of such, feverishly
devouring walls, cornices, pillars, seemed to say:

"God! If we only had the smallest of these things, what a fortune that
would mean! What an incredible fortune!"

Each man, reacting under the overwhelming stimulus of this wonder
city, in his own expression betrayed the heart and soul within him.
And thus, each absorbed in his own thoughts and dreams, silently the
Legionaries pondered as they galloped through the enchanted streets.

Some fifteen minutes' riding, with no slackening of the pace and
always on an upward grade toward what seemed the central citadel of
Jannati Shahr, brought the party to an inner wall, forty feet high
and pierced by a triple-arched gate surmounted by a minaret of golden
lacery.

Through the center arch rode Bara Miyan, now reining into a canter.
The _imams_ and the Legionaries followed, and with them about fifty
of the Arabs, of superior rank. The rest drew rein outside, still in
complete silence.

The lessened cavalcade now found itself in what at first glance seemed
an enchanted garden. Not even a feeling of anxiety caused by the
silent closing of the hugely massive golden gates that, as they
passed through, immediately blocked the triple exit, could divert the
Legionaries' minds from the wondrous park confronting them.

Date and cocoa-palms with shadowy paths beneath them; clear rills with
bamboo thickets along their banks and with tangles of white myrtle,
red clouds of oleanders that diffused an almond perfume, delicate
hybiscus, and unknown flowers combined to weave a magic woof of
beauty, using the sifted sunlight for gold threads of warp.

Unseen water-wheels splashed coolly; vivid butterflies flickered
through masses of greenery among the acacia, mimosa, lote and mulberry
trees. And there were color-flashing parrots, too, a-wing and noisy
in the high branches; and apes that swung and chattered; and round the
high, golden walls of the citadel, half visible through the cloud of
green and party-colored foliage, whirls of pigeons, white as snow,
flicked against the gold.

The Legionaries were hard put to it to obey the Master's order never
to express surprise or admiration. But they kept silence, though their
eyes were busy; and presently through another smaller gate they all
clattered into a _hosh_, or court, facing what obviously must have
been the central citadel of Jannati Shahr.

Bara Miyan pulled sharply on the red, silver-broidered reins and
cut bac