Near to the Show-room is the cave of "The Grand Stalactites." It is only about 10 feet by 13 feet, but its massive grandeur is so impressive that the pleasure it produces is "akin to pain." Some of the stalagmites are enormous. Their summit is lost in the masses of huge stalactites which depend from the roof, and they rest on beautiful brown terraces and mounds, covered with scintillating reticulation. The elephantine stalagmites, like the stalactites which hang between and about them, and in several instances descend nearly to their base, are of dazzling whiteness. The massive pillars are so close together that the intervening spaces look like columns of jet, and thus we have "buttress and buttress alternately framed of ebon and ivory." The majesty of this cave haunts you. When the magnesium lamp is extinguished and thick darkness once more casts its veil over the magnificent scene, the vision of beauty dwells in the mind like a memory which stirs the depths of the soul. CHAPTER XXV. THE FAIRIES' BOWER. A few paces only from "The Show-room" is "The Fairies' Bower," rich in grotesque lines and mystic crypts, in the purity of the formation which decorates it, and in delicacy of tints and shades. In the midst is a peculiarly-shaped stalactitic pillar resting on a dome, and which may be regarded as the Pixies' trysting-place. Then there are the "Diamond Walls," covered with millions of gems, each of which, as it flashes through the gloom, sparkles like "a rich jewel in an Ethiop's ear," or, like the very obtrusive French paste "drops" which, on her "Sunday out," light up the auricular organs of Mary Jane. It is noticeable that the walls are not of the formation which is diamantiferous. There is nothing suggestive of the diamond beds on the banks of the Ganges, the gem mines of Brazil, the rich fields of South Africa, or even the more recently-discovered diamond-bearing districts of Bingera, Mudgee, or New England, in New South Wales. There is not any gravel-drift, and the reflected light displays neither diamantine lustre nor play of colours; but, nevertheless, there is great brilliancy. It suggests, however, not so much the glories of the Koh-i-noor or the splendours of the Orloff, in the Russian Imperial sceptre, as the glitter of spangles on the dress of the acrobat. THE SELINA CAVE.