64 THE MAMMOTH CAVE. 
guide suggested that the oxen were introduced 
separately, and the carts in piecemeal. 
On the route from the Acute Angle to the 
Star Chamber, several stone cottages, formerly 
inhabited by the invalids already mentioned, 
are still standing,—gloomy monuments of their 
departed occupants. One of these cottages is 
used as a card-room, where hundreds of private 
and business cards may be found. 
We are now upon what is known as the Long 
Route, and we leave the Main Cave at the foot 
of the Giant's Coffin. 
One by one we pass into a crevice behind the 
Coffin, at the bottom whereof yawns a narrow 
hole. Half stooping, half crawling, we descend — 
through an irregular, contracted passage to a 
basement hall called the Deserted Chamber. 
The Deserted Chamber is a gloomy, aban- 
doned-looking hall, and is fully entitled to the 
name givenit. This is the pomt at which the 
water left the Main Cave to reach Echo River, 
after it had ceased to flow out of the mouth 
of the former into Green River. In other re- 
spects it is not of particular interest. . 
The two illustrations which accompany this 
part of our text—“Entrance to the Long 
Route,” and the “‘ Deserted Chamber’—give the 
