BRICKS WITHOUT STRAW.
We are astir with the dawning of day on the morrow, eager as children
in some of childhood’s butterfly pursuits, and soon we swing back
another hewn-rock-pivoted door and are in a chamber similar in detail
to the others explored, but the walls are bare of any trace of ornament
and are even unfurnished in some places; but in the center of the room
is a square column of red granite, as we suppose, supporting the roof,
but there is not a sign of any openings in the wall, or any receptacle
for the records we expected to find here. We are dumbfounded for a
little, and know not where to begin to unearth the secrets that plainly
enough repose here.
While we are at a standstill and are racking our brains to find a
solution of the new enigma we mechanically strike our picks into
the granite column--Eureka! the granite column is a column of brick
tablets, and instead of supporting the roof (they are built in very
nicely to suggest that idea) they slip from their places in layers
easily. What the records are, or in what form we shall find them,
are sealed books to us, but within this column undoubtedly lies the
secret. It is built of a single tier of bricks which are a cubit long,
half a cubit wide, and half the thickness of a common brick, but are
exceedingly hard, giving forth a metallic ring when struck together.
Our care was bestowed upon removing the brick, one by one in the hope
of finding a hollow in the column containing the records, but no such
hollow appeared, and when we had displaced the brick nearly to the
floor of the vault we noticed that the underside was covered with
peculiar looking characters and we began to realize that the bricks
themselves were the tablets upon which the records were impressed while
they were “green.” The wedge was a prominent character in the writing
and suggested that this set of inscriptions belonged to the class of
writings on rocks and tablets known as cuneiform, and a line dividing
the brick into two squares separated this picture writing from an
explanatory version of its contents in Hebrew.
What at first we had mistaken for a mere filigree style of ornament,
or sort of trade mark, was in reality the characters that went to make
up the regularly numbered tablets of a connected and complete though
brief history of the tribe from the time of leaving Babylon down to
the beginning of the seventh century of the Christian era, and told
a story of the life-struggles of a nation too intensely interesting
to be disposed of in a word, and therefore too long to be admitted to
this chapter. We promise that we will, in due time, lay bare the secret
of past centuries and show a glimpse of the loves and jealousies, the
ambitions and strifes of this most notable of all the earthly tribes.
Meanwhile we must finish our work as mapped out for us by the chart of
Solomon’s “man of cunning devices, who could search out all secrets and
all manner of cunning work.”
All that remained for us to explore, according to the diagram, that was
of any vital interest to us and to the world, was the mine itself from
which all this treasure had been taken.
Accordingly we sought out the door of communication from this vault to
the branch of the main corridor in the whole system leading directly
to the ledge of gold quartz or of whichever of the multifarious forms
of rock gold is found in. This door was of the same old pivot pattern,
and we quickly gained the passage which led us into the depths of the
mountain for about fifty yards and, like some of the others, seemed
to terminate in nothing but solid granite walls. Working from the
standpoint of our previous experience we could not detect the evidence
of a door with our usual facility. The artful son of the Woman of Tyre
had varied his plans and exerted his best skill to outwit any intruder
who might by accident grope his way thus far in this granite labyrinth
and baffle all attempts to vandalize the mine of its rich treasure. How
well he had succeeded the tablets and parchment bore witness, and but
for their aid and directions we might have labored for years without
penetrating to the sacred precincts of Solomon’s Ophir.
Our firm convictions that a door existed here alone prevented our
giving up in utter despair; but, putting the evidence of reason against
that of sight, we labored over the probable location of the door, inch
by inch, but no opening to admit a needle point could we find.
Just overhead in the roof of the passage was a handsome fresco ornament
cut into the rock, with a gorgeous brass pendent as a center. Easily
within reach my hand wandered aimlessly to the bauble and grasped it
as I called Abner’s attention to the tarnished and tawdry gimcrack.
Unconsciously I rested my weight upon it as we turned away from it
again to renew the perplexing search, when I felt it yield to the
pressure of my weight, and as it descended, the end wall before our
eyes rose slowly in grooved bearings till its lower edge was on a level
with the roof, and the underground river was once more before us,
but several feet below our level. A flight of steps led down to the
brink, and another led up to the passage again on the farther side.
