The design of the dishes with which the table was set was quite in keeping with all the other mad designs of the palace of Ghron. No two plates or goblets or platters were of the same shape or size or design and nothing seemed suited to the purpose for which it was intended. My wine was served in a shallow, triangular-shaped saucer, while my meat was crammed into a tall, slender-stemmed goblet. However, I was too hungry to be particular, and, I hoped, too well conversant with the amenities of polite society to reveal the astonishment that I felt. Here, as in other parts of the palace, the wall coverings were of the gossamer-like silver fabric that had attracted my attention and admiration the moment that I had entered the building and so fascinated was I by it that I could not refrain from mentioning it to the girl who sat at my right. "There is no such fabric anywhere else in Barsoom," she said. "It is made here and only here." "It is very beautiful," I said. "Other nations would pay well for it." "If we could get it to them," she said, "but we have no intercourse with the world above us." "Of what is it woven?" I asked. "When you entered the valley Hohr," she said, "you saw a beautiful forest, running down to the banks of the river Syl. Doubtless you saw fruit in the forest and, being hungry, you sought to gather it, but you were set upon by huge spiders that sped along silver threads, finer than a woman's hair." "Yes," I said, "that is just what happened." "It is from this web, spun by those hideous spiders, that we weave our fabric. It is as strong as leather and as enduring as the rocks of which Ghasta is built." "Do women of Ghasta spin this wonderful fabric?" I asked. "The slaves," she said, "both men and women." "And from whence come your slaves?" I asked, "if you have no intercourse with the upper world?" "Many of them come down the river from Tjanath, where they have died The Death, and there are others who come from further up the river, but why they come or from whence we never know. They are silent people, who will not tell us, and sometimes they come from down the river, but these are few and usually are so crazed by the horrors of their journey that we can glean no knowledge from them." "And do any ever go on down the river from Ghasta?" I asked; for it was in that direction that Nur An and I hoped to make our way in search of liberty, as deep within me was the hope that we might reach the valley Dor and the lost sea of Korus, from which I was convinced I could escape, as did John Carter and Tars Tarkas. "A few, perhaps," she said, "but we never know what becomes of these, for none returns." "You are happy here?" I asked. She forced a smile to her beautiful lips, but I thought that a shudder ran through her frame.