We found ourselves at last under the four arching dachshund legs from which the Tower tapers improbably into space, and strayed round on the gravel underneath it, lavishing upon each other truisms appropriate to the occasion, and expressing artificial regrets that we had apparently come too late in the afternoon for the lift. While we spoke, a clicking sound dropped to us from the sky; we looked up, and saw amidst the cobwebs of iron a large square fly descending. I hardly know how we came to find ourselves at the entrance of the _ascenseur_. We both dislike lifts; and my cousin can repeat many rousing tales of lift-accidents, in which the point is usually the apparent identity of the attendant with the leading character in a thrice-repeated nightmare; but some form of false shame impelled us to the first stage. We held our breaths as we slid upwards through the girders that looked like all the propositions in Euclid run mad, and it was not till the horrible hiccough came, that told us we had stopped at the first platform, that we ventured to glance at the lift-man. We walked round the long galleries, my cousin making herself both conspicuous and absurd by her determination to find out how many dragoon-like strides went to each side. It will doubtless be a blow to the designer to hear that the four faces of the Tower vary in length, two of them measuring ninety-seven yards, another a hundred, and the fourth ninety-nine and a hop. We had thought of going to the top--thought of it vaguely and valiantly for some little time after the lift had shaken us out on the first _étage_, and before we had looked over the edge. One glance, however, down at the black specks crawling on the strips of tape that represented the gravel paths of the Exhibition grounds satisfied us that we were as high as we wished to go. Even here the height was making my fingers tingle, and my cousin had retired unsteadily from the verge under the pretext of buying a photograph at a neighbouring stall; while as to the view, all Paris was already far below us, a marvellous gray and green toy, with the afternoon sun striking flame out of the tiny gilded domes and spires, and the pale thread of a river winding from one microscopic bridge to another, all showing clear in the smokeless air with a magical precision of detail.