GIANT URN CARVED FROM THE SOLID ROCK IN PETRA, THE STRANGE 

 LOST CITY OF THE ARABIAN DESERT 



The size of this urn, one hundred and sixty feet above the ground, crowning El Deir, is such that 



a horse and carriage could be driven around on its base. El Deir is gray in tone, contrasting 



with the fantastic color of most of Petra's mountains. (The general tint of the sandstone 



is a fine rich red, but the surface of the rock is veined with white, saffron, orange, 



vermilion, pink, crimson, and violet in endless variations, producing beautiful 



or bizarre effects.) El Deir, the most immense of Petra's rock-hewn 



monoliths, compares in size with the Abu Simbel in Egypt, or the 



Kailas Temple in India. We climbed to the urn by means of 



a vertical ladder of holes cut in the cliff 



