Orleans County monitor. [volume] (Barton, Vt.) 1872-1953, 1878-02-11

CsOiy "h0lO SiC@nAH5 ~ Vh0 lorCu-llSHts
with dazzle of crystalline splendor.
Do you ask what is this radiagt sub
stance of which the fairy world is
wrought?
The answer is simple.
Salt. Rock salt in the wonderful far
famed mines of Poland, Wieliezka by |
name.
The picture is not exaggerated. All |
that has been said is true, and far more.
Here are stately halls, vast and magnif-
icent, many of them one hundred and
Fifty feet long and wide. Fancy it. Trim
ity Church spire is only two hundred
feet high. There are chapels, galleries,
caves grottos-all of the same material
and each beautiful tiny grain sparkling
for itself.
After one has wandered till weary, he
will suddenly come upon a grand stair
case cut in the solid rock-crystal lead
ing down to another world as vast and
wonderful. There are five stories, one
below the other, and more than thirty
miles of subterranean passages. Four
or five of these are as much as most
travellers care to explore. These cham
bers and galleries have been left in the
| % ont Of coll
which has been going on for more than
six hundred years-no wonder they are
so vast and grand.
The miners are a cheerful, pious people
who cross themselves devoutly when they
start to descend the frail swinging lad
ders that lead down the shafts for the
workmen.. They have cut from the rock
many chapels adorned with images of
saints, so that at every turn one meets a
statue of solid crystal, SO clear and
transparent that torch held behind it
CLEANS through with a softened light.
When any image or altar is to be made
1t is roughly outlined in mass of salt
and then water poured over it. This
dissolves the outer crust, and when the
water has evaporated it leaves the sur
face smooth and solid.
The miners who look like pigmies IN
the vast chambers, only work during a
few hours-and than come up to the
blessed sunlight. They have helpers in
their daily labor, the patient horses who
, draw the huge blocks of salt to the foot
of the shafts these never see the light
of day, their lives of sunless toll are
spent in the depths of the earth. Poor
faithful servants of mans need ON
i, wishes that the Indians hunting ground
> of the Great Spirit might await them in
: the hereafter.
. In the deepest depths, said to be eigh
:. hundred feet below the sunlight, tn
passages grow narrower and the ceiling
lower till one must creep on all tours t
see new wonder of this wondrou
P world. A sudden turn, and before hir
d sparkle the silver waters of a silent lake
IS Torches fastened in the crystal wall
in CLEAN above, and the still waters belo'
tie flash back their brightness. Far as th
90 eye can see into the darkness beyon
d. stretches the mirror-like, motionless LAX
st guarded by the strong walls of salt rocl
of We know that once, long ages and agt
ed ago these waters laughed in the sunshir
at dancing down the mountain side or
eel the meadow brook, but down, down the
re came. through cleft and crevice, ca,
gh and cavern, till they found their plac
or of rest in this world of night and darl
en- ness. The flashing oars of the fat-bo
vn toned boat that carries travellers to Il
,ss further end of the lake alone break i
us stiffness.
a Here stands little chapel. plain al
he unpretending. On it might well
DOT grven the words of our Lord, "Throug
out the world this also that she ha
90 done, shall be spoken of as memoir
of her,"
For it was erected in memory of
r.. good Queen of Poland, who, more tn;
six hundred years ago, discovered the
~ mines of treasure and gave them to h
q suffering people.
W. The old story runs in this wise: 81
'n- was away in Hungary. and hearing
~ the poverty and distress of her subject
10y she prayed for them. A holy man a
.n' peared to her directed her to cast b
- most precious possession, priceless je
, W" elled ring, into deep well. This S
'0u did with simple faith, and when she l
VI turned to her home at the foot of
great mountains, some peasants broug
her piece of rock salt, thinking it
;, 10 costly gem. Examining the gift S
ior discovered imbedded in the heart Of t
ny crystal her long lost ring. This told
~ her the Heaven sent secret. She knt
'iu- that, far down in the bottom of the b.
tom of the well running stream
mo carried her treasure down deep throu
a the earth, over rich deposits of precie
~, salt, and that at last, the spring h
''ai dubbed up into the sunlight at the fl