a half to three
This gold , in incredible masses , had not been mined and brought hither to be fashioned into a great city . Quite the contrary , it formed part of the cliffs and black mountains themselves . Some stupendous volcanic upheaval of the remote past had cleft the mountain wall , and had extruded through the `` fault '' a huge `` dyke '' of virgin metal -- to use technical terms . This golden dyke , two and a half to three miles wide and of undeterminable length and depth , had merely been formed by strong , cunning hands into walls , battlements , houses , mosques , and minarets . It had been carved out _ in situ _ , the soft metal being fashioned with elaborate skill and long patience . Jannati Shahr seemed , on a larger scale and a vastly more magnificent plan , something like the hidden rock-city of Petra in the mountains of Edom -- a city wholly carved by the Edomites out of the solid granite , without a single stone having been laid in mortar . Wonderful beyond all words as the early afternoon sun gleamed from its broad-flung golden terraces and mighty walls -- whereon uncounted thousands of white figures had massed themselves -- the `` Very Heavenly City '' widened to the Legionaries ' gaze .