The Jeffersonian Democrat. [volume] (Chardon, Ohio) 1854-1865, 1860-12-28
Music in the Mammoth Cave.

Were you ever in the Mammoth Cuve7 It's,
with all its wonders, the most gloomy, God.tor
saken, dreary spot mortal ever entered. There
Is yet some strange, mystic power in the place to
transfgure the weakest most wretchcd music in
30 harmony fit for the celestial sphere.
After poking about in the bowels of the earth
for three four hours visitors to The cave arrive
at Echo iver, where they embark on disgust.
tngly muddy scow, or the party is large enough,
two three wretched boats are brought into req.
ulsiton. The women are oil dressed in tanci-
fully colored boomer dresses, and wi tn tho up.
lifted lantern, present strange and weird op-
penrance the boat is pushed from the shore,
and floats down into the black gloom, the lights
rejecting themselves on the surfnce of the deadly
the arch of rock overhead. When they are fairly
out Of sight, we enter the other boat, and our.
selves push gu, into the dark stream. Dark, aw
fully dark il isl The dark River Of Death finds
on earth more vivid parallel than this You
know, in the first picture of Coles Voyage Of
Lille" the gloomy river of the past. from which
fonts out into light and life the little boat Of the
baby voynger. The stream issues from dark,
rocky cavern. mysterious and unknown. Such
stream is this on which we are embarked. ST.
lent and gloomy. dark and mysterious, it serves
ns type OF the pnst ana III, future of tho past
mystery whence all life evolves, of the inscruta.
BILE future whittier all life tends.
The feeling OF security is not very great. The
boats sink down almost TO the waters edge, and
the perpendicular slippery rock either side Of
fers no ledge on which a ship-wrecked voyuger
tbSHt iOOtlHB' hUONe, SOIne-
times so low that you might crouch 10 avoid it,
and again SO high as to be scarcely visible, rises
the rock roof while the wafer in which you glide
is 30 feet in dcYih and as cold as the breast of
corpse. There is no sound but the ripping made
by the boa: not cricket along the shoreess
stream, not II fish TO plunge up and flash no.
ent in the air before returning to its wntery Gle.
ment--no symptom OF lfe-no sound, no motion,
save that made by ourselves. .
Hark there is sound Far of, a delicat tie
shade OF music, so faint to seem the ghost oi
some deTing eUlpy. by tegIvus it in crease
II becomes clear and defined. Rich harmony,
trembling with strange, sensuous wildnoss, fut-
tering around the rocky projections, swelling in
waves Of harmony TO the arched roof above. Now
II appears 10 come from one direction, now from
another. Anon higher note or strain ia heard
like some clear voice rising above n mighty cho-
rus. Never did syren sing more magic song to
listening traveLer-never did the mysterious mai.
den Of Lurlenburg chant more enhancing mel.
ody to the unwary boatman who floats along the
moonlii Rhine.
Suddenly turn OF the boat brings You opposite
break In the perpendicular rocky shore, and
perched upon mass of broken rock, you
party OF four negroes playing upon vions and {
eornet. Those are the syrens these the Lurne'
uf Echo River. Out on the earth surface the
music would be merely quaint aud odd but her
in the Mammoth Cave il is weird and TN earthly
Floating away, out OF sight above minsrels-
who are, in fact, the barber ,boot-bnck and waite
from the hotel at the mouth Of the cave-thei
music resumes is supernatural tones and eiiec
and so, until we land on the opposite shore Of IN
dark river II hauns the oar with its peculiar hal
mony, while ever after it forms the most vivi
"Reminiscences OF visit TO the Mammoth Cave