Sir Thomas Browne says, in the _Religio Medici,_ 'Conceive light
invisible, and that is a spirit.' We very nearly saw a spirit here.
The descent from the mouth of this chamber to the deeper recesses of the
main fissure was very rough, but was speedily accomplished, and we
reached a point where solid rock stopped us in face; while, to the
right, a chamber with a threshold of ice was visible, and, to the left,
a dark opening, down which the descent appeared to continue. From this
opening all the strong cold current came. We took the ice-chamber first.
The entrance had evidently been closed till very lately by a large
column of ice, and we passed over the debris, between rock portals and
on a floor of solid grey ice, into a triangular cave of any height the
imagination might choose to fix. The entire floor of the cave was of
ice, giving the impression of infinite thickness and firmness. A little
water stood on it, near the threshold, so limpid that we could not see
where it commenced. The base of this triangular floor we found to be 17
feet, and its altitude 30 feet; and though these dimensions may seem
comparatively small, the whole effect of the thick mass of ice on which
we stood, with the cascades of ice in the corners, and the ice-figures
on the walls, and the three sides of the cave passing up into sheer
darkness, was exceedingly striking, situated, as it all was, so deep
down in the bowels of the earth.
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