their dates recent, and their black
inscriptions glossy in the hardly dried lettering-ink. Beyond the
graveyard, out in the fields, I saw, in one spot hard by where the
fruited boughs of a young orchard had been torn down, the still
smoldering embers of a barbecue fire that had been constructed of rails
from the fencing around it. It was the latest sign of life there. Fields
upon fields of heavy-headed grain lay rotting ungathered upon the
ground. No one was at hand to take in their rich harvest. As far as the
eye could reach, they stretched away--they, sleeping too in the hazy air
of autumn.

Only two portions of the city seemed to suggest the import of this
mysterious solitude. In the southern suburb the houses looking out upon
the country showed, by their splintered woodwork and walls battered to
the foundation, that they had lately been the mark of a destructive
cannonade. And in and around the splendid temple, which had been the
chief object of my admiration, armed men were barracked, surrounded by
their stacks of musketry and pieces of heavy ordnance. These challenged
me to render an account of myself, and to tell the reason why I had had
the temerity to cross the water without a written permit from a leader
of their band.

Though these men were generally more or less under the influence of
ardent spirits, after I had explained myself as a passing stranger they
seemed anxious to gain my good opinion. They told me the story of the
"dead city": that it had been a notable manufacturing and commercial
mart, sheltering over twenty thousand persons; that they had waged war
with its inhabitants for several years, and had been finally successful
only a few days before my visit, in an action fought in the ruined
suburb; after which, they had driven them forth at the point of the
sword. The defence, they said, had been obstinate, but gave way on the
third day's bombardment.

They also conducted me inside the massive sculptured walls of the
curious temple, in which they said the banished inhabitants were
accustomed to celebrate the mystic rites of an unhallowed worship. They
particularly pointed out to me certain features of the building, which,
having been the peculiar objects of a former superstitious regard, they
had as matter of duty sedulously defiled and defaced. The reputed sites
of certain shrines they had thus particularly noticed, and various
sheltered chambers, in one of which was a deep well constructed, they