DESCRIPTION OF MARBLE CAVE, MISSOURI. 621 



about the length of a finger, glittering like diamonds and soft enough for chew- 

 ing. About the middle of the outer curve, thirty feet above the floor, in the 

 outer circular side, is a hole, about six feet in height and four feet in width, the 

 entrance of a passage about twenty feet in length, which ends at a precipice of 

 unexplored size. Rocks thrown down that precipice are heard to strike the bot- 

 tom in the time required to count twenty-one. 



Near the clay wall is a winding and gently descending passage, about four 

 feet wide and from five to ten feet high. It leads in succession to three rooms, 

 which average twenty feet in height and twelve feet in width, and are semi-cir- 

 cular, and with arched roofs. In length they vary from thirty to fifty feet. 

 Some guano, but no great quantity. Passage and rooms together about 500 feet 

 long with emery rock and red clay. This passage, always descending, ends in 

 the one which passes the foot of Blow Room shaft. The point of junction is 200 

 feet from the bottom of the shaft. Between these two points is the entrance of 

 the passage taken when going toward the Voice Room, so that a circuit has been 

 made. The passage in the roof of which the shaft ends, continues beyond the 

 point of junction just described, but has not been farther explored. 



This entire part of the inside of Roark Mountain, is one vast labyrinth of 

 caves and passages, the one above the other and as yet only partly known. 



9. A ninth passage has its entrance fifteen feet above the bottom of the 

 cave. That opening is wedge-shaped ; the base is three feet, ^d the sides come 

 together at a height of ten feet. The passage retains that shape. It is level and 

 smooth at the bottom, but the sides are rough and only a small sized person can 

 enter. This passage is sixty feet long. It leads to and ends in a small triangu- 

 lar room. The floor of the room is an isosceles triangle, each side twenty feet. 

 The roof is pyramidal and about fifty feet high. From the top stalactites, clear 

 as crystal, from one to five feet long, hang down. The sides are covered with 

 crystals of translucent onyx. On the bottom is but little guano, as the bats seem 

 to prefer smoother roofs and larger rooms. Water formations so completely 

 encrust the walls that the nature of the rock has not been ascertained. 



10. A tenth passage is a crack in the wall of the cave, near the point where 

 the foot of the cone-shaped pile comes closest to that wall. The crack is wedge- 

 shaped and seventy feet high and three feet wide at the bottom, the sides coming 

 together at the top. The passage thus made is rough from protruding flints, and 

 descends at an angle of 45°, until, at a distance of sixty feet from the starting 

 point, it is intersected by a precipice forty-six feet deep. Across the precipice, 

 leaving a gap of about six feet, is a projecting ledge about two feet thick. The 

 passage continues across this ledge, but becomes mucii narrower and has not 

 been further examined. Descending the precipice with a ladder, one finds 

 an oblong room about fifteen feet wide and twenty feet long. The top is on a 

 line with that of the passage, except in so far as the projecting ledge mentioned 

 intervenes. The bottom is very thickly covered with guano. Sides per- 

 fectly plumb and as smooth as masonry, of dove-colored marble. In the wall 

 under the ledge is a hole about five feet high and three feet wide, through rock 



VIII— 40 



