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Then they returned to the valley, drew the fallen trees out, lopped off the branches, shaped the poles, dug holes, and got the uprights into position. Then followed the ridge-poles and the sideposts, and the roof took shape, to the wonder of the women, a noble span covering some thousands of square feet, with a length of one hundred and fifty feet, and a height of fifty feet.
The entrance, which is 12 feet broad, can be closed in a moment by a huge falling wicket or gate. Now it stands open, and from the two sideposts run out two long palisades of stakes, forming an open passage to the entrance. The two fences diverge outwards and are nearest to each other at the entrance.
The exterior is absolutely devoid of decoration, with the exception only of the western entrance and the lateral door, of which the former has carved sideposts and architrave, and the latter, crosses of rich sculpture; while the massy stone shutters of the windows, turning on huge rings of stone, which answer the double purpose of stanchions and brackets, cause the whole building rather to resemble a refuge from Alpine storm than the cathedral of a populous city; and, internally, the two solemn mosaics of the eastern and western extremities, one representing the Last Judgment, the other the Madonna, her tears falling as her hands are raised to bless, and the noble range of pillars which enclose the space between, terminated by the high throne for the pastor and the semicircular raised seats for the superior clergy, are expressive at once of the deep sorrow and the sacred courage of men who had no home left them upon earth, but who looked for one to come, of men "persecuted but not forsaken, cast down but not destroyed."
The blood flowed into a basin, and the attendants brought a branch of hyssop, which Jesus dipped in it. Then he went to the door of the room, stained the sideposts and the lock with blood, and placed the branch which had been dipped in blood above the door.
The boards at the top and bottom of the capital, which are called "peritreti," should be in thickness equal to one hole, and in breadth to one and three quarters, except at their extremities, where they equal one hole and a half. The sideposts on the right and left should be four holes high, excluding the tenons, and five twelfths of a hole thick; the tenons, half a hole.
The sideposts are five holes and two thirds in length, their curvature half a hole, and their thickness thirty-seven forty-eighths of a hole. In the middle their breadth is increased as much as it was near the hole in the design, by the breadth and thickness of... hole; the height by one fourth of a hole. Its tenons are one hole and one sixth long, and one quarter of a hole in thickness.
There is no one, as when the first-born were slain of old, to sprinkle with blood the lintel and the two sideposts of our doors, that he may spare and pass on; he takes his victims from the castle of the noble, the mansion of the wealthy, and the cottage of the poor and the lowly, and it is on behalf of all these classes that I make this solemn appeal.
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