Right under the snowy glacier above us were wide, yawning apertures, arched at the top, and framed, as it were, with ice, in the form of rude portals, through which the white waters of the river burst in a continuous stream. These were ice caves. Climbing over the rough boulders, and then descending into a rocky channel, where the water mounted over our knees, we entered the largest of these singular structures, when a wonderful sight met the gaze. We found ourselves in a cave of some 200 feet in circumference, whose sides of black volcanic rock were sheeted with ice, and festooned with icicles, all grandly and marvellously designed. At the further end from where we entered was a wide, cavernous opening, so dark that the waters of the river, as they burst out of it in a foaming, eddying stream down the centre of the cave in which we stood, looked doubly white, in comparison with the black void out of which they came. We were now right under the enormous glacier that covered the summit of the mountain, and the roof of the cave was formed of a mass of frozen snow, which had been fashioned by some singular law of Nature into oval-shaped depressions of about two feet in height, and a foot and a half broad, all of one uniform size, and so beautifully, and so mathematically precise in outline, as to resemble the quaint designs of a Moorish temple; while, from all the central points to which the edges of these singular designs converged, a long single icicle hung down several inches in diameter at its base, perfectly round and smooth and clear, tapering off towards its end with a point as sharp as a needle. High up on our left, in the walls of the cave, were two apertures like the slanting windows of a dungeon, through which the light streamed, giving a soft, mysterious halo to the whole scene, which looked weird and indescribably curious. We had brought candles with us, and lighting them, we pressed forward to explore the deep cavern beyond, but to do so we had to climb over sharp, slippery rocks, which were covered with a coating of ice, as if they had been glazed with glass, while the white waters streaming beneath us fell into a deep, eddying pool. We managed, after some difficulty, to cross the stream in the second cave, and to penetrate a considerable distance along the treacherous rocks into the very centre, as it were, of the great mountain; but, just as we were winding along a kind of subterranean passage, which looked like a short cut into eternity, our lights went out, owing to the water falling from above, and, as we could hear nothing but rushing waters ahead, we, with some difficulty, beat a retreat into the first cave, which looked like a fairy palace in comparison with the dark cavern we had just left. These caves were at an altitude of 7000 feet above the level of the sea, and we were now at the true source of the remarkable river. Wherever the water poured over the rocks it left a white deposit, and