THE BOTTOMLESS PIT.
If you pass behind Satan's Throne, by a narrow ascending path, you come into a vast hall where there is nothing but naked rock. This empty dreary place is appropriately called the Deserted Chamber. Walking along the verge, you arrive at another avenue, inclosing sulphur springs. Here the guide warns you of the vicinity of a pit, one hundred and twenty feet deep, in the shape of a saddle. Stooping over it, and looking upward, you see an abyss of precisely the same shape over head; a fact which indicates that it began in the upper region, and was merely interrupted by this chamber.
From this, you may enter a narrow and very tortuous path, called the Labyrinth, which leads to an immense split, or chasm, in the rocks. Here is placed a ladder, down which you descend twenty-five or thirty feet, and enter a narrow cave below, which brings you to a combination of rock called the Gothic Window. You stand in this recess, while the guided ascends huge cliffs overhead, and kindles Bengal Lights, by the help of which you see, two hundred feet above you, a Gothic dome of one solid rock, perfectly overawing in its vastness and height. Below, is an abyss of darkness, which no eye but the Eternal can fathom. If, instead of descending the ladder, you pass straight alongside the chasm, you arrive at the Bottomless Pit, beyond which no one ever ventured to proceed till 1838. To this fact we probably owe the meagre account given by Lieber, in the Encyclopædia Americana. He says, "This cave is more remarkable for extent, than the variety or beauty of its productions; having none of the beautiful stalactites found in many other caves." For a long period this pit was considered bottomless, because, when stones were thrown into it, they reverberated and reverberated along the sides, till lost to the ear, but seemed to find no resting place. It has since been sounded, and found to be one hundred and forty feet deep, with a soft muddy bottom, which returns no noise when a stone strikes upon it. In 1838, the adventurous Stephen threw a ladder across the chasm, and passed over. There is now a narrow bridge of two planks, with a little railing on each side; but as it is impossible to sustain it by piers, travellers must pass over in the centre, one by one, and not touch the railing, lest they disturb the balance, and overturn the bridge.
This walk brings you into Pensico Avenue. Hitherto, the path has been rugged, wild, and rough, interrupted by steep acclivities, rocks, and big stones; but this avenue has a smooth and level floor, as if the sand had been spread out by gently flowing waters. Through this, descending more and more, you come to a deep arch, by which you enter the Winding Way; a strangely irregular and zig-zag path, so narrow that a very stout man could not squeeze through. In some places, the rocks at the sides are on a line with your shoulders, then piled high over your head; and then again you rise above, and overlook them all, and see them heaped behind you, like the mighty waves of the Red Sea, parted for the Israelites to pass through. This toilsome path was evidently made by a rushing, winding torrent. Toward the close, the water not having force enough to make a smooth bed, has bored a tunnel. This is so low and narrow, that the traveller is obliged to stoop and squeeze himself through. Suddenly he passes into a vast hall, called the Great Relief; and this leads into the River Hall, at the side of which you have a glimpse of a small cave, called the Smoke House, because it is hung with rocks perfectly in the shape of hams. The River Hall descends like the slope of a mountain. The ceiling stretches away—away—before you, vast and grand as the firmament at midnight. No one, who has never seen this cave, can imagine the excitement, and awe, with which the traveller keeps his eye fixed on the rocky ceiling, which, gradually revealed in the passing light, continually exhibits some new and unexpected feature of sublimity or beauty.
One of the most picturesque sights in the world, is to see a file of men and women passing along these wild and craggy paths—slowly, slowly—that their lamps may have time to illuminate the sky-like ceiling, and gigantic walls; disappearing behind the high cliffs, sinking into ravines, their lights shining upward through fissures in the rocks; then suddenly emerging from some abrupt angle, standing in the bright gleam of their lamps, relieved against the towering black masses around them. He who could paint the infinite variety of creation, can alone give an adequate description of this marvellous region. At one side of River Hall is a steep precipice, over which you can look down, by aid of blazing missiles, upon a broad, black sheet of water, eighty feet below, called the Dead Sea. This is an awfully impressive place, the sights and sounds of which do not easily pass from memory. He who has seen it will have it vividly brought before him by Alfieri's description of Filippo: "Only a transient word or act gives us a short and dubious glimmer, that reveals to us the abysses of his being; dark, lurid, and terrific, as the throat of the infernal pool." As you pass along, you hear the roar of invisible waterfalls, and at the foot of the slope, the River Styx lies before you, deep and black, overarched with rock. The first glimpse of it brings to mind the descent of Ulysses into hell.
"Where the dark rock o'erhangs the infernal lake,
And mingling screams eternal murmurs make."
Across these unearthly waters, the guide can convey but two passengers at once; and these sit motionless in the canoe, with feet turned apart, so as not to disturb the balance. Three lamps are fastened to the prow, the images of which are reflected in the dismal pool.
If you are impatient of delay, or eager for new adventures, you can leave your companions lingering about the shore, and cross the Styx by a dangerous bridge of precipices overhead. In order to do this, you must ascend a steep cliff and enter a cave above, from an egress of which you find yourself on the bank of the river, eighty feet above its surface, commanding a view of those passing in the boat, and those waiting on the shore. Seen from this height, the lamps in the canoe glare like fiery eyeballs; and the passengers sitting there, so hushed and motionless, look like shadows. The scene is so strangely funereal and spectral, that it seems as if the Greeks must have witnessed it, before they imagined Charon conveying ghosts to the dim regions of Pluto. Your companions, thus seen, do indeed—
"Skim along the dusky glades,
Thin airy shoals, and visionary shades."
