New-York daily tribune. [volume] (New-York [N.Y.]) 1842-1866, 1845-09-10
THE TRIBUNE.
From the Louisville journal.

From the Louisville journal
MAMMOTH CAVE...BY GEORGE D. PRENTICE.
ALL DAY. as dav is reckoned on the earth,
I've wandered in these dim and awful asles,
sbui from the blue and breezy dome OF Heaven.
While. fbonghts wild. drear. and shadowy. have
Across nv aw e struck soul like spectres or swept
The wizard magic glass or thunder clouds
Der the blue waters OF the deep. And now
III sit me down upon yon broken rock
To muse upon the strange and solemn things
OF this my sterious realm.
All day my steps
Have been amid the beautiful, the wild,
The gloomy. the terrific. Chrysal :ounts
Almost invisible in their serene
Aud pure transparency-high, pillar'd domes
With stars and flowers all ireitcd like the halls
OF Oriental mOnsrchs-rivers dark
And drear and vOceless as Oblivions stream CULTS
That flows through Deaths dim vale Of silence
All fatbomless down hich the loosened rock
punges until its farof echoes come
Fainter and fainter like the dying roll
OF ,hunders in The distance-Stygian pools
Whose sgiiated waves give back a sound
Hollow and dismal. like the sullen roar
In the VOLCANOES dcpths-these, these have left
Their spell upon me, and their memories
Have passed into my spirit, and are
Blcnt with my being till they seem part
OF my own immortality.
God hand
AT the creation, followed out this vast
Domain Of darkness, where nor herb nor Hover
Fer sprang amid the sands, nor dews nor rains
Nor blessed sunbeams fell with ireshening power
Nor gentle breeze its Eden-messagc told
Amid the dreadful gloom six thousand years
Swept o er the earth ere human foot prints marked
This snbterraneaD desert. Centuries
Like shadows came and passed, and not a sound
Was IN THIS realm, save when at intervals
Ia the long lapse Of ages some huge mass
ove rbapU tcl laundering
Its echoes sounding through these corridors
moment, and then dying in hush
OF silence such brOOded Ter the earth
When Earth was chaos The great Mastodon,
The dreaded monster Of the elder world,
Passed DER this mighty cavern and his tread
Bent the old forest oaks like fragile reeds
Aud made Earth trembe-Armes in their pride
Perchance have met above it in the shock
OF war with shout and groan and clarion blast
And the hoarse echoes of the thunder gun
The storm, the whirlwind, and the hurricane
Have roarcd above il, and the bursting cloud
Sent down its red and crashing thunder. bolt
Earthquakes have tramped DER ii in their wrath
Rocking Esrths surface the storm wind rocks
The old Atlantic-yet no sound of these
T. or came down to the everlasting depths
OF these dark sOitudes
How oft we gaze
With awe or admiration ON the new
And unfamiliar, but pass coldly 10y
The lOvcliCr anu me mlghlcr! w Ondcrlul
Is this lone world OF darkness and Of gloom
Blu, far more wonderful yon outer world
Lit by the glorious sun These arches swell
Sublime in lone and dim magniiiccnce.
Rui how sublmer Gods blue canopy
Belcagucred with his burning chcrubm
Keeping their watch eternal Beautiful
Are all the thousand snow-w bite gems that lie
In these mysterious chambers cleaning out.
Amid the melancholy gloom, and wild
These rocky hills and cliffs, and CULTS but far
More beautiful and wild the things that greet
The wandercr in our world of lighl--ihe stars
Floating on high like islands of the best
The autumn sunsets glowing like the gate
OF far of Paradise--the gorgeous clouds
Ga which the elories of the Earth and sky
Meet and comminglc-- Earh's unnumbered flowers
All turning up their gentle eyes to Heaven
The birds, with bright wings glancing in the sun
Filling the air with rainbow miniatures
The green old forests surgng in the gale
The everlasting mountains whose peaks
The setting sun burns like an altar flame
And Ocean, like pure heart rendering back
Heavens perfect image, or in his wild wrath
heaving and tossing ike the stormy breast
uf chained giant in his agony.