RUINS OF PERSEPOLIS. 
585 
by 22. On ascending the first flight, an irregular landing-place 
presents itself, of 37 feet by 44, from whence springs a second 
flight, formed of forty-eight steps, and covering 59 feet by 22. 
A couple of corresponding staircases terminate on the grand 
level of the platform, by a landing-place occupying 64 feet. I 
dropped a line from this upper landing-place to the lower one, 
and found the distance produced was 29 feet. As there cannot 
be a doubt that the present visible height of the platform is not 
much: more than half its original elevation from the plain, so 
the length of the flights of stairs from the plain must have been 
abridged in the same manner. The beauty and ease of the 
ascent which remains, will readily be understood, when I mention 
that I invariably rode my horse up and down them during my 
visits to their interesting summit. It struck me as a singular 
taste, to have made the only entrance to this vast space, not in 
the center of any one of its faces, but so much to the contrary, 
as to be 961 feet from the southern face, and 208 from the 
northern. 
On reaching the platform, the first objects that strike the 
astonished traveller, are the lofty sides of an enormous portal, 
(C). The interior faces of its walls are sculptured into the forms 
of two immense quadrupeds, which, on nearer approach, we 
found to represent a couple of colossal bulls. (Plate XXXI.) 
They look towards the west; their heads, chests, and fore-legs 
occupying almost the whole thickness of the walls in that 
direction, the rest of their bodies is left in relief. A kind of 
pedestal, formed of two blocks, elevates them five feet above the 
level of the platform. On the fine surface of the hewn stone, 
which forms the portal, and at a considerable height over the 
backs of the animals, are three small compartments, and all 
4 F 
VOL. i. 
