showed their design to the King, who gathering together his army returned with them to the city.  Presently the Architects and Master-masons fell to building it square of corners and towering in air over the height of an hundred ells and an ell; and amiddlemost thereof stood a quadrangular hall with four-fold saloons, one fronting other, whilst in each was set apart a cabinet for private converse.  At the head of every saloon a latticed window projected over the garden whereof the description shall follow in its place; and they paved the ground with vari-coloured marbles and alabastrine slabs which were dubbed with bezel stones and onyx[FN#186] of Al-Yaman.  The ceilings were inlaid with choice gems and lapis lazuli and precious metals:  the walls were coated with white stucco painted over with ceruse[FN#187] and the frieze was covered with silver and gold and ultramarine and costly minerals.  Then they set up for the latticed windows colonnettes of gold and silver and noble ores, and the doors of the sitting chamber were made of chaunders-wood alternating with ebony which they studded with jewels and arabesque’d with gold and silver.  Also they placed in each sitting-room a pillar of Comorin lign-aloes and the best of sandal-wood encrusted with gems; and over the speak-room they threw cupolas supported upon arches and connecting columns and lighted in the upper part by skylights of crystal and carnelian and onyx.  And at the head of each saloon was a couch of juniper-wood whose four legs were of elephants’ ivories studded with rubies and over each was let down a hanging[FN#188] of golden weft and a network of gems, whilst higher than the whole was a latticed casement adorned with pearls which were threaded upon golden wire and curtains bearing scented satchels of ambergris.  The furniture of the divans was of raw silk stuffed with ostrich- down and the cushions were purfled with gold.  The floors of all the saloons were spread with carpets and rugs embroidered with sendal, and in the heart of the Great Hall amiddlemost the four saloons rose a marble jet-d’eau, square of shape, whose corners were cunningly wrought and whose floor and marge were set with gems of every hue.  They also placed upon the edges of that fountain figures fashioned of gold and silver representing all manner birds and beasts, each modelled according to his several tint and peculiar form; their bellies too were hollow and from the fountain was conducted a conduit which led the water into their insides and caused it gush from their mouths so that they jetted one at other like two hosts about to do battle.  After this the same water returned to the middle of the fountain and thence flowed into the gardens, of which a description will follow in its place.[FN#189] Also the walls of the Great Hall were variegated with wondrous pictures in gold and lapis lazuli and precious materials of every kind, and over the doors of the sitting-places they hung candelabra of crystal with chains of gold wherein were set jewels and jacinths and the costliest stones; after which they inscribed upon the entrance of the speak-rooms couplets to the following purport,