The River Falls journal. (River Falls, Pierce County, Wis.) 1857-1861, 1858-09-29
From Tho Louisville Journal.
Terrific Adventure in the
Mammoth Cave.

us entrance, tnefe is q PIT dark, ana deep
and terrible, known rs the Maelstrom.
Tens of thousands have gazed into it with
awe, whilst Bengal lights were thrown
down it to make its fearful depths visible.
but none ever had the daring to explore
it. The celebrated guide Stephen, who
was deemed insensible to fear. was offered
six hundred dollars by the proprietors of
the cave if he would descend to the bot
tom of it, but he shrank from the peril.
A few years ago, Tennessee professor,
a learned and bold man, resolved to do
what no one before him had dared to do,
and making his arrangements with great
care and precaution, he had himself low
cred down by strong rope, hundred
feet but at that point his courage failed
him, and he called aloud to be drawn out.
No human power could ever have induced
him to repeat the appalling experiment.
A couple of weeks ago, however, a
gentleman of Louisville, whose nerves
never trombled at mortal peril, being at
the Mammoth Cave, with Professor
Wright Of our city and others, deter
mined, no matter what the damages and
difficulties might be, to explore the depths
of the Maelstrom. Mr.. Proctor, the en-
terprising proprietor Of the cave, sent to
Nashville, and procured long rope of
great strength expressly for the purpose.
The rope and some necessary timbers
were borne by the guides and others to
the point Of proposed exploration. The ar
rangements being soon completed, the
rope with fragment Of rock affixed to it,
was let down and swung to and fro to
dislodgo any loose rocks that would be
likely to fall at the touch. Several were
thus dslodged, and the long continued
reyerbe:at:ons, rising up like distant thun-
der from below, proclaimed the depth of
the horrid chasm. Then the young hero
of the occasion, with several hats drawn
over his head to protect it as far as pos
sble against any masses falling from
above, and with light in his hand and
the looe fastened around his body, took
his place over the awful pit, and directed
the half dozen men, who held the end of
the rope, to let him down into the CHM
merriam gloom.
We have heard from his own lips an
account of this descent. Occasionally
masses of earth and rock went whining
past, but none struck him. Thirty or
forty feet from the top, he saw ledge,
from which, as he judged by appearan-
ces, two or three avenues led off in differ
ent directions. About hundred feet
from the top, a cataract from the side of
the pit went rushing down the abyss,
and. as he descended by the side of the
falling water and in the midst Of the
spray, he felt some apprehension that his
light would be extinguisbed, but his care
prevented this. He was landed at the
bottom of the pit, a hundred and ninety
feet from the top. He found it almost
perfectly circular, about eighteen feet in
diameter, with a small opening at one
point, leading to a fine chamber of no
great extent. He found on the floor
beautiful specimens of black slick of I'M
mensc size, vastly larger than were ever
discovered in any part of the Mammoth
Cave, and also a multitude Of exquisite
formations as pure and white as snow.
Making himself heard with great effort,
BY his friends, he at length asked them to
pull him partly up, intending to stop on
the way and explore cave that he had
observed opening about forty feet above
the bottom of the pit.
Reaching the mouth of that cave, be
swung himself with much ezertion into it,
and, holding the end Of the rope in his
hand. he incautiously let it go, and it
swung out apparently beyond bis reach.
The situation was fearful one, and his
friends above could do nothing for him.
Soon however, he made hook of the
end of his lamp, and by extending him
self as far over the verge as possible with
out falling, he succeeded in securing the
rope. Fastening it to rock, he followed
the avenue $50 or 200 yards to point
where he found it blocked by an impassi-
Bile avalanche of rock and earth. Return
inc to the mouth of this avenue, he be-
held an almost exactly similar mouth OF
another on the opposite side of the pit,
but, not being able to swing himself into
it, he refastened the rope around his body,
suspended himself again over the abyss,
and shouted to his friends to raise him to
the top. The pull was an exceedingly