A Madeira Party

by S. Weir Mitchell

"'Halloa!' cried our thief. 'Keep still!' and so saying, hid the lantern under the skirt of his coat. I was dreadfully scared, for these dark caverns were full of mysterious noises. As yet we had heard none like this which now we heard. In the dark I seized the thief's coat-tail for company. At intervals there were lesser noises, and when at last they ceased, the Duke cried out, 'Heavens! What was that?'

"'I will see, Monsieur,' said the thief. 'I shall not go far.' This time the Duke made no remonstrance. The thief was away not more than five minutes. He left the lantern beside my mother.

"'Well?' said she, as he reappeared.

"'Madame,' he answered, the tunnel from the wine-cellar has fallen in: a great tumble of stone fills up all the way.'

"'And to go back is impossible,' said the Duke.

"'Heaven has willed for us that we go on, and at least now no one can pursue us,' said my mother.

"'That is so,' said the Duke; and we moved along, perceiving that the way grew broader until we were standing in a space so great that no walls could be seen.

"'And now where are we?' said the Duke. 'Light us another candle.' When this was done, we saw that the great chamber, quarried out in past centuries, was too vast to give us sight of all of it, or to enable us to get a notion of its height. Close by us a mighty pyramid of bones of men stood in the mid space, as if these had been cast down through some opening overhead, but long since closed. These were the dead of hundreds of years. There was no odor of decay, but only a dull, musty smell, like that of decayed cheese. Here and there on this great pile were faint tufts of bluish light, seen only where the lantern-light did not chance to fall. I was just getting a little used to this horrible sight when, as our steps disturbed the base of the pyramid, a good fourth of it came rattling down with crash and clatter, and dozens of tumbled skulls rolled by us and were lost to view in the darkness. This noise and movement alarmed not us alone; for scarce was it half over when myriads of rats ran out from among the bones and fled away. This pretty nearly made an end of my courage; and, indeed, these beasts were so big and so many that had they been brave we should, I think, have fallen an easy prey.

"My mother was trembling all over, as I could feel; but she laughed a queer little laugh when François said it was a mercy they were not mice, because ladies were afraid of these, but not, he had heard, of rats. As we had been kept in motion, by this time we were across this woeful space, and groping along the wall for a way out. Finding none, we went back whence we came, and started afresh, taking the extreme righthand passage, which seemed to lead, as we guessed, toward the Luxembourg. Every few yards were ways to left or right, some hard to crawl through, but most of such size that the Duke, a tall man, could walk in them erect. We saw no more bones, but rats in legions. How they lived, who can say? They may have come from the cellars of houses overhead. When we crossed beneath streets, the immense noise of the vehicles told us this much, but hours went by with no sound but the scamper of rats, or the dull dripping of water from the roof. In some places it was a foul-smelling rain, and in one place a small rill fell down the wall and ran off along the passage we were in.

"I do not know, Monsieur,"—and here the old gentleman, being next to me, leaned over and laid a hand on my knee,—"I do not know how I can ever make you or any one feel the increasing horror of day after day of darkness. When we walked, it was often with no light until the thief, who kept touching the wall, would tell us there was a passage to the right or left. Then we would light the candle and decide which way to go.