The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1886-06-28
A FRIGID CAVE.
A Visit to a Subterranean Re-
frigerator.
The Provision Nature Makes to Enable
the Inhabitants Of Bakers River VAL
ley to Contemplate a Hot summer
with Indifference.
boston Transcript.1


summer" was the after breakfast remark
OF a summer sojourner in the Bakers River
Valley one bright August morning. Gin
deed!" Think it is true?" "Apocryphal
tale" are few Of the CALCULATIONS that
fell from fellow boarders on the utterancs
of this remark; but interest enough has
been stirred to determine an expedition in
search Of the mysterious cooler. A pre-
hminary exploration was even volunteered
by the doubling Thomas of the party who
had suggested that the report belonged
among uncanonical legends. On the very
day on which the above remark was made
party from a neighboring house, headed
by young man locally famous for varied
requirements, exceeding humility and self
dePreciatory speech, and including in its
number portly Appalachian, sought, and
by the help of a neighboring farmer, who
during the heats of summer turns this nat
ural refrigerator TO account, found the cave
in question, bringing back as a trophy a
large piece of ice, part of which was left
TO cool the drink and stir the emulation of
the party of Thomas, doubter now
no longer. We determined to prof
It by the experience of our
ueighbors and drove thither in the even
ing TO get directions for the search which
next day we proposed to make. We were
told that there undoubtedly existed an ice
cave which could readily be found by
those who knew what they were looking
after (''If they have some one to show
them," muttered some one from our car
riage), and which lay about one hundred
yards or one hundred rods, or about as far
as modest young man could toss a base
ball (daZzled by his meekness we became
mixed as to distance), from a sugar camp
which furnished a convenient starting
point for the search. The likelihood was,
however, that we would not find the place
without guide. Just here patience broke
down, and after thanks rendered for the
information we had not received our I'M
offending horse had an abrupt invitation
to start for home. Our carriage was pur-
sued by a shrek from the modest young
man, that when we were ready to go in
search of the cave just to let him know and
he would come and show US the way
Thanks to the clatter of our carriage, we
were able to decline this offer in terms suf-
ficiently opprobrious to serve as a vent to
our feelings without much danger of their
reaching the ears of the meek. "Oh yes!
you can find it if you know what you are
looking after" growled Thomas DidyTnus.
''Does the -- think that we will be
looking after a buttermilk cave with
cows tail for a sign?"
Early next morning Thomas started on
his reconnaissance, crossed the refresh
ing intervale, waded the little river, and,
filling his lungs with balm and his shoes
with the dews of the morning, soon reached
the hugh talus which some pre-Adamite
ague of nature has thrown down from the
face of the ledge, and among whose numer.
GUS assures the ice-cave was in hiding
Foil
ploration, of scrambling over powders, of
slow and doubtful crawling through mar
row assures and long, dark, tortuous pas
sages under the immense rocks that lie
piled in strange confusion. Noon came and
DO ice-cave had been found, though many
promising openings had been secured
Thomas returned across the stream bruised
and tired, to recount at dinner his advent
ures and failure, and to lead back afterward
considerable party to renew the search
School mistresses and masters, librarians,
artists and people of leisure gathered and
waited on the river banks while the not nu-
merous male contingent carried their sis
ter in Adam across in their arms. On re-
viewing our force it was found that a high
ly-endow ed young artist had saved himself
paroxysms of bashfulness by slipping
quietly up stream and wading cross by
himself.
1t was the opinion of a general council
that directions for our scar CHI should be OBJ
tanned from the farmer who had already
served as a guide to our neighbors. Two
of US were delegated to get information,
and proceeded at once to the farm house.
We did not find the master at home, but
were assured by his wife that she knew
quite as much about the ice cave as her
hna
tered upon directions, which had for start
ing point the gate of an adjacent calf
pasture, and the course of which was as
tortuous the career of a politician. 1
am convinced that if we had carefully fol-
lowed the course marked out by her we
should now be just in the midst of our
search, and probably encamped on the
shores of Hudson's Bay. But we were
nearly as much obliged as though the
knowledge impaired had been useful, for
within half an hour after the search began
Thomas emerged from a dark hole half
way up the slope of rocks, holding in his
hands a great chunk of clear ice, and ut
tered yell that speedily called together
from every sort of uncanny place the party
Of explorers. The ice lay about twelve feet
below the mouth of the cave, directly under
what appeared to be its bottom, and had
TO be reached through a small opening by
hard squeezing. There must have been
hundreds, perhaps thousands of pounds of
ice. The cake was about five feet each
way, of rather irregular outline, and
thickening rapidly from the edge. where
it was quite thin, as was shown by the /
large fragments which we broke off and
carried home. We took, perhaps, forty or
fifty pounds; and, being puzzled to a
means of carrying it, were relieved 10y the
ingenuity of a schOolma'am who sacri-
feed the the stout overskirt of her flannel
dress to this exigency of orr trip. We
went back across the meadows jubilant at |
our success, and impressed with the frsaki-
ness of our common mother who on this
hot August day had let US into her ice 4
chest.
The cave is distinctly marked by large /
aat, projecting rock above it mouth, and /
may easily be recognized by one who /
knows what is looking after.'' We were
told that after dry winters, .
when no water trickles into this cave, the
mass of ice disappears, not being able to
withstand the heats of two summers with
1ut replenish ;ng.
Taken at His Word.