its base it had upheaved another buried base, laying bare a sort of cellar and a flight of stone steps descending into darkness.

"Into this excavation the sand was still running in tiny rivulets. Listening, I could hear it pattering far, far down into the shadows.

"Sitting there in the saddle, the thing explained itself as I looked. The fallen pillar had been built upon older ruins; all Egypt is that way, ruin founded on the ruin of ruins--like human hopes.

"The stone steps, descending into the shadow of remote ages, invited me. I dismounted, walked to the edge of the excavation, and, kneeling, peered downward. And I saw a wall and the lotus-carved rim of a vast stone-framed pool; and as I looked I heard the tinkle of water. For the pillar, falling, had unbottled the ancient spring, and now the stone-framed lagoon was slowly filling after its drought of centuries.

"There was light enough to see by, but, not knowing how far I might penetrate, I returned to my horse, pocketed matches and candles from the saddlebags, and, returning, started straight down the steps of stone.

"Fountain, wall, lagoon, steps, terraces half buried--all showed what the place had been: a water garden of ancient Egypt--probably royal--because, although I am not able to decipher hieroglyphics, I have heard somewhere that these picture inscriptions, when inclosed in a cartouch like this"

He drew rapidly: [Illustration: Glyph]

"or this" [Illustration: Glyph]

"indicate that the subject of the inscription was once a king.

"And on every wall, every column, I saw the insignia of ancient royalty, and I saw strange hawk-headed figures bearing symbols engraved on stone--beasts, birds, fishes, unknown signs and symbols; and everywhere the lotus carved in stone--the bud, the blossom half-inclosed, the perfect flower."His dreamy eyes met the gaze of the Tracer, unseeing; he rested his sunburned face between both palms, speaking in the same vague monotone: 

"Everywhere dust, ashes, decay, the death of life, the utter annihilation of the living--save only the sparkle of reborn waters slowly covering the baked bed of the stone-edged pool--strange, luminous water, lacking the vital sky tint, enameled with a film of dust, yet, for all that, quickening with imprisoned brilliancy like an opal."

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