dome.

As soon as the party came out into the open air they began to realize
how high they had ascended; for they found, on looking down into the
neighboring streets, that the tops of the chimneys of the six-story
houses there were far below them. And yet, as you will see by looking at
the engraving, they had not, thus far, ascended more than half way to
the top of the building.

The party walked round the stone gallery, looking off over the roofs of
the houses in the city on every side. They could see the river, the
bridges, vast ranges of warehouses, and long streets, with tiny
omnibuses and carts creeping slowly along them, and men, like mites,
moving to and fro along the sidewalks. They could see tall chimneys,
too, pouring forth columns of smoke, and steeples and spires of
churches, far below them.

"How high we are!" said Rollo.

"Yes," said Mrs. Holiday; "I am high _enough_. I do not wish to go any
higher."

In fact, it was somewhat frightful to be so high. It even made Mr.
George dizzy to look down from so vast an elevation.

"Are we above, or below, the dome?" said Mrs. Holiday.

"We are above the inner dome," said Mr. George, "but below the outer
one."

"I thought they were both the same," said Mrs. Holiday. "I thought the
inner dome was the under side of the outer one."

"It ought to be," said Mr. George; "but it is not so in St. Paul's.
There is a great space between, filled with masonry and carpentry."

Here Mr. George led the way up a flight of stone steps that ascended
from the gallery to a door leading into the interior of the church
again. When they had all entered they looked up and saw above and around
them the commencement of a perfect maze of beams, piers, walls,
buttresses, and braces, all blackened by the smoky London atmosphere,
and worn and corroded by time. What was near of this immense
complication was dimly seen by the faint light which made its way
through the narrow openings which were left here and there in nooks and
corners; but the rest was lost in regions of darkness and gloom, into
which the eye strove in vain to penetrate.

This was the space between the inner and the outer dome. The walls which
were seen were part of an immense cone of masonry which was built in the
centre to sustain the whole structure. The lantern above, with the ball
and cross surmounting it, rests on the top of this cone. The outer dome
is formed around the sides of it without. This outer dome is