from this series, the largest and most beautiful being called, very inappropriately, the Top Cavern. As it leads eventually to a charming piece of cave scenery that we agreed to call the "Bowling Alley," it might well be named after this. [Illustration: IN STUMP CROSS CAVERN. _Photo by E. A. Baker._] [Illustration: THE PILLAR, STUMP CROSS CAVERN. _Photo by E. A. Baker._] I will now, as clearly as I can, follow the steps of the party in their exploration of these Middle Caverns, and proceed afterwards with them into the other series. Descending gradually, and passing many nooks and corners where exquisite recesses are wreathed about by the ivory-white incrustations on wall, roof, and floor, we stayed to drink a ceremonious glass from the icy waters of Jacob's Well, a crystal pool curtained in with masses of stalactite, and then passed on to one of the chief show places seen by the public, bearing the modest name of the Chapel. Its great attraction is the series of massive pillars of translucent white that seem to uphold the arching roof. In few of the caverns that I have explored is there anything to compare with the stateliness of this pure colonnade, the cylindrical shafts of which are a good deal longer than a man's height, and modelled fantastically by the irregular deposit of the calc spar. One column in this part of the cave measured three feet in circumference. A peculiar beauty was the transparency of the material, a pure glassy white through which the light of a candle shone clearly, whilst a light inside converted the hanging folds and clusters of stalactites into a beautiful species of lantern. On the walls were folds and ridges of snowy stalagmite, and from the roof hung stalactites of all shapes and sizes, myriads of threadlike growths hanging in a lacy fringe. Onwards the arcading and the array of pillars extended into a roomy vault, the end of which struck upwards, as already explained, south-eastwards, toward Dry Gill. Though a perceptible draught comes through from the open air, and the heaps of clay-coated blocks show that a swallet is not far off above, no way can be forced through without excavation. Augmented by the arrival of two or three local friends, the party descended, after lunch, into the Lower Caverns. Unlike the other passages, with their continual windings and perplexing branches, these two series of large vaults, narrow tunnels, and almost impracticable crevices maintain a westerly direction throughout, and the few branches strike off decisively to the right or to the left. Two of us, being delayed by some trifling accident, missed the others at the bottom of the short vertical descent, and, unaware that there were two series of passages, crept on along the first that opened. This had the appearance of an old stream-bed, the ground being littered in places with blocks of Limestone, in others clayey, and in some parts smoothed down by the rush of a torrent. High in places, it often dwindled to a very