MAMMOTH CAVE. 



213 



tary shudder. He seemed surprised that an Englishman should 

 be so particular, but apologized." 



On the Sunday, "the young men smoked and drank, 

 and went out shooting : there were the usual parties in 

 the cave ; and the pianoforte was generally going, with 

 such things as ' Pop goes the weasel/ etc. If I had been 

 a pious orthodox parson, I would have proposed a preach- 

 ment in the cave : but my kind of sermon would not have 

 suited the taste of the people ; so I preached to myself in the 

 river. It seemed a shame to miss the opportunity of picking up 

 such fine Unios, [the animals of] which the musk-rats had eaten, 

 and which were as good as living, lying on the bank or shining 

 under the shallow water. I thought of all the people at home 

 who would be glad of anything I could get, and thought it a 

 poor story if they were not worth carriage. So I put on the 

 shirt I intended to wash; put my clothes in the umbrella under 

 a tree in the island ; and proceeded by a zigzag pilgrimage 

 through the channel, sometimes standing, sometimes sitting in 

 the stream, and making heaps on the gravelly shore as I went 

 along, undisturbed, except by a party of boys who came to 

 bathe towards noon. . . . There were three times as many 

 shells as I could carry • so I shouldered what I could, and left 

 the rest. It was 3.30 ; but they gave me some dinner, and 

 I arranged to pay a man for bringing up the rest, Hyatt 

 offering to go down and show him the place. However, what 

 did the young Hercules do, while I was at dinner, but arm 

 himself with two buckets and his great bag, and brought them 

 all up himself at one journey. I did not know whether to 

 be most angry or grateful, but decided on the latter. Then 

 came the sorting out and packing, and my room presented 

 a curious spectacle (so thought the strangers), so covered 

 with heaps of Unios that it was hard to pass between. 

 They said I could not possibly pack them : they did not 

 know my capacity in that line. However, after I had 

 done the heaviest box, H. came, and began to lay them in 

 order for me; and Mr. Glover, a young man from St. Louis, 

 also came in, and considered himself honoured in helping a 



