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Let d ≥ 2 be a square-free integer and for all n ≥ 0, let $l\left({\left(\surd d\right)}^{2n+1}\right)$ be the length of the continued fraction expansion of ${\left(\surd d\right)}^{2n+1}$. If ℚ(√d) is a principal quadratic field, then under a condition on the fundamental unit of ℤ[√d] we prove that there exist constants C₁ and C₂ such that $C₁{\left(\surd d\right)}^{2n+1}\ge l\left({\left(\surd d\right)}^{2n+1}\right)\ge C₂{\left(\surd d\right)}^{2n+1}$ for all large n. This is a generalization of a theorem of S. Chowla and S. S. Pillai [2] and an improvement in a particular case of a theorem of [6].