GEOLOGY. G91 



and which, in fact, ought to be so, for what purpose could 

 eyes serve in the midst of waves where the most perfect 

 darkness reigns ! 



Fiu'ther on, in this immense Mammoth Grotto filled 

 with rivers, cataracts, and subterranean lakes, the traveller 

 is astonished to find himself beside a large sheet of water 

 on which glide slowly a few boats, the dull glare of 

 their torches being lost in the obscurity of the distance 

 without lighting up the banks and projecting rocks.^ This 

 dark and calm mass of water is called the Dead Sea. 



As happens in many of the cavernous openings in the 

 globe there are in the Mammoth Caves certain abysses 

 which seem bottomless. The guides throw down ignited 

 substances, which are seen to descend for an extraordi- 

 narily long time, whirling round and round, and at last, to 



1 The Mammoth Cave is always an object of great curiosity with the Ameri- 

 cans. They go there in crowds, and there is not always accommodation to be 

 found in the great hotel intended to receive the tourists, although it is arranged 

 for 300 guests. The exploration requires five or six days, and an army of guides 

 is always kept ready for the service of travellers. 



Each site in this celebrated cave bears a picturesque name. There is the 

 Starry Cavern, dazzling with stalactites; the Chamber of the Spirits, formerly 

 encumbered with Indian mummies, which by an act of profanation has become 

 a species of refreshment-room, where the wives of the guides supply liquors and 

 newspapers to those travellers who are already fatigued with the subterranean 

 journey, and glad to make a short halt. There is also a kind of hospital here, 

 where some medical men keep patients afflicted with chest aifectious, thinking 

 the sulphureous atmosphere of these caverns would be favourable to them. 

 In the centre of this hall an almost entire skeleton of a mastodon has been set 

 up. It is also at this part of the Mammoth Cave that the wives of the guides 

 show and sell to those who care for such things, the extraordinary little blind 

 fish, the Cyprinodons, which are caught in the water-courses of these immense 

 caverns. 



Further on is seen the Devil's Arm-chair, which, like a gigantic crystallization, 

 rears itself all gleaming on the brink of a dark bottomless abyss. Besides the 

 Styx and the Dead Sea, these caverns, in which underground windings 20 to 25 

 miles in length are known, possess other bodies of water. Up to the present 

 time 226 avenues have been made out, besides 57 domes, 11 lakes, 7 rivers, 8 

 cataracts, and 32 abysses, some of which are of an immense depth. 



