the least sound becomes audible. I hear the midnight chime of the bells from the distant city; and now, as the sound dies away, the roar of the surf as it breaks with softened murmur, tossing its green waves and glittering spray in the clear moonlight upon the neighboring | find and appreciate the objects of interest shore but naught else, save now and then the gentle rustle of a withered leaf as it falls without, or the impatient chirrup of the little bird whose sleep I have disturbed in the clustering passion-flower that hangs in dark masses from the window. I direct my telescope to the heavens, and, passing it slowly from star to star, I at length fix it upon that bright moon, now in her first quarter. I apply my eye to the glass, and now-what do I see? It brings that beauteous globe so near that I am absolutely upon it; but what a strange metamorphosis! No one who has been accustomed to see it from the earth would recognize it. Like a face which appears beautiful at a distance, but is found full of wrinkles and imperfections when close to it; so our lovely satellite, whose beauty has lent inspiration to the poet's verse, and her charm to the painter's landscape, loses her perfections in a moment. She is no longer the soft, tender, liquid, silvery thing, whose familiar face we love, and whose beams we hail, whether breaking through the sea of clouds among which she sails, or whitening the gray ruin, or shining on the placid lake, or the waveless sea. No; I perceive a huge bright mass, full of holes, rents, and fissures; it is a strange-looking country, indeed, that we have arrived at a wonderful place, unlike anything we could have imagined, so different indeed from the expectations usually formed by those who (hearing of mountains and valleys in the moon) long to see them, that, to prevent disappointment, some explanation is necessary to enable such persons to understand what they see, and teach them what to look for and how to there. To such of our readers, then, as are unaccustomed to telescopic observation, I would say, there are a few obstacles in the way of appreciating lunar scenery which you must be prepared for beforehand. For instance, at the first moment your eye is applied to the telescope, (say, with a power of 120 upon it,) you will find yourself within two thousand miles only of the moon; in fact, you will see it precisely as you would if you were removed bodily and placed upon a planet separated from it by that interval: short, indeed, when compared with the actual distance of the moon from the earth, (two hundred and forty thousand miles,) or with other astronomical intervals, and yet still very considerable, as can easily be understood by thinking what a distance two thousand miles is with reference to any terrestrial object-it is, in fact, equal to a fourth part of the diameter of our globe, or one entire diameter of the moon from herself. At such a distance here, were a bird's-eye view possible, how little could be discerned! At this distance, indeed, it is plain no minute object could be seen; but yet it is astonishing how much is visible, and the general features of the lunar surface are at once quite perceptible to the practised eye. But there are three striking effects in particular which this proximity immediately produces. The first is increase of brightness, as when a lamp or candle is brought close to the eye. The second is increase of size, or the angle subtended at the eye; and the third, distinctness of shape, both as to the general figure of the moon herself, and the objects discernible upon her surface. The first |