If we were unable to take the external dimensions of this column, I
had no doubt that we should find internal investigations interesting;
so, to Christian's surprise, I began to chop a hole in it, about two
feet from the ground, and, having made an entrance sufficiently large,
proceeded to get into the cavity which presented itself. The flooring
of the dome-shaped grotto in which I found myself, was loose rock, at
a level about two feet below the surface of the ice-floor on which
Christian still stood. The dome itself was not high enough to allow me
to stand upright, and from the roof, principally from the central
part, a complex mass of delicate icicles passed down to the floor,
leaving a narrow burrowing passage round, which was itself invaded by
icicles from the lower part of the sloping roof, and by stubborn
stalagmites of ice rising from the floor.[61] The details of this
central cluster of icicles, and in fact of every portion of the
interior of the strange grotto, were exceedingly lovely, and I crushed
with much regret, on hands and knees, through fair crystal forests and
frozen dreams of beauty.
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