This place was named by the hunters of these plains, the White Castle, from the colour of the blocks of granite which formed it. "We shall never be able to get up there with our horses," said Loyal Heart, after carefully surveying for an instant the space they had to clear. "Let us try, at all events!" said Belhumeur, pulling his horse by the bridle. The ascent was rough, and any other horses than those of hunters, accustomed to the most difficult roads, would have been unable to accomplish it, but would have rolled from the top to the bottom. It was necessary to choose with care the spot on which the foot must be placed, and then to spring forward at a bound, and all this with turnings and twisting enough to produce a dizziness. After half an hour of extraordinary difficulties they arrived at a sort of platform, ten yards broad at most. "This is it!" said Belhumeur, stopping. "How this?" Loyal Heart replied, looking around on all sides without perceiving an opening. "Come this way!" said Belhumeur, smiling. And still dragging his horse after him, he passed behind a block of the rock, the hunter following him with awakened curiosity. After walking for five minutes in a sort of trench, at most three feet wide, which seemed to wind round upon itself, the adventurers found themselves suddenly before the yawning mouth of a deep cavern. This road, formed by one of those terrible convulsions of nature so frequent in these regions, was so well concealed behind the rocks and stones which masked it, that it was impossible to discover it except by a providential chance. The hunters entered. Before ascending the mountain, Belhumeur had collected a large provision of candlewood; he lit two torches, keeping one for himself, and giving the other to his companion. Then the grotto appeared to them in all its wild majesty. Its walls were high and covered with brilliant stalactites, which reflected back the light, multiplying it, and forming a fairy-like illumination. "This cavern," said Belhumeur, after he had given his friend time to examine it in all its details, "is, I have no doubt, one of the wonders of the prairies; this gallery, which descends in a gentle declivity before us, passes under the Verdigris, and debouches on the other side of the river, at a distance of more than a mile, into the plain. In addition to the gallery by which we entered, and that which is before us, there exist four others, all of which have issues at different places. You see that here we are in no risk of being surrounded, and that these spacious chambers offer us a suite of apartments splendid enough to make the president of the United States himself jealous." Loyal Heart, enchanted with the discovery of this refuge, wished to examine it perfectly, and although he was naturally very silent, the hunter could not always withhold his admiration. "Why have you never told me of this place before?" he said to Belhumeur.