Soon after the self-banished lord made his appearance at Oberstein in a hermit’s garb, and set to work upon the hard rock with indefatigable zeal. Never was labour performed with better will, and such, consequently, was the progress of the excavation that it seemed as if he were assisted by the angels in his penitential task. At the expiration of four years, the rock-chapel was completed, and the bones of the murdered man were conveyed with great ceremony to the tomb which had been prepared for their reception at the foot of the altar. As soon as they were lowered into the grave, the murderer bent over them; a smile of ineffable happiness was seen to illumine his emaciated features, and he dropped down dead upon the remains of his brother. CHAPTER XVII. ICE-CAVES AND WIND-HOLES. Ice-caves of St. Georges and St. Livres—Beautiful Ice-stalagmites in the Cave of La Baume—The Schafloch—Ice Cataract in the Upper Glacière of St. Livres—Ice Cavern of Eisenerz—The Cave of Yeermalik—Volcanic Ice- caves—Æolian Caverns of Terni—Causes of the low temperature of Ice- caves. Some caves, remarkable for an extremely low temperature even in summer, form natural ice-cellars, though unconnected with glaciers or snow mountains, and in latitudes and at altitudes where ice could not under ordinary circumstances be supposed to exist. Besides the interest attaching to these natural curiosities, these ice-caves are sometimes lucrative sources of revenue to their owners, or answer various purposes of use or comfort. In hot summers, when the supplies of the artificial ice-houses fail in Geneva and Lausanne, the hotel-keepers have recourse to the stores laid up for them by nature in the ice-caves or glacières of St. Georges and St. Livres, situated in the canton of Vaud, on the slope of the Jura. Other ice-caves are made use of as dairies, or as storehouses for cheese; and the quarries of Niedermendig, near the small town of Andernach, on the Rhine, which are likewise remarkable for a glacial temperature, serve as excellent beer-cellars. To Mr. Browne, who has made them his special study, we are indebted for an interesting account of the ice-caves of France and Switzerland,[26] which, as may naturally be expected in halls and galleries hung with drapery of transparent silver, not seldom offer scenes of beauty rivalling the most renowned stalactital grottoes. Footnote 26: ‘Ice Caves of France and Switzerland: a Narrative of Subterranean Exploration.’ By the Rev. G. F. Browne. Longmans, 1865. [Illustration: LOWER GLACIÈRE OF ST. LIVRES.]