And as I walked in the dark along the amethyst precipice I suddenly
saw across it a curved white bridge. It was one ivory tusk. And I
knew it for the triumph of Singanee. I knew at once that this curved
mass of ivory that had been dragged by ropes to bridge the abyss was
the twin of the ivory gate that once Perdóndaris had, and had itself
been the destruction of that once famous city--towers and walls and
people. Already men had begun to hollow it and to carve human figures
life-size along its sides. I walked across it; and half way across,
at the bottom of the curve, I met a few of the carvers fast asleep. On
the opposite cliff by the palace lay the thickest end of the tusk and
I came down a ladder which leaned against the tusk for they had not
yet carved steps.

Outside the ivory palace it was as I had supposed and the sentry at
the gate slept heavily; and though I asked of him permission to enter
the palace he only muttered a blessing on Singanee and fell asleep
again. It was evident that he had been drinking bak. Inside the ivory
hall I met with servitors who told me that any stranger was welcome
there that night, because they extolled the triumph of Singanee. And
they offered me bak to drink to commemorate the splendour but I did
not know its power nor whether a little or much prevailed over a man
so I said that I was under an oath to a god to drink nothing
beautiful; and they asked me if he could not be appeased by a prayer,
and I said, "In nowise," and went towards the dance; and they
commiserated me and abused that god bitterly, thinking to please me
thereby, and then they fell to drinking bak to the glory of Singanee.
Outside the curtains that hung before the dance there stood a
chamberlain and when I told him that though a stranger there, yet I
was well known to Mung and Sish and Kib, the gods of Pegana, whose
signs I made, he bade me ample welcome. Therefore I questioned him