The steps lead up from the landing of the sea-gate through the entrance to the courtyard.
"This courtyard is surrounded by another basalt wall, rectangular, following with mathematical exactness the march of the outer barricades.

The sea-wall is from thirty to forty feet high--originally it must have been much higher, but there has been subsidence in parts.
The wall of the first enclosure is fifteen feet across the top and its height varies from twenty to fifty feet--here, too, the gradual sinking of the land has caused portions of it to fall.
"Within this courtyard is the second enclosure.

Its terrace, of the same basalt as the outer walls, is about twenty feet high.

Entrance is gained to it by many breaches which time has made in its stonework.
This is the inner court, the heart of Nan-Tauach! There lies the great central vault with which is associated the one name of living being that has come to us out of the mists of the past.

The natives say it was the treasure-house of Chau-te-leur, a mighty king who reigned long 'before their fathers.' As Chan is the ancient Ponapean word both for sun and king, the name means, without doubt, 'place of the sun king.' It is a memory of a dynastic name of the race that ruled the Pacific continent, now vanished--just as the rulers of ancient Crete took the name of Minos and the rulers of Egypt the name of Pharaoh.
"And opposite this place of the sun king is the moon rock that hides the Moon Pool.
"It was Stanton who discovered the moon rock.