“In about one hundred feet you encounter a small pond of water filling the whole width of the passage and extending twenty to thirty feet, but the guide tells you it is only one foot deep, and calls attention to the fact that the water does not come within a foot of the roof of the passage and you can easily keep your chin above it, and with this assurance through you go.

“Within the next one hundred feet you encounter and pass in the same manner three more ponds of varying sizes.  The guide calls your attention to the fact that you are not alone, and looking about you by the dim light of your candle you see numbers of small eyeless salamanders, from four inches to one foot long.  They are peaceable and harmless, appear to have no teeth and are easily caught, if you so desire.

“Another hundred feet and the Rest Room, or Egyptian Temple is reached, and rising to your feet you may rest.  The room is small, but contains beautifully fluted walls, resembling basaltic columns; and natural marks of erosion that resemble hieroglyphic inscriptions.  From the other side of this room the passage goes on with the same characteristics, but as you enter to go forward a sound strikes the ear, and you pause to listen.  It is a confusion of sounds, a babel of voices; and sounds like a distant conversation carried on by a large number of people.  So striking is this resemblance that you instantly ask the guide if there are people in the room ahead, and hardly believe him when he says, ‘No.’

“You hear voices of men, voices of boys, babies, girls and ladies, and occasionally loud laughter; but forward is the word and on you go, encouraged by the assurance of the guide that you are now over half way through the passage and that the sounds came from Blondy’s Throne Room.  Suddenly the passage divides into two much alike, and taking the right hand one, you make your slow advance until at last, with clothes soaked and covered with clay mud, and your strength about gone, you begin to feel desperate and tell the guide that you will go no further, when you see him rise to his feet, and he says:  ‘Here we are.’  You step over a steep bank of clay and emerge into a large room.  It is almost square in shape; about eighty feet long and sixty feet wide, and about fifty feet high, with white, smooth walls and a pure white ceiling, and sloping gradually downward on the left ends in a small, clear lake of water.  This lake has a beautiful beach of white pebbles, and though shallow on the edge seems quite deep at the center; in fact it is believed to have there a concealed opening that gives exit to its waters.  On the opposite side from you, a stream of clear water pours into the lake, and in doing so it gives off the sounds that in the passage you mistook for human voices; and this noble stream has been named Mystic River.  It enters the lake from under a beautiful natural arch, about thirty feet across at the bottom, and six feet above the water at the