As we stepped down to the water’s edge we began to speculate as to how
we should cross the Styx, when, to our amazement, the water began to
recede from our feet, disclosing another step rounded and worn by the
action of the current, and then another, till, as we gazed in utter
amazement the stream ran dry before our eyes.
What witchery was here at work to defeat our plans, what spirit of evil
was haunting our footsteps and warning us to desist from our unholy
pursuit of secrets consecrated by the dust of so many centuries? I own
that a superstitious chill came over me for a moment, a feeling that
vengeful spirits were following us in our sacrilegious attempts to
force the confidence of the beings who had lived and died here, who had
worshiped in these chilly grottoes and labored day and night that their
secrets should die with them.
I read the expression of similar thoughts in my companion’s sober face
for a moment, but his somewhat irreverent nature soon rallied from its
feeling of awe, inspired by thoughts of the supernatural inhabitants
of the place, and waving his torch he led the way down the slippery
staircase across the slimy channel, and ascending the opposite side we
found ourselves in a winding gallery, ascending rapidly toward a point
directly above the grooved doorway. A hundred feet we toiled upward
and came to the channel of the stream once more, where it had poured
headlong down a well-like passage in the rock to the level of the
grooved doorway. Following our passage which was a few feet higher than
the channel, and parallel to it, we soon came out upon the banks of
the Colorado itself. And here was a partial solution of this problem.
The underground stream had its source in the Colorado by artificial
means. Here was a neat channel hewn in the rock far enough below the
level of the river to divert a small stream from it, whence it was
led along for some distance on an easy grade to prevent the action
of the current from wearing away the channel too rapidly; and their
skill in accomplishing this end was further shown by the fact that the
channel was exactly at right angles to the river, a correct principle
recognized in modern hydrostatic engineering.
The water stood in the channel to its accustomed depth, as proven by
the marks of the current on the sides everywhere; but there was no
current in the stream that had so long poured its tireless waters
through the dark passage opened for it by man; it was stagnant for
the first time in decades of centuries. No doubt we would find on our
return to the lower level that the same mechanism which opened our
grooved door closed a floodgate at the bottom of the well. Anxious
to explore this new mystery we retraced our steps to the slippery
stairway, and traversing the channel with uncertain steps in the ooze
and slime for a few yards, we found what was beyond a doubt the bottom
of the shaft or well, with another grooved door or floodgate from
beneath which a little stream of water trickled down. Considering the
great lapse of time since it was fitted for its present purpose, it was
a marvel of joining wrought by hands that did not spare for weariness
or rest content with less than perfection of workmanship.
Not a sign of any mechanism connecting these two doorways was visible
if, indeed, any such contrivance existed, except that the same sort of
brass globe as the center piece of another fresco overhung the channel
close to the door.
Abner proposed that he should go back to the inner side of the other
doorway ready to reopen it should it close and that I should then
attempt to reopen the floodgate standing on a shelf or landing above
the water mark. A little shaky at the thought of what might happen
should we become separated in those cells, I hesitated, but finally
agreed, stipulating that in case we failed to reopen the first door
after it should close, we should use our picks to force an entrance
through it. At his signal I pulled lustily at the knob above me and
with a deafening roar the waters burst out at my feet, again following
their old channel toward the outlet. Connected with the brass knob
was a ponderous brass chain which was the only visible part of the
contrivance by which these doors acted as a counterpoise to each other.
For a few moments I watched the foaming current as it swirled from the
confining walls of the perpendicular passage, and then as suddenly as
it broke forth its waters were dried again, the roaring of the awful
cataract was hushed and Abner’s torch appeared in the grooved doorway.
Consulting our diagrams again we found that the passage indicated as
the way to the mine was in the direction of the floodgate, and as
nothing appeared to indicate that there were two parallel passages,
the most natural conclusion was that the channel itself was the secret
avenue of access to the treasures in the ledges of the rock, and the
stream’s real use was to terrify invaders from attempting its swift
current, or braving its frightful roaring cataract.
