"Come, Rollo, I think we had better go along."
Rollo at once acceded to this proposal, and they both walked on. They soon found themselves passing out of the garden, though the space on each side of the broad alley in which they were walking was bordered with so many walls, palisades, terraces, statues, and columns, and the gateway which led out from the garden into the square was so broad, and was so filled up, moreover, with the people who were going and coming, that it was difficult to tell where the garden ended and the great square began. At length, however, it began to be plain that they were out of the garden; for the view, instead of being shut in by trees, became very widely extended on either hand. It was terminated on one side by ranges of magnificent buildings, and on the other by bridges leading across the river, with various grand and imposing edifices beyond. In the centre of the square the tall form of the obelisk towered high into the air, gently tapering as it ascended, and terminating suddenly at its apex in a point.
The square, though open, was not empty. Besides the obelisk, which stood in the centre of it, on its lofty pedestal, there were two great fountains and colossal statues of marble; and lofty columns of bronze and gilt, for the gaslights; and raised sidewalks, smooth as a floor, formed of a sort of artificial stone, which was continuous over the whole surface, which was covered by it, without fissure or seam. There were roadways, also, crossing the place in various directions, with carriages and horsemen upon them continually coming and going. The great fountains were very curiously contrived. The constructions were thirty or forty feet high. They consisted of three great basins, one above the other. The smallest was at the top, and was, of course, high in the air. A column of water was spouting out from the middle of it, and, after rising a little way into the air, the water fell back into the basin, and, filling it full, it ran over the edge of it into the basin below.
This was the middle basin, and, besides the water which fell into it from the basin above, it received also a great supply from streams that came from the great basin below, like the jets from the hose of a fire engine when a house is on fire. There was a row of bronze figures, shaped like men, in the water of the lowest basin of all, each holding a fish in his arms; and the jets of water which were thrown up to the middle basin from the lower one came out of the mouths of these fishes. The fishes were very large, and they were shaped precisely like real fishes, although they were made of bronze.
The children looked at the fountains as they walked along, and at length came to the foot of the obelisk. They stopped a minute or two there, and looked up to the top of it. It was as tall as a steeple. Rollo was wondering whether it would be possible in any way to get to the top of it; and he told Jennie that he did not think that there was any way, for he did not see any place where any body could stand if they should succeed in getting there. While they both stood thus gazing upward, they suddenly heard a well-known voice behind them, saying,—
"Well, children, what do you think of the Obelisk of Luxor?"
They turned round and beheld their uncle George. They were, of course, very much astonished to see him. He was walking with another young gentleman, a friend of his from America, whom he had accidentally met with in Paris. When the children had recovered from the surprise of thus unexpectedly meeting him, he repeated his question.
"What do you think of the obelisk?"
"I don't believe it is so high," replied Rollo, "as the column in the Place Vendome."
"No," replied Mr. George, "it is not."