p that courtyard wall and drag you with me."

Unsheathing our swords, as an object lesson to the soldiers, we followed
our guide to the blind end of a long passage, which apparently gave
entrance only to a small stone chamber. Following the soldier and
muleteer, who were now carrying our shields and telescope, we crowded
into this and waited. Presently the entire chamber, operated in some
unseen manner, turned slowly half way round, so that its door now gave
entrance directly to a vast but gloomy and tomb-like audience chamber,
where we were evidently expected.

Upon a massive throne of richly-chiselled stone a youth of scarcely more
than five-and-twenty years (if judged by earthly standards) sat
gorgeously arrayed in vestments of richly coloured feathers, woven
skilfully into the meshes of coarse cloth. Longer plumes of changeable
colours radiated from a wide collar which he wore, covering his breast
and back, and extending over his shoulders. The peach-blow of his fair
cheeks was partly hidden by a heavy false beard, plaited into stubby
braids, which hung to an even line a little below the chin. His own
soft, flaxen hair peeped meekly out from under a wig of tightly curled
grey strands, cropped all round to a level with the beard. His feet and
arms were bare, except for thin ribbons of downy, purple feathers, which
circled the wrists and ankles. No crown was on his head, but among the
stringy wig-curls the sinuous body of an asp bent in and out, and the
curved neck and threatening head surmounted his clear brow.

To his right, round an oval table of highly polished stone, sat twelve
wrinkled men, not one of whom but had seen three times his years. They
wore their own white beards, unplaited, and their feather clothing was
less elaborate and of simple grey, like the plumage of the Terror-bird.

Our soldier placed his right hand upon his cheek, and inclined his head
slightly forward and to the right, as a salutation to the ruler, and,
leaving the woman standing by me, he and the muleteer retired. She
seemed neither surprised at, nor accustomed to, these surroundings. She
made no salutation or obeisance to the ruler or to the old men, and they
made none to her. Withdrawing her hand from mine, she stretched it
toward them, as she had toward the commonest man outside. They paid her
no attention, but the oldest of the men signalled to an attendant, who
led her back and placed her hand in mine again. That soldiers and
cou