13th May



A startling discovery this morning.

By landing higher up the river we explored a part of the city where
the buildings are of a different character from those we saw
yesterday. Nofuhl considers them the dwellings of the rich. In shape
they are like bricks set on end, all very similar, uninteresting, and
monotonous.

We noticed one where the doors and shutters were still in place, but
rotting from the fantastic hinges that supported them. A few hard
blows brought down the outer doors in a dusty heap, and as we stepped
upon the marble floor within our eyes met an unexpected sight.
Furniture, statues, dingy pictures in crumbling frames, images in
bronze and silver, mirrors, curtains, all were there, but in every
condition of decay. We knocked open the iron shutters and let the
light into the rooms sealed up for centuries. In the first one lay a
rug from Persia! Faded, moth-eaten, gone in places, it seemed to ask
us with dying eyes to be taken hence. My heart grew soft over the
ancient rug, and I caught a foolish look in Lev-el-Hedyd's eye.

As we climbed the mouldering stair to the floor above I expressed
surprise that cloth and woodwork should hold together for so many
centuries, also saying: