hey were buried from five hundred to one thousand in a single large
vault, the corpses in some instances being thickly piled one upon
another, like a heap of slain.

[*] For a long while it puzzled me to know what could have
been done with the enormous quantities of rock that must
have been dug out of these vast caves; but I afterwards
discovered that it was for the most part built into the
walls and palaces of Kor, and also used to line the
reservoirs and sewers.--L. H. H.

Leo was of course intensely interested in this stupendous and unequalled
sight, which was, indeed, enough to awake all the imagination a man
had in him into the most active life. But to poor Job it did not
prove attractive. His nerves--already seriously shaken by what he had
undergone since we had arrived in this terrible country--were, as may
be imagined, still further disturbed by the spectacle of these masses of
departed humanity, whereof the forms still remained perfect before his
eyes, though their voices were for ever lost in the eternal silence of
the tomb. Nor was he comforted when old Billali, by way of soothing
his evident agitation, informed him that he should not be frightened of
these dead things, as he would soon be like them himself.

"There's a nice thing to say of a man, sir," he ejaculated, when I
translated this little remark; "but there, what can one expect of an old
man-eating savage? Not but what I dare say he's right," and Job sighed.

When we had finished inspecting the caves, we returned and had our
meal, for it was now past four in the afternoon, and we all--especially
Leo--needed some food and rest. At six o'clock we, together with Job,
waited on Ayesha, who set to work to terrify our poor servant still
further by showing him pictures on the pool of water in the font-like
vessel. She learnt from me that he was one of seventeen children, and
then bid him think of all his brothers and sisters, or as many of them
as he could, gathered together in his father's cottage. Then she told
him to look in the water, and there, reflected from its stilly surface,
was that dead scene of many years gone by, as it was recalled to our
retainer's brain. Some of the faces were clear enough, but some were
mere blurs and splotches, or with one feature grossly exaggerated; the
fact being that, in these instances, Job had been unable to recall
the exact appearances of the individuals, or remembered them only by a