Rambles in the Mammoth Cave, during the Year 1844 | Page 3

even the loudest peal of thunder, is heard one quarter of a mile in the Cave.
* * * * *
The author of "Rambles in the Mammoth Cave," has written a scientific account of the Cave, embracing its Geology, Mineralogy, etc., which we could not, in time, insert in this publication.

TABLE OF DISTANCES.
FROM LOUISVILLE TO MAMMOTH CAVE.
Medley's 10 miles. Mouth Salt River 10 Trueman's 8 Haycraft's 7 Elizabethtown 9 Nolin 9 Lucas 11 Munfordsville 10 Mammoth Cave 14-1/2 ------ 88-1/2 miles.
FROM LEXINGTON TO MAMMOTH CAVE.
Harrodsburgh 20 miles. Perryville 10 Frosts 12 Young 4 Lebanon 7 New Market 12 Barbee 6 Somerville 3 Carters 5 Moss 5 Mitchell 12 Curls 7 Greens 10 Dickeys 8 Mammoth Cave 9 --- 130 miles.
FROM GLASGOW TO MAMMOTH CAVE, via
Dickeys 18 miles.
FROM NASHVILLE TO MAMMOTH CAVE.
Gees 9 miles. Tyree Springs 13 Buntons 12 Franklin 10 Bowling Green 20 Pattersons 12 Dripping Springs 3 Mammoth Cave 8 -- 87 miles.
FROM BARDSTOWN TO MAMMOTH CAVE.
New Haven 15 miles. McDougals 10 McAchran (Cobb's stand) 12 Bear Wallow 20 Dickeys (Prewett's Knob) 7 Mammoth Cave 9 -- 73 miles.
FROM BARDSTOWN TO MAMMOTH CAVE, via. MUNFORDSVILLE.
McAchran (Cobb's stand) 37 miles. Munfordsville 12 Mammoth Cave 14-1/2 ------ 63-1/2 miles.
FROM GLASGOW TO MAMMOTH CAVE, via.
Bells 18 miles.

CONTENTS.

CHAPTER I.
Mammoth Cave--Where Situated--Green River--Improved Navigation--Range of Highlands--Beautiful Woodlands--Hotel--Romantic Dell--Mouth of the Cave--Coldness of the Air--Lamps Lighted--Bones of a Giant--Violence of the Wind--Lamps Extinguished--Temperature of the Cave--Lamps Relighted--First Hopper--Grand Vestibule--Glowing Description--Audubon Avenue--Little Bat Room--Pit two hundred and eighty feet deep--Main Cave--Kentucky Cliffs--The Church Second Hopper--Extent of the Saltpetre Manufacture in 1814.

CHAPTER II.
Gothic Gallery--Gothic Avenue--Good Road--Mummies--Interesting Account of Them--Gothic Avenue, once called Haunted Chamber--Why so named--Adventure of a Miner in former days.

CHAPTER III.
Stalagmite Pillars--The Bell--Vulcan's Furnace--Register Rooms-- Stalagmite Hall or Gothic Chapel--Devil's Arm-Chair--Elephant's Head--Lover's Leap--Napoleon's Dome--Salts Cave--Annetti's Dome.

CHAPTER IV.
The Ball-Room--Willie's Spring--Wandering Willie--Ox-Stalls--Giant's Coffin--Acute-Angle or Great Bend--Range of Cabins--Curative Properties of the Cave Air long known.

CHAPTER V.
Star Chamber--Salts Room--Indian Houses--Cross Rooms--Black Chambers--A Dinner Party--Humble Chute--Solitary Cave--Fairy Grotto--Chief City or Temple--Lee's Description--Return to the Hotel.

CHAPTER VI.
Arrival of a large Party--Second Visit--Lamps Extinguished--Laughable Confusion--Wooden Bowl--Deserted Chambers--Richardson's Spring--Side-Saddle Fit--The Labyrinth--Louisa's Dome--Gorin's Dome--Bottomless Fit--Separation of our Party.

CHAPTER VII.
Pensico Avenue--Cheat Crossings--Pine Apple Bush--Angelica's Grotto Winding Way--Fat Friend in Trouble--Relief Hall--Bacon Chamber Bandits Hall.

CHAPTER VIII.
Mammoth Dome--First Discoverers--Little Dave--Tale of a Lamp--Return.

CHAPTER IX.
Third Visit--River Hall--Dead Sea--River Styx--Lethe--Echo River--Purgatory--Eyeless Fish--Supposed Level of the Rivers--Sources and Outlet Unknown.

CHAPTER X.
Pass of El Ghor--Silliman's Avenue--Wellington's Gallery--Sulphur Spring--Mary's Vineyard--Holy Sepulchre--Commencement of Cleveland Avenue--By whom Discovered--Beautiful Formations--Snow-ball Room--Rocky Mountains--Croghan's Hall--Serena's Arbor--Dining Table--Dinner Party and Toast--Hoax of the Guide--Homeward Bound Passage--Conclusion.


CHAPTER I.
Mammoth Cave--Where Situated--Green River--Improved Navigation--Range of Highlands--Beautiful Woodlands--Hotel--Romantic Dell--Mouth of the Cave--Coldness of the Air--Lamps Lighted--Bones of a Giant--Violence of the Wind--Lamps Extinguished--Temperature of the Cave--Lamps Lighted--First Hoppers--Grand Vestibule--Glowing Description--Audubon Avenue--Little Bat Room--Pit Two-Hundred and Eighty Feet Deep--Main Cave--Kentucky Cliffs--The Church--Second Hoppers--Extent of the Saltpetre Manufacture in 1814.
The Mammoth Cave is situated in the County of Edmondson and State of Kentucky, equidistant from the cities of Louisville and Nashville, (about ninety miles from each,) and immediately upon the nearest road between those two places. Green River is within half a mile of the Cave, and since the improvements in its navigation, by the construction of locks and dams, steam-boats can, at all seasons, ascend to Bowling Green, distant but twenty-two miles, and, for the greater part of the year, to the Cave itself.
In going to the Cave from Munfordsville, you will observe a lofty range of barren highlands to the North, which approaches nearer and nearer the Cave as you advance, until it reaches to within a mile of it. This range of highlands or cliffs, composed of calcareous rock, pursuing its rectilinear course, is seen the greater part of the way as you proceed on towards Bowling Green; and, at last, looses itself in the counties below. Under this extensive range of cliffs it is conjectured that the great subterranean territory mainly extends itself.
For a distance of two miles from the Cave, as you approach it from the South-East, the country is level. It was, until recently, a prairie, on which, however, the oak, chestnut and hickory are now growing; and having no underbrush, its smooth, verdant openings present, here and there, no unapt resemblance to the parks of the English nobility.
Emerging from these beautiful woodlands, you suddenly have a view of the hotel and adjacent grounds, which is truly lovely and picturesque. The hotel is a large edifice, two hundred feet long by forty-five wide, with piazzas, sixteen feet wide, extending the whole length of the building, both above and below, well furnished, and kept in a style, by Mr. Miller, that cannot fail to please the most fastidious epicure.
The Cave is about two-hundred yards from the hotel, and you proceed to it down a lovely and romantic dell, rendered umbrageous by a forest of trees and grape vines; and passing by the ruins of saltpetre furnaces and large mounds