148 



INCIDENTS OF TRAVEL. 



ner of fantastic shapes, and seemed like monstrous 

 animals or deities of a subterranean world. 



From the brink on which we stood an enormous 

 ladder, of the rudest possible construction, led to the 

 bottom of the hole. It was between seventy and 

 eighty feet long, and about twelve feet wide, made of 

 the rough trunks of saplings lashed together length- 

 wise, and supported all the way down by horizontal 

 trunks braced against the face of the precipitous 

 rock. The ladder was double, having two sets or 

 flights of rounds, divided by a middle partition, and 

 the whole fabric was lashed together by withes. It 

 was very steep, seemed precarious and insecure, and 

 confirmed the worst accounts we had heard of the 

 descent into this remarkable well. 



Our Indians began the descent, but the fore- 

 most had scarcely got his head below the surface 

 before one of the rounds slipped, and he only saved 

 himself by clinging to another. The ladder having 

 been made when the withes were green, these were 

 now dry, cracked, and some of them broken. We 

 attempted a descent with some little misgivings, but, 

 by keeping each hand and foot on a different round, 

 with an occasional crash and slide, we all reached 

 the foot of the ladder ; that is, our own party, our 

 Indians, and some three or four of our escort, the 

 rest having disappeared. 



The plate opposite represents the scene at the 

 foot of this ladder. Looking up, the view of its bro- 

 ken sides, with the light thrown down from the orifice 



