THE MAMMOTH CAVE. 193 



have obtained a copy of " The Mouthly Mao'azine ; or, British 

 Register; reprinted, with American Intelligence, in Boston, 

 U. S." In the number for April, 1816, under the head of Ameri- 

 can Intelligence, is given a " Description of the Great Cave in 

 Warren [now Edmonson] County, Kentucky. — Extract of a 

 letter from Dr. Nahum Ward, formerly of Shrewsbury, Massa- 

 chusetts, now resident in the Western country, to his friend in 

 Worcester, giving an account of an excursion in Kentucky in the 

 fall of last year; dated Marietta, April 4, 1816." 



This account appears to be copied from a newspaper called the 

 "Worcester Spy;" and this is the original publication, of the 

 history of the mummy which we have extracted from " Collins' 

 Kentucky." "The Monthly Magazine," however, did not copy 

 the details relative to the mummy (dress, ornaments, etc.) which 

 we have seen was so fully copied by Mr. Collins. We find 

 nothing in this article the quotation of which would afford addi- 

 tional interest to our readers. In a subsequent number of the 

 same magazine, July, 1816, Dr. Ward furnished a map of the 

 Cave, together with an engraving of the mummy which was 

 therein found, and with which he had been presented. 



The map, of course, is chiefly drawn from imagination : at that 

 early date no surveys had been attempted. Nearly all the names 

 by which the various parts of the Cave were then described have, 

 since that date, been changed. 



As might naturally be expected in describing a curiosity so 

 extraordinary in its dimensions and characteristics, and of which 

 so little was known at that day, we find considerable exaggera- 

 tion and some misstatements in the account of Dr. Ward. He 

 speaks of various chambe. . jich constitute an area of from six 

 to eight acres, and estimates that he explored a continuous avenue 

 to the distance of eleven miles. The "Bottomless Pit" was not 

 crossed for more than twenty years afterward ; and the extreme 

 length of the " Long Route," now known, does not exceed nine 

 miles. The writer also speaks of Green River as passing over 

 several of the avenues of the Cave, the incorrectness of which 

 statement has long since been eistablished. 



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