The Ottawa free trader. [volume] (Ottawa, Ill.) 1843-1916, 1877-02-24

| plicabie physical lacis are not c0Dnned to the
| lowands along the route OF the Mississippi
and stranger than the works of primeval
man, consisting of mounds, canals and fort
fled stronghods, and cavernous depths, with
| in which rivers flow from the mountains to
the great drain of the continent. Fourteen
miles southeast OF Bowling Green, Ky, is a
cavern more extraordinary and wonderful
than Mammoth Cave. Not far away, on a
stone at the entrance to the latter The wonder
of a country pumpkin is inscribed IN words
once quoted in the Senate Of the United
States:
The Mammoth Cave, what spot!
In summer cold, and winter hot.
Ye powers above! Great God, ! wonder.
Andrew Jackson! h-ll and thunder.
The entrance to the more mysterious pit is
on the front of a perpendicular height, made
almost inaccessible by vines, brambles and
densely growing forest trees. Trammel's en-
tiers brakes Creek just above the strange
aperture to unknown depths ard impenetra
BILE darkness below. This adytum is ten
feet long and four feet wide, and the chasm
seems to yawn, and its great mouth Is horr
BILE to contemplate.
Rude people in the vicinity call it "Hell's
Hole" or tie Indians Pit From the
measureless abyss there issues, ceaseess as
the lapse of hours and days and years. a vol
ume of mist On cold, clear, frosty mornings
II rises in spiral columns far above the tree
tops, and, whitened as 1t asccnds and CLEAN
ing iii the sunlight, it floats away and is lost
In the clouds. At some unknown period in
the worlds history mother earth breahed
heavily, and great boulders, worn round and
smooth as if ground by friction when upheld
by currents OF air, and falling back again
and again, lifted up and rubbed by other
stones, cover the hillside and have rolled
from the cavern's mouth into the valley be
low. People dwelling near by tell that in
fall and winter the heavy Sterlorous breath
ings from the cavern are much warmer than
sharp blasts sweeping along the deep gorge
while IN summer the misty vapor from with
IN is cooler than the exterior atmosphere.
This fathOmless pit grows wider IN Its down
ward course, and nothing living or inanimate
that has entered ever found exit. Not the
fainiest echo was ever heard when great
stones have been rolled into the awful depth
of this decensus Aoerni. If such MASSIVE
boulders had encountered any object within
miles of the entrance the sound produced
would have been surely borne to listeners
: above by the strong, steady aircurrent.
! The impression fixed from childhood to old
age, that the solid earth must be forever I'M
movable beneath our feet as surely and i'm.
movably as the sun and stars and blue vault
above our heads, IS rudely shaken when one
! stands in the presence of such demonstrate
hollowness and emptiness as this Very
much the same sensations are excited when
standing at the PITS mouth as when an earth.
quake shakes the land and sea and makes
5 men and women shudder
. When, not long ago, it was sought to ascer
tain the depth of the chasm, heavy weigh,
i was attached to a strong cord and the lead
| down ha md
plummet had measured the greatest possible
depth. but no sound came back to tell of the
: end of unu.terable hollowness below. The
/ weight wien withdrawn, was unsoiled, and
by the moisture on its surface showed that IL
ITS descent ana ascent 1t touched nothing bu
mist and darkness.
The very hollOwness of life and its evanes
c cent pleasures are almost illustrated IN ply
!. seal facts discovered everywhere in Ken
lucky and Tennessee. The river, down II
the depths of Mammoth Cave, if it find it
r way to the green fields and sunshine, IS neve
r. recognized above as the stream noted for ii
eyeless fishes below the earth's surface, ant
though the great cavern has been explored
twelve miles from Its entrance. those VIII
have traversed its depths and labyrinths con
cur In the assertion that there are other caves
beyond the remotest yet explored, and grand
er and deeper than those that attract the curl
IS Gus from all lands
!. Near Union City, in Tennessee and neal
,, Their the southwestern confines of Kentucky
is Reelioot Lake. Here the roof of might,
cavern was shaken down by the earthquake
of 1Si1-l2. Lofty forest trees, the tallest tina
d tower above the lowlsnds, disappeared will
e. the land on which they grew, and a sea
< broader and deeper than that of Galilec, wa
C outspread in crystal clearness in the midst o
.. the lowlands. Ducks and geese heck its sur
&c face and trout abound in the modern lax
D, that had never reflected the suns face In it
II fathomless depths till the bridge of soil an,
4 trees and cane was broken down by the earth
IS quake's resoundng footsteps.
e Where the railway from Nashville to HEX
3 man. Ky, on the Mississippi, crosses tina
Il from Mobile TO Cairo and Chicago stands tn
/. town of Union City 1t is ten miles from
e. this lake. 1t has been stated that when beav,
h locomotives and heaviy.laden trains com
l. rushing by. hotels ard station houses quake
g candlesiicks are shaken from mantels anC
: and tables, and that holowness in which tn
(. forest disappeared which brldged Reelfoo
e Lake, extends. 1t has been alleged, beneatl
l. the town and railway. The water of thi
o lake is not that of the Mississippi 1t is o
o crystal brightness and clearness, such as dis
n tinguishes the river in the depths of Nam
II moth Cave, while the great river allow
r ground, bearing alluvlum from northwestern
,e mountains. is tawny in IFS yellowness ant
e impervious 10 vision. When the earthquake
Is lof lSll-l2 was most violent and the nigh
n was of extraordinary darkness the Mssis
v. sippi flowed backward. and hai-boa,s in III,
q vicinity of Hickman drIfted backwards fort.
miles towards Cairo. 4 mighty volume o
h the rivers noodtidc receded into measure
Al less caverns beneath the coumry's surface
c and nowhere were the lowlands submerged.
b. There is dead sea" of murly water hid
d den beneath the earth's surface IN the vicinit,
vs. of Cairo ana New Madrid, and broader ant
n deeper than the iathom less lseltoot LAX
a dug by the GEM OF earthquakes The visible
It lake of our time may be the receptacle TO
D. the bright that flow through Mammoth Cave
Is Cave, and if the Devils Pit with its emptiness
e were sounded 1t would be discovered that i'll
e depths were carved out by great rive