I wept in joy, and threw my arms about my guide, forgetting in the ecstasy his clammy cuticle, and danced in hysterical glee and alternately laughed and cried. How vividly I realized then that the imprisoned miner would give a world of gold, his former god, for a ray of light.
"Compose yourself; this emotional exhibition is an evidence of weakness; an investigator should neither become depressed over a reverse, nor unduly enthusiastic over a fortunate discovery."
"But we approach the earth's surface? Soon I will be back in the sunshine again."
"Upon the contrary, we have been continually descending into the earth, and we are now ten miles or more beneath the level of the ocean."
"WE APPROACH DAYLIGHT, I CAN SEE YOUR FORM."
I shrank back, hesitated, and in despondency gazed at his hazy outline, then, as if palsied, sank upon the stony floor; but as I saw the light before me, I leaped up and shouted:
"What you say is not true; we approach daylight, I can see your form."
"Listen to me," he said. "Can not you understand that I have led you continually down a steep descent, and that for hours there has been no step upward? With but little exertion you have walked this distance without becoming wearied, and you could not, without great fatigue, have ascended for so long a period. You are entering a zone of inner earth light; we are in the surface, the upper edge of it. Let us hasten on, for when this cavern darkness is at an end—and I will say we have nearly passed that limit—your courage will return, and then we will rest."