"Nor, although it was inhabited, could certain information be procured as
to its internal construction. Those who dwelt in it often discovered rooms
they had never entered before--yea, once or twice,--whole suites of
apartments, of which only dim legends had been handed down from former
times. Some of them expected to find, one day, secret places, filled with
treasures of wondrous jewels; amongst which they hoped to light upon
Solomon's ring, which had for ages disappeared from the earth, but which
had controlled the spirits, and the possession of which made a man simply
what a man should be, the king of the world. Now and then, a narrow,
winding stair, hitherto untrodden, would bring them forth on a new turret,
whence new prospects of the circumjacent country were spread out before
them. How many more of these there might be, or how much loftier, no one
could tell. Nor could the foundations of the castle in the rock on which
it was built be determined with the smallest approach to precision. Those
of the family who had given themselves to exploring in that direction,
found such a labyrinth of vaults and passages, and endless successions of
down-going stairs, out of one underground space into a yet lower, that
they came to the conclusion that at least the whole mountain was
perforated and honeycombed in this fashion.
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