The baths are of the most sumptuous character.  The walls are decorated with raised foliage work in colors, silver and gold, upon a ground of mirrors, and the ceiling is finished with pounded mica, which has the effect of silver.  Fronting the entrance of the bathrooms are rows of lights over which the water poured in broad sheets into a basin, then, running over a little marble causeway, fell over a second cluster of lights into another basin, and then another and another, five in succession, so that many ladies were able to bathe in these fascinating fountains at the same time.  Below the baths we were shown some dark and dreary vaults.  In the center of the most gloomy of them there is a pit—­a well—­which, the guide told us, has its outlet in the bottom of the river, three-quarters of a mile away.  Over this pit hangs a heavy beam of wood very highly carved, and in the center is a groove from which dangles a silken rope.  Here, according to tradition, unfaithful inmates of the harem were hanged, and when life was extinct the cord was cut and the body fell into the pit, striking the keen edge of knives at frequent intervals, so that it finally reached the river in small fragments, which were devoured by fishes or crocodiles, or if they escaped them, floated down to the sea.  After each execution a flood of water was turned from the fountains into the pit to wash away the stains.

But let us turn from this terrible place to the jasmine tower containing apartments of the chief sultana, which overhangs the walls of the fort and is surpassingly beautiful:  a series of rooms entirely of marble—­roof, walls and floor—­and surrounded by a broad marble veranda supported, by noble arches springing from graceful, slender pillars arranged in pairs and protected by a balustrade of perforated marble.  One could scarcely imagine anything more dainty than these lacelike screens of stone extremely simple in design and exquisite in execution.  The interior walls are incrusted with mosaic work of jasper, carnelian, lapis-lazuli, agate, turquoise, bloodstone, malachite and other precious materials in the form of foliage, flowers, ornamental scrolls, sentences from the Koran in Arabic letters and geometrical patterns.  The decoration is as beautiful and as rich as the Taj Mahal, so far as it goes, and was done by the same artists.

There is a broad field for the imagination to range about in and picture this palace when it was a paradise of luxury and splendor, filled with gorgeous and costly hangings, draperies, rugs, couches and cushions.  The writers of the time tell us that the sultanas had 5,000 women around them who were divided into companies.  First were the three chief wives, next in rank were 300 concubines and the remainder were dancing girls, musicians, artists, embroiderers, seamstresses, hair dressers, cooks and other servants.  The mother of the Mogul was always the head of the household.  The three empresses were subject to her authority,