x in front of it.

At some little distance in front of the table stood the President's chair
(c), or I might almost call it throne. It was so placed that his back
would be turned towards the table, which fact again shews that the table
was not regarded as having any greater sanctity than the rest of the
temple.

Behind the table, the picture already spoken of was raised aloft. There
was no balloon; some clouds that hung about the lower part of the chariot
served to conceal the fact that the painter was uncertain whether it
ought to have wheels or no. The horses were without driver, and my
father thought that some one ought to have had them in hand, for they
were in far too excited a state to be left safely to themselves. They
had hardly any harness, but what little there was was enriched with gold
bosses. My mother was in Erewhonian costume, my father in European, but
he wore his clothes reversed. Both he and my mother seemed to be bowing
graciously to an unseen crowd beneath them, and in the distance, near the
bottom of the picture, was a fairly accurate representation of the
Sunch'ston new temple. High up, on the right hand, was a disc, raised
and gilt, to represent the sun; on it, in low relief, there was an
indication of a gorgeous palace, in which, no doubt, the sun was supposed
to live; though how they made it all out my father could not conceive.

On the right of the table there was a reliquary (b) of glass, much
adorned with gold, or more probably gilding, for gold was so scarce in
Erewhon that gilding would be as expensive as a thin plate of gold would
be in Europe: but there is no knowing. The reliquary was attached to a
portable stand some five feet high, and inside it was the relic already
referred to. The crowd was so great that my father could not get near
enough to see what it contained, but I may say here, that when, two days
later, circumstances compelled him to have a close look at it, he saw
that it consisted of about a dozen fine coprolites, deposited by some
antediluvian creature or creatures, which, whatever else they may have
been, were certainly not horses.

In the apse there were a few cross benches (G and H) on either side, with
an open space between them, which was partly occupied by the President's
seat already mentioned. Those on the right, as one looked towards the
apse, were for the Managers and Cashiers of the Bank, while those on the
left were for their wives and daughters.