lumns of the nave are twenty-three feet in height, and have
bell-shaped capitals, while those of the aisles, two on either side, are
eighteen feet high, and are crowned with lotiform capitals.

[Illustration: 077.jpg THE COURT OF THE TEMPLE OF KHONSU]

Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a photograph by Beato.

The roof of the nave was thus five feet higher than those of the aisles,
and in the clear storey thus formed, stone gratings, similar to those
in the temple of Amon, admitted light to the building. The courtyard,
surrounded by a fine colonnade of two rows of columns, was square, and
was entered by four side posterns in addition to the open gateway at the
end placed between two quadrangular towers.

[Illustration: 078.jpg THE COLONNADE BUILT BY THUTMOSIS III]

Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a photograph by Insinger and
Daniel Heron.

This pylon measures 104 feet in length, and is 32 feet 6 inches wide,
by 58 feet high. It contains no internal chambers, but merely a narrow
staircase which leads to the top of the doorway, and thence to the
summit of the towers. Four long angular grooves run up the facade of the
towers to a height of about twenty feet from the ground, and are in
the same line with a similar number of square holes which pierce the
thickness of the building higher up. In these grooves were placed
Venetian masts, made of poles spliced together and held in their place
by means of hooks and wooden stays which projected from the four holes;
these masts were to carry at their tops pennons of various colours.
Such was the temple of Khonsu, and the majority of the great Theban
buildings--at Luxor, Qurneh, and Bamesseum, or Medinet-Uabu--were
constructed on similar lines. Even in their half-ruined condition there
is something oppressive and uncanny in their appearance. The gods
loved to shroud themselves in mystery, and, therefore, the plan of
the building was so arranged as to render the transition almost
imperceptible from the blinding sunlight outside to the darkness of
their retreat within. In the courtyard, we are still surrounded by vast
spaces to which air and light have free access. The hypostyle hall,
however, is pervaded by an appropriate twilight, the sanctuary is veiled
in still deeper darkness, while in the chambers beyond reigns an almost
perpetual night. The effect produced by this gradation of obscurity
was intensified by constructional artifices. The different parts of the
building