THE CRYSTAL PALACE.

Another route in Wind Cave is that to the Crystal Palace which, although
the shortest, is the one most seldom taken by visitors, because of a
certain amount of difficulty and discomfort being unavoidable. Only a
portion of the great stairway below the entrance is descended, when we
abandon it and climb into a hole in the side-wall of the narrow passage,
from which point to the end of the trip our feet prove to be merely
encumbrances.

The space crawled into and through widens sufficiently in several places
to form chambers of good size, but the height of the ceiling is nowhere
more than three feet and most of it only two or even less. The rough
rock floor is partly carpeted with patches of loose moist clay, which is
the means of our becoming as grimy as tramps, and its source is readily
accounted for by an examination of the ceiling. This is easily made
while resting one skinned elbow at the expense of the other. The word
"abraded" is inadequate where anything approaching real cave study is
attempted.

The box work of the ceiling has almost entirely lost its
crystallization, and is as ready to crumble as the enclosed clay, which
is still retained because it had not yet reached the necessary point of
deterioration to be carried out before the great volume of water,
required for that service, retired from this high level of the cave.

When finally reached, the Crystal Palace proved worthy of the effort,
its decoration being entirely of dripstone and very beautiful, although
on too small a scale to be compared with similar work in many caves: it