CHAPTER XIV.
THE FLOWER TEMPLE It was half-past eight by my watch when I woke on the morning following our arrival at Milosis, having slept almost exactly twelve hours, and I must say that I did indeed feel better.
Ah, what a blessed thing is sleep! and what a difference twelve hours of it or so makes to us after days and nights of toil and danger.

It is like going to bed one man and getting up another.
I sat up upon my silken couch -- never had I slept upon such a bed before -- and the first thing that I saw was Good's eyeglass fixed on me from the recesses of his silken couch.

There was nothing else of him to be seen except his eyeglass, but I knew from the look of it that he was awake, and waiting till I woke up to begin.
'I say, Quatermain,' he commenced sure enough, 'did you observe her skin?
It is as smooth as the back of an ivory hairbrush.' 'Now look here, Good,' I remonstrated, when there came a sound at the curtain, which, on being drawn, admitted a functionary, who signified by signs that he was there to lead us to the bath.
We gladly consented, and were conducted to a delightful marble chamber, with a pool of running crystal water in the centre of it, into which we gaily plunged.

When we had bathed, we returned to our apartment and dressed, and then went into the central room where we had supped on the previous evening, to find a morning meal already prepared for us, and a capital meal it was, though I should be puzzled to describe the dishes.

After breakfast we lounged round and admired the tapestries and carpets and some pieces of statuary that were placed about, wondering the while what was going to happen next.