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[[underline]] Chapter V. [[underline]]  95.
successive receding stages which culminated near its northern end.  It had, our Chinese companions stated, been the foundation-platform of the principal West Han palace, the Wei Yang Kung already mentioned.
We found the form of this interesting construction that of a rectangle, with surprisingly well defined corners considering its age.  Its total length was 450 yards, its breadth 145 yards, and its fifth or topmost stage rose some 50 feet above the surrounding fields (see plan and elevation, fig. 18). Without digging, we were of course unable to ascertain how high it had stood above the original surface; but the latter must have been at least 2 or 3 feet below the present one---perhaps even somewhat more.  The mound had been constructed of layers of [[underline]] terre pisée [[underline]] like those forming the rampart that we had just examined.  It was thinly covered with grass save for patches of cultivation here and there and a few great stones of which we shall speak in a moment.
At the center of the mound's southern end we found the eroded remains of and approach or ascent of some sort, apparently a ramp (marked A on the accompanying plan).  This was about 100 feet in width east and west; and it extended northward, sloping gently upward the while, for some 70 feet, until it came out on the top of the lowest terrace (B).  Thence we were able to trace it intermittently onward as we worked north.  The surface of this first stage was practically level, and extended for 156 yards, until it came to the second (C), marked by a sharp rise of 2 feet, the beginning of the third terrace (D).  The ground then continued rising gently until, 95 yards still farther north, it reached the edge of the fourth stage (E).  This was a steep earthen bank some 10 feet high; from its southern face there projected a somewhat lower platform of earth (F), now much eroded, in exact alignment with the avenue of approach, of which it formed the culmination.