SHIRAZ TO FERSEPOLIS. 
131 
saw few marks of masonry on that exposure, and observed* that the 
base of that side of it was richly sculptured and ornamented. This 
front opens upon a square platform, on which no building appears to 
have been raised. But on the side opposite to the room which I have 
just mentioned, there is the same appearance of a corresponding apart¬ 
ment, although nothing but the bases of some small columns and the 
square of its floor attest it to have been such. The interval between 
these two rooms (on those angles which are the furthest distant from 
the grand front of the building) is filled up by the base of a sculpture 
similar to the bases of the two rooms; excepting that the centre of it 
is occupied by a small flight of steps. Behind, and contiguous to these 
ruins, are the remains of another square room, surrounded on all its 
sides by frames of doors and windows. On the floor are the bases of 
columns: from the order in which they appeared to me to have stood, 
they formed six rows, each of six columns. A staircase cut into an 
immense mass of rock (and from its small dimensions, probably the 
escalier dtrobk of the palace) leads into the lesser and enclosed plain 
below. Towards the plain are also three smaller rooms, or rather one 
room and the bases of two closets. Every thing on this part of the 
building indicates rooms of rest or retirement. 
• In the rear of the whole of these remains, are the beds of aqueducts 
which are cut into the solid rock. They met us in every part of the 
building; and are probably therefore as extensive in their course, as 
they are magnificent in construction. The great aqueduct is to be 
discovered among a confused heap of stones, not far behind the build¬ 
ings (which I have been describing) on this quarter of the palace, and 
almost adjoining to a ruined staircase. We descended into its bed, 
which in some places is cut ten feet into the rock. This bed leads East 
and West; to the Eastward its descent is rapid about twenty-five paces; 
it there narrows, so that we could only crawl through it; and again it 
enlarges, so that a man of common height may stand upright in it. It 
terminates by an abrupt rock. 
s 2 
