to the colour, and there, descending from the roof down the side of
the rock, was the waved hair of an undine that had been changed into
white and glistening stone. The stalactites were less remarkable. The
sound of dropping water told us that another cascade was near. This we
left behind by climbing along the side of the gallery, clinging to the
rock, and in the same way four more obstacles of precisely the same
character were overcome. All the distance the slope was rapid, but at
intervals there was a sudden fall of from ten to fifteen feet, with a
black-looking pool at the foot of the rock, hollowed out by the action
of the tumbling torrent. The last of these falls was the worst to
cross. To this point the cavern had been already explored, but no
farther apparently, the local impression being that it ended just
beyond. It was an ugly place. The rock over which the water fell was
almost perpendicular, and the pool at the bottom was larger and deeper
than the others. Seen by the light of day, any schoolboy might have
scoffed at the difficulty of getting beyond it, but when you are
descending into the bowels of the earth, where the light of two
candles can only dissolve the darkness a few yards around you, every
form becomes fantastic and awful, and the effect of water of unknown
depth upon the imagination is peculiarly disturbing. But we made up
our minds to go on if it were possible. The passage was very narrow,
and the sides offered few salient points to which one could cling. We
moved along a very narrow ledge in a sitting posture, and then, when
we had gone as far as we could in this way, and there was nothing
beyond to sit upon, we made a spring. My companion, being the more
agile, nearly cleared the pool, but I went in with a great splash, as
I expected, and thought myself lucky in being only wetted to the
waist. The water was not very cold, the temperature of the cavern
being much higher than that of the outer air.