One day, Mr. Lindsay, the most intrepid traveller I had ever known, and who had recently accompanied me to the lake of Socolme, proposed to me to go with him to the grotto of San-Mateo, a place that several travellers and myself had visited more than once, but always in so incomplete a manner, that we had only been able to explore a small portion of it. I was too well pleased with the proposal not to accept it with eagerness; but this time I resolved that I would not return from this expedition, as I had from former ones, without having made every possible effort to explore its dimensions and recesses. Lindsay, Dr. Genu, and my brother, participated in my resolution of verifying whether or not there was any semblance of truth in what the Indians related concerning that grotto; or if, as I had so often experienced it myself, their poetic minds did not create what had never existed. Their old Indian traditions attributed to that cavern an immense extent. There, they would say, are to be seen fairy palaces, with which nothing could be compared, and which were the residences of fantastical beings. Determined, then, on seeing with our own eyes all these wonders, we set out for San-Mateo, taking with us an Indian, having with him a crowbar and a couple of pickaxes, to dig us out a way, should we have the chance of prolonging our subterraneous walk beyond the limits which we all already knew. We also took with us a good provision of flambeaus, so necessary to put our project into execution. We arrived early at San-Mateo, and spent the remaining part of the day in visiting admirable views and situations in the neighbourhood. We also went down into the bed of a torrent that takes its source in the mountains, and passes through the north side of this district; there we saw several Indians, male and female, all busy in washing the sand in search of gold-dust. Their daily produce at this work varies from one to ten francs; this depends on the more or less fortunate vein that perchance they fall on. This trade, together with the tilling of land--to be equalled by no other in fertility--and hewing timber for building, which is to be found most plentifully on the neighbouring mountains, is all the wealth of the inhabitants, who, in most part, live in abundance and prosperity.