There was no room on the hot south side of the palace, but on the west was the morning room, in which all the morning entertainments were held, whilst the evening banqueting hall was on the eastern side.

By this arrangement the direct rays of the sun were never felt by those within the palace.

Then, on the cool northern side was the grand throne room, in which the king sat in state, and through which a whole army of soldiers, or an immense body of courtiers, could file without the slightest confusion, entering and leaving the room by stone staircases placed opposite each other.

The steps were only four inches in depth and sixteen feet wide, and were so built that horsemen could easily mount or descend them.
Into one of the grand halls of the palace Nehemiah the cup-bearer enters.

The pavement is of coloured marble, red, white, and blue; curtains of blue and white, the Persian royal colours, drape the windows and are hanging in graceful festoons from the pillars; the fresh morning breeze is blowing from the snow-clad mountains, and is laden with the scent of lemons and oranges, and of the Shushan lilies and Persian roses in the palace gardens.
There is the royal table, covered with golden dishes and cups, and spread with every dainty that the world could produce.
There is the king, a tall, graceful man, but with one strange deformity--with hands so long that when he stood upright they touched his knees, from which he had received the nickname of Longimanus, the long-handed.
He is dressed in a long loose robe of purple silk, with wide sleeves, and round his waist is a broad golden girdle.