PISTHETAERUS. That's good news.

MESSENGER. 'Tis a most beautiful, a most magnificent work of art. The
wall is so broad, that Proxenides, the Braggartian, and Theogenes could
pass each other in their chariots, even if they were drawn by steeds as
big as the Trojan horse.

PISTHETAERUS. 'Tis wonderful!

MESSENGER. Its length is one hundred stadia; I measured it myself.

PISTHETAERUS. A decent length, by Posidon! And who built such a wall?

MESSENGER. Birds--birds only; they had neither Egyptian brickmaker, nor
stonemason, nor carpenter; the birds did it all themselves, I could
hardly believe my eyes. Thirty thousand cranes came from Libya with a
supply of stones,[313] intended for the foundations. The water-rails
chiselled them with their beaks. Ten thousand storks were busy making
bricks; plovers and other water fowl carried water into the air.

PISTHETAERUS. And who carried the mortar?

MESSENGER. Herons, in hods.

PISTHETAERUS. But how could they put the mortar into hods?

MESSENGER. Oh! 'twas a truly clever invention; the geese used their feet
like spades; they buried them in the pile of mortar and then emptied them
into the hods.