Dungeon of Enchantment.
Before us is a broad, oddly-shaped and low-roofed chamber, about one hundred and twenty feet long, by seventy in width, and from four to twenty feet high.
Bright coral-like stalactites hang down in irregular rows and in almost every variety of shape and shade, from milk-white to cream color; forming a most agreeable contrast with the dark arches and the frowning buttresses on either hand, while low-browed ridges, some almost black, others of a reddish-brown, stretch from either side, the space between which is ornamented with a peculiar kind of coloring which nearly resembles a grotesque species of graining.
Descending toward the left, we approach one of the most singularly beautiful groups of stalactites in this apartment. Some of these are fine pendants, hardly larger than pipestems, from two to five feet long, and hollow from end to end. When the cave was first discovered there were four or five of these pendants over eight feet long, but the early admitted vandals ruthlessly destroyed, or selfishly carried them off. Others resemble the ears of white elephants, or, rather, the white elephant of Siam, while others still present the appearance of long and slender cones, inverted.
Examining this and other groups more closely, we discover at their bases coral-like excrescences of great beauty; here, like petrified moss, brilliant, and almost transparent; there, a pretty fungus, tipped and spangled with diamonds; yonder, miniature pine trees, which, with a most obliging disposition to accommodate themselves to circumstances, grow bottom up. In other places appear fleeces of the finest merino or silky floss.
Leaving these, and turning to the right, we can ascend a ladder into the loftiest part of this chamber. Here new combinations of beauty surprise and delight us. Thence passing on, we come to a large stalagmite, whose form and size suggest a tying post for horses. This has been dignified, or mystified, anything but beautified, by different names, more or less appropriate. One is "Lot's Wife." If the woman was no higher than the stalagmite she must have been a dwarf, for the top of the post is but four feet and a quarter above its bottom, while its diameter at the bottom is hardly one foot. Its two other names, "Hercules' Club," and "Brobdignag's Forefinger," are more appropriate, though the latter would suggest an "exaggeration," as Mrs. Partington would have it.
Continuing on, we pass over a gently rising floor resembling solidified snow, until we approach the verge of, and look down into, an immense abyss, surmounted by a cavernous roof. Icicle and coral formations depend from the roof, and a rude drapery of jet covers the sides. Here is suspended a singular petrifaction resembling a human heart, which looks as if it might have belonged to one of the primitive Titans, or come from the chest of that Miltonian monster, whose spear-shaft was like a Norway pine.
On one side of this is an elevated and nearly level natural floor, upon which a table and seats have been temporarily erected for the convenience of choristers, choirs or singing societies, and even for the accommodation of public worship, should any desire to witness or participate in it in this most beautiful of God's natural temples. The lover of sacred music would be delighted beyond measure to hear these "vaulted hills" resound the symphonies of Mozart, Haydn or Mendelssohn. Scores of these pendent harps would vibrate in unison, or echo them in delicious harmonies from chamber to chamber, or bear them from roof to wall in diminishing reverberations even to the most remote of these rock-formed corridors.
We may not linger here too long, so passing hence, we enter other and smaller chambers, along whose roofs we trace formations that resemble streams of water suddenly arrested in their flow and turned to ice. In another, a peculiarly shaped petrifaction presents a perfectly formed beet from one point of view, while from another it resembles a small elephant's head. Not far hence, a bell-shaped hollow, a beautiful combination of grotto and arcade, has received the name of "Julia's Bower."
Once more advancing, a narrow, low-roofed passage brings us into the most beautiful chamber of all, the