The veil hung between the Holy Place and the Holy of Holies, and concealing the latter from sight, was a large piece of silk, on which the skilful hand of Eastern embroideresses had represented the image of the world; the four colours which entered into its composition were the symbols of the elements: purple represented the sea, saffron fire, hyacinth air, byssus earth. The inner walls were panelled with carved planks of cedar. In the Holy Place these wood-carvings represented colocynths and open flowers; in the Holy of Holies, palm-trees and fantastic animals or cherubim were mixed with the flowers. This decoration was relieved by plates of gold fixed on the wood with nails of the same metal. The Ark of the Covenant, in the Holy of Holies, was sheltered under the wings of two immense cherubim of wood overlaid with plates of gold. The different parts of these monstrous figures were borrowed from the animal world, like those of the winged bulls in the Ninevite palaces. According to the Bible, the cherubim are winged and have bulls’ feet; they draw Jehovah in his chariot or carry Him upon their back, like the Assyrian deities. Each cherub has at the same time a human face and a lion’s face. They form a silent procession upon the cedar panels, the leaves of the olive-wood doors, and the veil before the Holy of Holies, alternating with palms and colocynths, which, at Jerusalem, are substituted for the Egyptian lotus. [Illustration: Fig. 176.--Egyptian naos and cherubim (M. de Vogüé, p. 33).] In the Holy of Holies there were two colossal statues of cherubs, 10 cubits high, overlaid with gold, which guarded the Ark of the Covenant. Each cherub had two gigantic wings, one outspread and drooped over the ark which it overshadowed, the other symmetrically outspread in the opposite direction and raised towards the ceiling. M. de Vogüé ingeniously compares with this description the Egyptian representations of two figures with long wings, kneeling on each side of the symbolic scarabæus or the solar disk supported by uræi, which they cover with their wings. [Illustration: Fig. 177.--Egyptian ark and naos (from an Egyptian painting).] The Ark of the Covenant itself resembled those _naoi_ or _bari_ which we see carried by Egyptian priests upon their shoulders. It was of acacia-wood (_shittim_), covered with plates of gold both inside and outside. It was about 1¾ yards long, 2 ft. 8 in. broad and high. The lid was called the Throne of Jehovah. The ark contained the two tables of stone upon which the law of Sinai was engraved. [Illustration: Fig. 178.--Egyptian table of offerings (M. de Vogüé, p. 33).]