Alice, I spoze, see on every side a face, jest as young eyes will, when young hearts are full of love and hope.
Wall, Martin sed he must see the catacombs, and I felt, too, that I must go, although I knew it wuz resky. I felt that with his ardent temperament and his eager search after ontried paths, I more’n mistrusted that I should lose Josiah Allen for good in them catacombs. But I ventered, after layin’ stringent rules onto that small, but ambitious man.
Sez I, “Don’t you lose sight of me through the day, Josiah Allen!”
“How can I see you in the dark?” sez he.
“Foller my voice!” sez I.
“That’s an easy job,” sez he; “I could foller that for years and years, and not lose a minute.”
I d’no what he meant; he wuz excited and kinder wanderin’ in his mind, I believe.
“The guides went ahead with flarin’ lights.”
Wall, when we descended into the bowels of the earth, I felt queer, queer as a dog. The guides went ahead, with flarin’ lights held up to guide us, and as we proceeded onwards through what seemed to be milds and milds of underground rooms and halls and windin’ ways, the thought come, and I couldn’t keep it out of my mind—