The caverns of Luray : an illustrated guide-book to the caverns, explaining the manner of their formation, their peculiar growths, their geology, chemistry, etc. . f Chaos has beengiven. E r e b u s.—Clamberingover a huge pile of ruinsin Giants Hall, andmounting to a consider-able height by means of aladder, we enter upon theroute to Erebus. On ourway Ave find many curiousformations to these maybementioned The Toys, acluster of upward andlateral helictitic grow* §gathered about the cital of a stalactitic coluTurning about we find^ieway from this point toErebus arduous and diffi-cu
The caverns of Luray : an illustrated guide-book to the caverns, explaining the manner of their formation, their peculiar growths, their geology, chemistry, etc. . f Chaos has beengiven. E r e b u s.—Clamberingover a huge pile of ruinsin Giants Hall, andmounting to a consider-able height by means of aladder, we enter upon theroute to Erebus. On ourway Ave find many curiousformations to these maybementioned The Toys, acluster of upward andlateral helictitic grow* §gathered about the cital of a stalactitic coluTurning about we find^ieway from this point toErebus arduous and diffi-cult. It grows smaller andsmaller until we mustneeds creep, at full length,some twenty feet througha narrow, wet, and muddypassage, which is but acrack in the blue lime-stone. It is impossible toavoid the stalactites be-setting the way, and the dripping water fills the eyes with thetears appropriate to so uncomfortable a situation. Our clothingis reduced to a miserable plight. We are rewarded upon our emergence into Crystal Room bythe discovery of numerous hexagonal crystals, transparent, oflarge size, andTbeautiful. They project from the ceiling, in clus-. ARRANGEMENT IN STONE. 46 ters commonly, and arc found only where the ceiling is theoriginal blue limestone, within which, in cavities, they seem tohave been formed at some remote period. They are two,threeand four inches in length, and from one to twelve-sixteenths ofan inch in thickness. We rest at last in Erebus, a room large, dark and dismal,having the shape of the figure 8. At the point correspondingwith the middle of the figure, a large and symmetrical columnof brownish-white stone rises from floor to ceiling, a distanceof about seventy feet. It is the only column of any size in theroom. Along the side runs a sort of gallery containing finespecimens illustrating the processes of vegetal growth. E%tering this gallery we find it filled with decaying forms, andpeering thence into the central abyss— The dank tarn of Aube
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Keywords: ., bo, bookcentury1800, bookdecade1880, bookidcavernsoflurayil00amme
