Chapter XI: 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.