As he pulled it
gradually up, I was startled to find that the ice fell away sharply
immediately below the spot where we had been collected, and then formed
a solid wall; so that we had been standing on the mere edge of a shelf,
with nothing but black emptiness below. How far the solid wall receded
at the bottom I was unable to determine, for the light of one candle was
of very little use at so great a distance, and in darkness so profound.
I persuaded the maire to make an effort to reach a point from which he
could see the insecurity of the ice which had seemed to form so solid a
floor; and he was so much impressed by what he saw, that he fled with
precipitation from the cave, and we eventually found him asleep under a
bush on the rocks above. In reaching the farther side of the pit, we
crossed unwittingly an ice-bridge formed by a transverse pit or tunnel
in the ice, which opened into the pit we were examining. The maire
afterwards promised to rail off all that end of the glaciere, and forbid
his workmen to venture upon it. Considering that the hole itself was
only opened two years before by the fall of a column, and has already
undergone such changes, I shall be surprised if the ice-bridge, and all
that part on which we lay to fathom the pit, does not fall in before
very long; and then, by means of steps and ropes and ladders, it may be
possible to reach the entrance to the lower cave, 190 feet below the
surface of the earth.
Pages:
256
257
258
259
260
261
262
263
264
265
266
267
268
269
270
271
272
273
274
275
276
277
278
279
280