One of these cones was especially remarkable. It was at least five
meters high--Von Allmen said eight--and at the bottom was about four
meters in diameter. The base of this cone was entirely hollow. There
was a break on one side by which we could enter, and we then stood
on a rock floor with a small ice dome or vault overhead. I have seen
no other hollow cone like this. The guide lighted a red Bengal fire
inside, when the whole pyramid glowed with a delicate pink light,
resembling _Alpenglühn_. Near this cone stood the half of another
ice cone. It was quite perfect, and the missing half was cut off
perpendicularly, as if with a huge cleaver. A hollow in the base of
the remnant showed that this cone must have been originally also a
hollow cone, and its destruction was probably due to the change in the
temperature of the drip from the roof, at the setting in of the summer
thaw.
Just beyond the cones, the ice floor steepens and curls over into a
big ice slope, one of the finest I have seen. Von Allmen spoke of this
as _der gletscher_, an expression I never heard applied elsewhere to
subterranean ice. On the right side, the slope would be difficult
to descend in the darkness. On the left, the slope is gentle and a
rock juts out a little way down. Von Allmen insisted on roping--an
unnecessary safeguard--but he said: "If you slip, you will probably
break an arm or a leg, and then we shall be in a nice mess." He then
cut about twelve steps in the ice, down to the rock, while I shed light
on the performance with our torch. We were so completely away from
daylight that black was the predominating color; and even the ice was a
dark gray, and only appeared white in the high lights. Below the rock,
we found a narrow strip on the left side of the ice slope free from ice
and blocked with boulders, over which we carefully picked our way down.
At the bottom, the ice expanded into a level surface, stretching nearly
to the end of the cave. There were only a few fissure columns in this
part of the cavern, where the most remarkable feature was the cracks
in the rock walls, which were so regular in formation that they almost
looked like man's handiwork. The rocks are free from stalactites, and
in fact stalactites seem a good deal of a rarity in glacières.
On retracing our steps, we saw, when the first glimmers of daylight
became perceptible, the rocks assume a brilliant blue color, as if they
were flooded with moonlight. This effect lasted until near the mouth of
the cavern.
[Illustration: HOLLOW CONE AND FISSURE COLUMNS, SCHAFLOCH.]
DÉMÉNYFÁLVA JEGBARLANG.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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