Each gate had a solid square tower on each side of it that stood out from the wall and rose above it.

Beyond the wall were more towers and houses, gleaming with gold and bright colours.

Away to the left ran the steel-blue swirl of a great river.
And the children could see, through a gap in the trees, that the river flowed out from the town under a great arch in the wall.
'Those feathery things along by the water are palms,' said Cyril instructively.
'Oh, yes; you know everything,' Robert replied.

'What's all that grey-green stuff you see away over there, where it's all flat and sandy ?' 'All right,' said Cyril loftily, '_I_ don't want to tell you anything.

I only thought you'd like to know a palm-tree when you saw it again.' 'Look!' cried Anthea; 'they're opening the gates.' And indeed the great gates swung back with a brazen clang, and instantly a little crowd of a dozen or more people came out and along the road towards them.
The children, with one accord, crouched behind the tamarisk hedge.
'I don't like the sound of those gates,' said Jane.