He showed them the way into their dressing-rooms, and then disappeared into a room of his own. When the youths reappeared, in appropriate costume, their host called to them from somewhere down in the interior of the earth, and they proceeded in the direction of the voice.
AN UNDERGROUND WALK.
By a sloping and slippery stair-way cut in the rock they descended some thirty-five or forty feet till they reached a pool of clear water over which the rock rounded in a high dome nearly to the surface. A hole two or three feet in diameter and covered with an iron grating opened in the centre of the dome, and gave light enough to show the interior of the place very fairly. Many stalactites hung from the roof, and stalagmites stood up wherever they could find standing room. From the grotto where our friends found themselves little nooks and small grottos opened, so that the spot was by no means unattractive. Numerous lizards clung to the rock or swam in the water; and these crawling and slimy things took away many of the merits the bathing-place might have possessed.
FORMATION OF STALACTITES.
"The lizards do no harm," said Mr. Honradez, "but they are not pleasant to look at, and we would gladly drive them out if we could. There is a curious bird called the 'toh' which lives in the cenotés; it has a soft plumage, and sports a long tail of only two feathers, which have nothing on their stems until the very tip is reached. If you look sharp you may possibly see an eyeless fish similar to the fishes which are found in the Mammoth Cave in Kentucky."
The youths looked in every direction, and though Frank thought he saw one of these strange members of the finny tribe he was unable to capture it. Frank asked if the cenotés communicated with each other or were separately supplied from the rains sinking into the ground.