Stretching out before them, as though they
stood at the end of an elevated street and gazed
down on it, was a city--a large city, with streets,
houses, open squares, temples, statues, fountains,
dry for centuries--a buried and forgotten city--
a city in ruins--a city of the dead, now dry as
dust, but still a city, or, rather, the strangely
preserved remains of one.
"Look!" whispered Tom. A louder voice just then,
would have seemed a sacrilege. "Look!"
"Is it what we are looking for?" asked Ned in a low voice.
"I believe it is," replied the professor. "It is
the lost city of Kurzon, or one just like it. And
now if we can find the idol of gold our search will
be ended--at least the major part of it."
"Where did you expect to find the idol?" asked Tom.
"It should be in the main temple. Come, we
will walk in the ancient streets--streets where
no feet but ours have trod in many centuries.
Come!"
In eager silence they pressed on through this
newly discovered wonderland. For it was a
wonderful city, or had been. Though much of
it was in ruins, probably caused by an earthquake
or an eruption from a volcano, the central
portion, covered as it was by the overtoppling
mountains that formed the arching roof, was well
preserved.
There were rude but beautiful stone buildings.
There were archways; temples; public squares;
and images, not at all beautiful, for they seemed
to be of man-monsters--doubtless ancient gods.
There were smoothly paved streets; wondrously
carved fountains, some in ruins, all now as dry
as bone, but which must have been places of
beauty where youths and maidens gathered in
the ancient days.
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