DESCENT INTO THE WELL. 33 



hole, with loads on their backs, straps binding 

 their foreheads, and panting from fatigue and heat, 

 they held down their torches, and rendered obei- 

 sance to the blood of the white man. Descending 

 the next ladder, both above and below us were 

 torches gleaming in the darkness. We had still an- 

 other ladder to descend, and the whole perpendicu- 

 lar depth of this hole was perhaps two hundred feet. 



From the foot of this ladder there was an open- 

 ing to the right, and from it we soon entered a low, 

 narrow passage, through which we crawled on our 

 hands and knees. With the toil and the smoke of 

 the torches the heat was almost beyond endurance. 

 The passage enlarged and again contracted, de- 

 scending steeply, and so low that the shoulders al- 

 most touched the roof. This opened upon a great 

 chasm at one side, and beyond we came to another 

 perpendicular hole, which we descended by steps 

 cut in the rock. From this there was another low, 

 crawling passage, and, almost stifled with heat and 

 smoke, we came out into a small opening, in which 

 was a basin of water, being the well. The place 

 was crowded with Indians filling their calabashes, 

 and they started at the sight of our smoky white fa- 

 ces as if El Demonio had descended among them. 

 It was, doubtless, the first time that the feet of a 

 white man had ever reached this well. 



On returning we measured the distance. Doctor 

 Cabot going before with a line of about a hun- 

 dred feet, in the wild and broken passages being 



Vol, II.— E 



