my will, nine of our years[1]--more than thirty
of yours--were spent in the completion of this stupendous work.

[Footnote 1: Our year is not calculated like yours. The
year is marked by a peculiar appearance which the sun
assumes at equidistant epochs.]

The tower of itself is an object of great grandeur and beauty, and is
richly ornamented. The external walls of the plinth at the base of the
tower are overlaid with gold and ravine[1] metal, inlaid with large
transparent stones of varied colours. The ravine metal--a metal prized
beyond gold--possesses beautiful veins of colour, which change with the
temperature--veins of watery green, of purple, blue, and steel. When
refined, it is most beautiful. The colours are sometimes so bright that
it is dazzling to look at them.

[Footnote 1: So named from being found in the great
ravine, the largest ravine in Montalluyah.]

On the tower are scrolls and images of peculiar meaning, and of large
characters in gold and ravine metal, ornamented with transparent stones.
The sun's rays playing on these stones, and particularly on a large
yellow stone like an amethyst, illuminates the column with what may be
called a supernatural light.

Alternating with the scrolls are designs representing episodes in my
life and reign. These designs are in pure white marble in relief, and
with the light of our world stand out prominently from the iron-marble,
sufficiently large to be plainly seen at great distances from nearly all
parts of the city. The proposal for thus recording the events of my
reign came from the kings and people who loved me greatly.

As before observed, a person can be raised from the base to the top of
the column, and through a shaft into the Upper city. The movement is
rapid, and takes less than half an hour either way, whilst the journey
by our external roads, by reason of the circuits to be taken, and the
ascents and descents would, even to descend, occupy two days on a fleet
horse. The passage through the Tower, however, is seldom used either for
ascent or descent, except in cases of great emergency, because the great
difference of the atmosphere above and below materially affects the
health of the passenger.

The machinery, too, in the descent requires much care and calculation,
for the weight of the descending body would otherwise increase to such
an extent, that accidents would occur.

The difference of the atmosphere and the effect o