Pursuing this theory, we picked our steps on the slimy bottom of the
whirling stream to the floodgate at the bottom of the well and prepared
our minds once more to cope with determined resistance in the shape
of intelligent inertia, and tireless gravitation. The only sign of an
opening anywhere within sight was a low arched passage underneath the
well and floodgate into which we crept, obliged to stoop almost double
in a passage that was barely three feet in height, and from whose
sides and roof dripped incessant showers of murky water that chilled
us to the bone as we made our way tortuously along the circumscribed
passage, till, after traversing perhaps fifty yards in that manner, we
ascended three or four steps, and holding our torches aloft for better
illumination as our vision penetrated the gloom, we had no hesitancy in
deciding that at last we had unraveled the tangled thread of mystery
overhanging the history and fate of a long-lost people and stood in
the midst of the Gold of Ophir with its crowding associations in the
lives of all people in the Christian world. Here was wealth to sate
the greed of a Crœsus and add brilliancy to the regal glory of a King
Solomon. There was no longer any cause for doubt that we had got at the
heart and center of the grand purpose behind all the untiring industry
that had honeycombed the mountain walls of the Colorado, and elaborated
intricate passages, and invented ingenious barriers against discovery,
that looked from the outer view like the labors of a demented hermit
who worked for mere pastime, or of hopeless slaves who toiled at the
bidding of some tyrant master.
But as we now viewed the whole system explored by patient research and
explained by the records unearthed, who could fail at least to admire
the energy and skill of a people who had planned and executed all this
subterranean network to secure at their will, and in their absence the
riches that had added no small share of glory to the luster of King
Solomon’s name?
Self glory doubtless came to be the actuating motive of his latter
life, but the prestige of his wisdom could not be easily eradicated
from the earth and the fame of his marvelous abilities could not,
during his reign, nor, indeed, throughout all time, be forgotten, even
though he fell into voluptuous habits, and vainglorious pursuits. The
world forgives his human lapses and remembers only the transcendent
wisdom that marked all his official acts while in the youthtime of
his power, and takes all these acts to make up the man, ascribing the
latter weaknesses to the time of dotage and as evidence merely that he
lacked that much of being Solomon, a name that will always be accepted
for, and interchangeable with, that of wisdom.
No voice has been heard and no record has been found to portray the
circumstances attending the discovery of this mine of inexhaustible
wealth in a remote corner of a remote continent, but having been
discovered, one ceases to wonder that its ledges were diligently worked
and zealously guarded from pilfering natives, or plundering foes among
the great commercial nations of that day who went down into the sea in
ships; for here was not merely a ledge of gold-bearing quartz, but
in many places it was a ledge of pure gold a foot in width running up
and down the face wall of the mine and of such fabulous richness that,
notwithstanding all the millions of gold that had been taken from here
to adorn the Temple of Solomon, and maintain a corresponding degree of
splendor in every department of his kingdom, in spite of the fact that
for ages and ages, succeeding the coming of the ten tribes to these
shores, a similar state of grandeur in temples of worship, in palaces,
and works of art had drawn their supply of gold from this spot, only
a small area had been depleted of its treasure; and to-day as we
stood in the midst of the one room of the mine, its dimensions barely
reaching to the modest limit of a vault eighteen by one hundred feet,
the appetite for gold was cloyed by the sight of such masses of it, and
doubtless the same effect was produced in the Kingdom of Israel when
Solomon “made gold and silver as the stones.”
All around us were evidences of the abiding lust for gold that had
outlived all those who strove for it. The walls bore the marks of the
tools used by the miner in his eagerness to mine the golden metal,
and here in the soft clay of the floor was the print of a sandal as
distinct as though ages had not waxed and waned since that human foot
had indented its form there as an exquisite satire upon human ambition,
a fitting elegy to sum up the conclusion of the “whole matter” of
human existence.
We were past feeling any exhilaration at our vast discovery of mere
gold. We were oppressed by great object lessons presented to us more
forcibly than by standing in the burial chamber itself.
Our labors were ended; and picking off a few lumps of the precious
metal as souvenirs of our memorable adventures, we slowly turned away
from this, the richest storehouse of Nature’s treasure in existence,
and humbling ourselves to the demands of the low passageway, we
retraced our steps to the grooved doorway and through the treasure
vault, along the narrow street of the city of the dead, and through
the temple with its tarnished glory and faded draperies, out into the
sunlight of the luxuriant garden of the Colorado.