By a route obscure and lonely, Haunted by ill angels only, Where the Eidalon, named night On a black throne reigns upright; I have reached these lands but newly From an ultimate dim Thule, From a wild, weird chink sublime, Out of space and out of time. When you speak loudly your words have a weird sepulchral tone that echoes far and near through the spacious halls and avenues that makes the black pall of mystery all the more uncanny. As you first enter on your journey on this stream of inky blackness you are appalled by the awful darkness, and the stillness so intense is like that of some vast primeval forest at midnight. The ceiling is so low at one place you can touch it with your hands. With rock above and on both sides of you and water beneath, you think you have a faint conception of Hades. You hear no sound but the gentle splash of the water struck by the oars, or the labored and rapid breathing of the more timid ones of your party. Suddenly your boat stops and the guide utters a few tones beginning low in the scale and running higher, when, lo! the whole subterranean cavern seems filled with fairy tongues and becomes melodious with softer, sweeter tones until they die away among those avenues, like the music heard only in the realm of dreams. Some one suggests that a song be sung, whereupon an Irishman with deep sonorous voice starts, "Nearer, My God, to Thee," but he only sings but one line, for the clamor of voices insisting on another selection, is like that of a flock of crows in autumn who have discovered an owl. The multitudinous echoes, if not as musical as the voice of the guide, made more obvious harmony. Thus do these aged halls send back rarest melodies for the discordant notes received. How like the noble souls one knows who take the discordant jeers and taunts of the world and by a life of serenity and steadfastness of purpose (which is ever to help mankind onward) build for them an admiration and devotion that returns from a multitude of grateful hearts like musical echoes, perhaps too late unheard. The temperature of both Luray Caverns and Mammoth Cave is uniformly fifty-four degrees Fahrenheit throughout the year, and the atmosphere is both chemically and optically of singular purity. For this reason stone huts were once erected for consumptives in Mammoth Cave. Thirteen was the original number and for the poor unfortunates who inhabited them it was most unlucky; the patients became worse, and on being taken from their subterranean homes in Mammoth Cave quickly died. Only two of the huts still remain. "Those curious mortals who are always seeking morgues and graveyard scenes should come here." What a place for contemplation! "Into what vast unrecorded ages the philosopher could let his thoughts go back!"