Here was a _subterranean village_! Myriads of men and women dwelt in this awful place, where the sun never shone; here they festered with corruption, and died of starvation and wretchedness--those who were poor; and here also the fugitive murderer, the branded outlaw, the hunted thief, and the successful robber, laden with his booty, found a safe asylum, where justice _dare not_ follow them--here they gloried in the remembrance of past crimes, and anticipated future enormities. Men had no secrets here;--for no treachery could place them within the grasp of the law, and every one spoke openly and boldly of his long-hidden deeds of villainy and outrage. 'Come', said the boy to the stranger--'let us go the rounds and see what's going on.' They drew nigh a large, shelving aperture in the earth, on one side of the vault, and looking in saw a man, nearly naked; seated upon a heap of excrement and filthy straw. A fragment of a penny candle was burning dimly near him, which showed him to be literally daubed from head to foot with the vilest filth. Before him lay the carcase of some animal which had died from disease--it was swollen and green with putrefaction; and oh, horrible! we sicken as we record the loathsome fact--the starved wretch was ravenously devouring the carrion! Yes, with his finger nails, long as vultures' claws, he tore out the reeking entrails, and ate them with the ferocity of the grave-robbing hyena! One of the spectators spoke to him, but he only growled savagely, and continued his revolting meal. 'Oh, God!' said the stranger, shuddering--'this is horrible!' 'Pooh!' rejoined the boy--'_that's_ nothing at all to what you will see if you have the courage and inclination to follow me wherever I shall lead you, in these vaults.' In another cavern an awful scene presented itself. It was an Irish _wake_--a dead body lay upon the table, and the relations and friends of the deceased were howling their lamentations over it. An awful stench emanating from the corpse, indicated that the process of decomposition had already commenced. In one corner, several half-crazed, drunken, naked wretches were fighting with the ferocity of tigers, and the mourners soon joining in the fray, a general combat ensued, in the fury of which, the table on which lay the body was overturned, and the corpse was crushed beneath the feet of the combatants.