With great care the monk led the way down the steps of stone, until they numbered thirty, when they terminated in a narrow platform, which, indeed, was nothing more than a step somewhat longer than the others. Here our adventurers descended another stairway, likewise ending in a platform, and then yet another stairway was terminated by another platform; and thus they descended stairway after stairway, and crossed platform after platform, until the increasing coldness and dampness of the atmosphere, warned them that they had penetrated far below the surface of the earth.
Suddenly the stairway ended in a large and gloomy vault, with walls and floor of the unhewn rock.
On the side nearest the stairway, a gate of iron was erected between the points of two large and irregular rocks.
Through a large crevice which time had worn into this gate, the monk and Adrian passed into a vault like the former, except that the dim light of the taper discovered the rough floor strewn with grinning skulls, and whitened bones.
Along this dreary place strode the monk, lighting the way, while, at his back followed Adrian Di Albarone. In about a quarter of an hour the vault narrowed into a confined passage, along which they crawled on hands and knees. This terminated in another vault, sloping upwards with a gradual ascent, which having traversed, our adventurers found themselves again between two narrowing walls, and finally, all further progress was stopped by a large stone thrown directly across the path. Adrian spoke for the first time in half an hour—
“And are we to be baulked after all the adventures of this night?”
The monk answered by pointing to the stone, to which he and his companion presently laid their shoulders, but their united strength was insufficient to remove it.
Again they tried, and again were they unsuccessful; they made a third attempt, and the stone was precipitated before them.
Seizing the light, Adrian threw himself into the breach, and discovered an extensive vault, hedged in by walls built of hewn stone, while the floor was covered by rows of coffins, with here and there a monument of marble. Throwing themselves into this place, they picked their way through the dreary line of coffins, when they came to a wide staircase which they ascended, until they found it suddenly terminated by the archway above.
The monk raised his hand, and drawing a bolt which Adrian had not perceived, he pushed with all his strength against the archway, and a trap-door rose above the heads of our adventurers.—Through this passage the monk ascended, followed by Adrian, who looked around with a gaze of wonder, and found himself standing in the aisle of the Grand Cathedral of Florence.