In the end, however, we made the plunge, and scrambled up over the
rubble into the gaping embrasure. The floor beyond was of great slate
slabs, and seemed to form the outlet of a long, high corridor with
sculptured walls. Observing the many inner archways which led off from it, and realizing
the probable complexity of the nest of apartments within, we decided
that we must begin our system of hare-and-hound trail blazing. Hitherto
our compasses, together with frequent glimpses of the vast mountain
range between the towers in our rear, had been enough to prevent our
losing our way; but from now on, the artificial substitute would be
necessary. Accordingly we reduced our extra paper to shreds of suitable size,
placed these in a bag to be carried by Danforth, and prepared to use
them as economically as safety would allow. This method would probably
gain us immunity from straying, since there did not appear to be any
strong air currents inside the primordial masonry. If such should
develop, or if our paper supply should give out, we could of course
fall back on the more secure though more tedious and retarding method
of rock chipping. Just how extensive a territory we had opened up, it was impossible
to guess without a trial. The close and frequent connection of the
different buildings made it likely that we might cross from one to
another on bridges underneath the ice, except where impeded by local
collapses and geologic rifts, for very little glaciation seemed to have
entered the massive constructions. Almost all the areas of transparent ice had revealed the submerged
windows as tightly shuttered, as if the town had been left in that
uniform state until the glacial sheet came to crystallize the lower
part for all succeeding time. Indeed, one gained a curious impression
that this place had been deliberately closed and deserted in some dim,
bygone æon, rather than overwhelmed by any sudden calamity or even
gradual decay. Had the coming of the ice been foreseen, and had a
nameless population left _en masse_ to seek a less doomed abode? The precise physiographic conditions attending the formation of the
ice sheet at this point would have to wait for later solution. It had
not, very plainly, been a grinding drive. Perhaps the pressure of
accumulated snows had been responsible, and perhaps some flood from
the river, or from the bursting of some ancient glacial dam in the
great range, had helped to create the special state now observable. Imagination could conceive almost anything in connection with this
place. VI. It would be cumbrous to give a detailed, consecutive account of
our wanderings inside that cavernous, æon-dead honeycomb of primal
masonry--that monstrous lair of elder secrets which now echoed for the
first time, after uncounted epochs, to the tread of human feet. This is especially true because so much of the horrible drama and
revelation came from a mere study of the omnipresent mural carvings. Our flash-light photographs of those carvings will do much toward
proving the truth of what we are now disclosing, and it is lamentable
that we had not a larger film supply with us. As it was, we made crude
notebook sketches of certain salient features after all our films were
used up. The building which we had entered was one of great size and
elaborateness, and gave us an impressive notion of the architecture of
that nameless geologic past. The inner partitions were less massive
than the outer walls, but on the lower levels were excellently
preserved. Labyrinthine complexity, involving curiously irregular
differences in floor levels, characterized the entire arrangement; and
we should certainly have been lost at the very outset but for the trail
of torn paper left behind us. We decided to explore the more decrepit upper parts first of all, hence
climbed aloft in the maze for a distance of some one hundred feet, to
where the topmost tier of chambers yawned snowily and ruinously open to
the polar sky. Ascent was effected over the steep, transversely ribbed
stone ramps or inclined planes which everywhere served in lieu of
stairs. The rooms we encountered were of all imaginable shapes and proportions,
ranging from five-pointed stars to triangles and perfect cubes. It
might be safe to say that their general average was about 30 x 30 feet
in floor area, and twenty feet in height, though many larger apartments
existed. After thoroughly examining the upper regions and the glacial level
we descended, story by story, into the submerged part, where indeed
we soon saw we were in a continuous maze of connected chambers and
passages probably leading over unlimited areas outside this particular
building. The Cyclopean massiveness and giganticism of everything about us became
curiously oppressive; and there was something vaguely but deeply
unhuman in all the contours, dimensions, proportions, decorations, and
constructional nuances of the blasphemously archaic stonework. We soon
realized, from what the carvings revealed, that this monstrous city was
many million years old. We cannot yet explain the engineering principles used in the anomalous
balancing and adjustment of the vast rock masses, though the function
of the arch was clearly much relied on. The rooms we visited were
wholly bare of all portable contents, a circumstance which sustained
our belief in the city's deliberate desertion. The prime decorative
feature was the almost universal system of mural sculpture, which
tended to run in continuous horizontal bands three feet wide and
arranged from floor to ceiling in alternation with bands of equal width
given over to geometrical arabesques. There were exceptions to this rule of arrangement, but its
preponderance was overwhelming. Often, however, a series of smooth
cartouches containing oddly patterned groups of dots would be sunk
along one of the arabesque bands. *       *       *       *       *

The technique, we soon saw, was mature, accomplished, and æsthetically
evolved to the highest degree of civilized mastery, though utterly
alien in every detail to any known art tradition of the human race. In delicacy of execution no sculpture I have ever seen could approach
it. The minutest details of elaborate vegetation, or of animal life,
were rendered with astonishing vividness despite the bold scale of the
carvings; whilst the conventional designs were marvels of skillful
intricacy. The arabesques displayed a profound use of mathematical principles, and
were made up of obscurely symmetrical curves and angles based on the
quantity of five. The pictorial bands followed a highly formalized tradition, and
involved a peculiar treatment of perspective, but had an artistic force
that moved us profoundly notwithstanding the intervening gulf of vast
geologic periods. Their method of design hinged on a singular juxtaposition of the cross
section with the two-dimensional silhouette, and embodied an analytical
psychology beyond that of any known race of antiquity.