The Kimball graphic. (Kimball, Brule County, Dakota [S.D.]) 1883-1905, 1886-01-08
SALT MINE.

A GlitterinE Underground City-Pillars OF
Crystal.
Correspondence London News.
.Light a few Candles" was the or
der passed as we were leaving Wins
ford; and | am under the impression
that the hole down below is like any
other hole. and that the STEW candles
will just give us light ENOUGH for the
space OF some three or four yards.
But we shall see. We step into u
iron bucket. Thedoortherot isclosed
upon us. The steel ropes are made
fast. The signal is given. There is o
h~esitating, trembling motion, and we
drive swiftly into Plutonian night,
straight, sheer through a funnel $50
feet deep, and 8 feet g inches across,
the rim OF our bucket o and again
grinding, scraping, humping, s%creeching
against the narrow walls. After the
first few seconds have passed, ono
! cannot tell from ones sensations,
merely, whether one is going up or
down, or is suspended at rest, there IS
only the trembling OF the invisible
| steel ropes and the scrapine sound on
the walls. In q minutemore we touch
| the floor OF the under world with the
| liehtness OF q feather. In the name of
| the fairies, and COLLINS. and gnomes,
| and spirits OF the earth, what have VT
| there? Oh! Master Robert go few
candles" TIE city OF Dis Illuminated
this is what meets my astonlshed
gaze.
Open spaces. endless streets turning
and winding off in all directions, and
outlined IN spots of light, and In the
iarthest distance an ornamental group
OF lights, as ii on n wall OF on some
vast supporting pillar. 1t is as if one
looks from some point Of vantage up
| on the lights ofatown ina dark night,
without moon or stars; not a town
with empty space over it., but a town
under u horizontal ceiling thirty-three
feet above the pavement. On this
level pavement the massed bands
OF the British army may play
Strauss music, and the whole of the
London West End spin round on
Light fantastic toe" The first feel
ings Of surprise over, l examine my
surroundings in ~leisurely detail. At
some distance in front OF us looms q
dark mass with q horizontal line OF
lights half way up it. The three of us
Mr.. Nerdin, the guide, and myself
approach it, each carrying a lighted
candle across the floor, which appears
to be as level as the floor in n draw
ins-room, and which is covered with a
thin carpet OF salt fine as powder and
dry as finder. Wherever the light falls
upon it, thedark object elitters as if it
We're encrusted with rubies and dia-
monds. 1t turns out to be a huge,
square pillar, extending from floor to
ceiling. Each OF its forwsides measures
twelve yards, it is thirty-three feet
high, and it is nothing but q mass of
crystals, At every twenty-five yards,
north, south, east, west, stands one
OF these gigantic colulnns,-all OF
them, like this one, masses CT many
tinted salt crystals, and with the dia-
mond fish darling over their sides.
The plan of this wonderful colonnade
is now obvious. Theminers have been
cutting their way, all these many gem
erations, through the solid rock salt,
horizontally, clearing IL smooth floor
below their feet, leavinga smooth cell
ing over their heads, and, at the al
ready named distance, those enor-
nous piIasters, whose junction is to
prevent the roof, that is, the $50 feet
ofthe earths crust, fromfailingin. The
ceiling is too high to respond very lib
orally to theilicker ofour candle lights;
but in - hundred spots it wrinkles like
stars peering through the clouds of
night. They look as though they had
the strength OF doom, those pillars,
and were destined to The thereof.