244 WILD SCENES AND WILD HUNTERS. 
him, not to the station, but to a cave which he used a3. 
une of his places of deposit. No one knew of the existence 
of this hiding-place but himself, and he had discovered it by 
the accident of having driven a wounded bear into it. 
The entrance was very small and covered with briars; 
pushing these aside, you looked down into what seemed a 
deep well; when the eye became accustomed to the darkness, 
you could gradually discover a dry, white bottom. Harrod 
had descended into it by means of a pole ladder which he had 
let down; this ladder, which is essentially a frontier con- 
trivance, consists merely of a stout sapling, which is thick 
set with limbs; the sapling being cut down, the limbs are 
chopped off within six inches from the trunk, thus leaving 
excellent foothold to climb by. 
When you reached the bottom, which was about twelve fect 
below the surface, you found yourself in a small, but irregularly 
shaped room, the ceiling of which was hung with many beau- 
tiful and fantastic stalactites, from among which, and at the 
farther extremity of the room, a small, clear stream, poured 
steadily down into a white, round basin, which it had worn 
into the solid limestone. 
The little stream, after passing across the length of the 
chamber, found vent through a dark hole in the wall, about 
large enough to admit a man, crawling in on his hands and 
knees. Here, over the whitest sand, it escaped into unknown 
caverns beyond. From the point of every stalactite on the 
ceiling a drop of water fell slowly upon stalactites rising to 
meet them, many of which had assumed the most extraordi- 
nary shapes. About twelve feet square of the ceiling and 
floor of this singular subterranean chamber was as dry a8 
tinder. 
I am thus particular in describing this cave, having once 
visited it, and been singularly impressed with the quaint 
peculiarities of the place. Among other things, the steady 
dropping of the water upon the white and ringing stalactites, 
