The present Pool of Siloam has been found (by Dr. Guthe in 1881) to be much narrower than that which was probably first cut by Hezekiah in connection with his tunnel, which perhaps required the reservoir to be deeper than the older pool there existing. The pool thus became 30 feet deep and 60 feet square,[135] having a flat walk on each side about 7 feet wide. The tunnel from the Gihon spring is a third of a mile long, and it was begun from both ends. The spring and the pool lie in a south-west direction respectively, but the tunnel winds, and the lower part runs west, either because some soft stratum of rock was followed, or more probably because, working in the dark, the direction was lost till a shaft, 30 feet high, was driven down from the surface, and the correct direction recovered. At the spring a short passage was driven in west, from the back of the cave, and from this the main tunnel (1,707 feet long) began. Here also it is first cut in the wrong direction, westwards, and then bends round south; and here also a great shaft (discovered by Sir Charles Warren), with a rocky stairway, was carried down from the surface of Ophel. This no doubt marks the site of the “Water Gate”; and access to the spring from within the city wall was so attainable, which may be what is intended by “brought water into the city.” Finally, when the two parties of miners heard each other calling, a short cross-cut was made east and west. This point I examined in 1881, and found that each of the tunnels had been abruptly stopped where this cross-cut (about 4 feet long) occurs. It seems also to have been then found that the tunnel was not at a sufficiently low level in its southern part, and that the water would not flow freely, which would account for the Siloam end of the tunnel being much more lofty than the part nearer the spring, the floor level having been cut down.[136] [Sidenote: THE SILOAM TEXT]