Notwithstanding the extreme height of the tower, which rose full a hundred feet above the inferior buildings of the royal residence, it yet possessed its fountain, fed from a reservoir in the roof, itself supplied by the aid of machinery from the sources of those silver rivulets of the Xenil and Darro, which might be seen glittering in the level plain almost a thousand feet below; and the constant merry plash of its sparkling waters, as they leaped and fell in a shower of diamonds into their alabaster basin, together with the waving of the broad, fan-like palm-leaves in light coming air around the open casements, and the rich clusters of clematis, passion-flower and jessamine which hung their blossoms around every traceried column, rendered it difficult to conceive that so great a distance intervened between that bower of beauty and the solid earth, with all the choicest charms of which it was environed and invested. Half-seated, half-reclining on a broad, low step of marble, which ran all around the apartment, covered with rich cushions and foot-cloths of brocade, such as would now be cheaply purchased at its weight in gold, with her shoulders supported by the low parapet of the window immediately behind her, gazed the Lady Ayesha over the glimmering landscape, all as she untwined with the rosy, henna-tinted tips of her small, slender fingers the thick plaits of her luxuriant raven hair. For in truth, and for once, the epithet _raven_ was not misapplied to those soft, silky, glistening masses, which were not of the cold and hueless black, but of that nameless and indescribable hue which is never seen but in the hair of women of Moorish or Irish blood—and in the latter probably as originated of the former—black indeed, but black warmed and glowing with a rich metallic purplish lustre, unlike any thing on earth but the changeful hues that dance on the dark plumage of several of the feathered tribes. But though her long, languid eyes of that perfect almond form, so much prized by the beauty-loving Moors, fringed with lashes so long and dark as to require no aid of that Arabian dye to set off the liquid lustre which they curtained, were riveted with a serene and steady fixedness on a remote spot in the plain, it was by no means evident that they took note of that on which they lingered; nor did she even appear conscious of her occupation, as wave after wave of her soft tresses fell disentwined into her lap. For there was too much of tranquillity, approaching even to abstraction, in the fixedness of her eye, in the statue-like immobility of her perfectly regular features, and in the whole pose of her figure, to accord with any thoughts so frivolous as those of the mere decoration of the person, how beautiful soever it might be.