but their beauty filled us with amazement.
Incomparably the most wonderful is the temple, builded upon the summit of a great rounded rock in almost the very center of the city. It was as though we had been transported back to "the glory that was Greece." Yes, it is my belief, and the belief of Rhodes also, that this temple would not have suffered could it by some miracle have been placed beside the celebrated temple of Diana at Ephesus. Buildings more wonderful than this we were to see, the grandest of all the great temple in Nornawnla Prendella, the Golden City, which is the capital of Drome; but I do not think that anything we saw afterward struck us with greater wonder and amazement.
"Some Chersiphron," said Rhodes, "must have wandered from Drome and finally made his way up into ancient Greece and taught the secrets of his art there. It is indeed a marvel that the art of the ancient Hellenes and this of Drome are so very similar. And yet they must have been autochthonous.
"But," he added, "I wonder what they worship in that Splendid place. Some horrible pantheon, perhaps."
"Let us," said I, "give them the benefit of the doubt. For all we know to the contrary, these Dromans may be true monotheists."
And this, I rejoice to say, the Dromans are—though, I regret to subjoin, there are some very absurd things in their religion, things dark and even things terrible.
But I anticipate in this, for it was just after we landed that it happened.
We had started up one of the principal streets, on our way to the house of a high functionary—though, of course, Rhodes and I had no idea whither we were bound. On each side the street was a solid mass of humanity—many of the young people, by the way, having hair as white as snow, like that of our Delphis. Of a sudden a man, lean of visage and with eyes that glowed like red coals, broke through the guards (a half-dozen or so were marching along on either side of our little procession) and slashed savagely at the face of Rhodes with a great curved dagger. Rhodes sprang aside, almost thrusting me onto my knees, and the next instant he dealt the man a blow with his alpenstock. The blow, however, was a slanting one, ineffectual. With a scream, the fellow sprang again, his terrible knife upraised; but the guards threw themselves upon him, and he was dragged off, struggling and screaming like a maniac.
Of a truth, Rhodes had had a narrow escape. And what did it mean?
"It must have been the act of a madman," I said.
"It might have been," was Milton's answer. "But unless I am greatly mistaken, there was something besides madness back of it."
Chapter 39
The Golden City
Our stay in that place was marred by no other untoward incident; but right glad was I when, on the following morning, we were in our boat and going down the stream once more.
"We ought to be safe out here," I remarked at last.
"I don't know about that, Bill," smiled Milton. "The stream is not a wide one, certainly, and those bushes and trees that line the bank offer—look at that!"
But a hundred feet or so before us, a boat was gliding out from the concealment of a mass of foliage. There were three men in it, and the looks which they fixed upon us were lowering and sinister.
