The daily morning journal and courier., 1894-08-15
WONDERS oF .WISp CAFE,


 Give Out Musleai Topes. ns1
 From tho Chicago Daily Tribnne.l
 Wind Cave. in the Black Hills of South Dakota, only recently discov- cred and not yet fully explored. Is one of the most remarkable works of nature known. In a region where nature has been particularly lavish 1t Is the wonder of wonders. Ten years ago Its exist ence was unknown. To-day ninety-one miles of chambers and passages have been explored, and there are yet innu- merable routes which have never been entered. Last year three thousand per- sons visited the place.
 The cave lies In the midst of the most romantic scenery In the west. It Is twelve miles from the nearest railroad point-Hot Springs s. D.-on the line of the Burlington road, and Is reached by a mountain road which winds back and forth across the hills. giving the tourist a glimpse of peaks fifty miles away at one minute, and next dipping down into a valley where the stage In front IS lost to view. The road skirts the foot of Battle Mountain. where the Sioux and Crow Indians fought battle to the death less than q score of years ago. Further on the stage coach pass es within close range of Buffalo Gap. through which the white sand of the 1cp ha chi i'm 1f, the sun eighty miles away. Harney's Peak, the highest point in the Black Hills. raises its head eight thousand feet above the sea level and looks no more than ten miles away, when in re- ality 1t Is forty-five as the crow flies, and at least one hundred as the road runs. Man has done little to mar the beauties of nature in its wild and rug ged form. Aside from the road itself and two or three homes of ranchmen there are only cowboy paths across the mountain sides. All around are hills with dark and stunted pines. looking now as they have looked since the days when the world was young and history was being kept in sun-baked bricks along the river Nile The Indian is gone and the buffalo has made his last pilgrimage through Buffalo Gap to gain the shelter of the hills against the com ing of the winter but the hills remain as they were and as they will continue.
 Two hours is sufficient for the four horse coaches to take the visitor. from the resort hotels in Hot Springs to the entrance to Wind Cave. You have been told the story of the way in which Wind Cave got its name before you started on. the trip, and so when you hear the. sound of rushing air, which comes np from the bottom of deep lying gulch, you know the journeys end is nearly reached. When the day is sunshiny and no storm is, brewing the winds rush outward from the caves en- trance but let the weather change and the'air get heavy, and the wind current is reversed and it rushes in with the same noise that accompanies it's out ward flow. --'~-.A- '''''' '
 The three buildings About the en- trance are in keeping with the sur roundings.. They are the office and ho- tel, a barn and small building which covers the entrance to the cave, built of logs and undressed lumber. The origi- nal opening, a hole eight by twelve Inches, has been discarded for a new entrance blasted into the solid rock. A trap door covers this and when it is opened the cold air rushes by one and gives nervous person a shock that may result in abandoning the explora- tion. --. ',rTsta~
 Rough wooden steps lead down from the trap1deor, with two landings to rest the visitort to depth of one hundred and fifty-five feet, where the first pas- sage leads off into the, bowels of the earth, It,is through the solid rock, and while there has been much blasting to open the way, there still remain many places where one must stoop to keep his head and the roof from coming into violent conjunction. There are several smaller chambers into which the pas sage leads, but the first room of any considerable dimensions is the Post Office," a half mile from the entrance and two hundred and fifty feet below the floor of the cave house. This name was given the chamber because of pe- culiar box-like formation found in it re- sembling the boxes in post office This formation is new to geologists, and, So far as known, is found only in Wind Cave. Visitors are invited to leave their cards, and thousands of bits of white pasteboard lie in the boxes around the walls of the room. Some are yellow with age. There are still enough not taken to give one to every visitor for some years to come., This room narrows into a passage and broadens out again, making practically two rooms. but it is all Post Oftice.'
 The Brides Chamber" is a room near the Post Office" Its walls and ceiling are Rure white, and there is an Ante-chambef, also in white. Lin colns Fireplace" is hidden away in one of thu. passages. It opens into chim- ney which has natural draught, though where it leads has never been discovered. The formation of this re- Sembles unpublished onyx. One of the striking peculiarities of Wind Cave isr the varied character of the walls and ceilings. From a pure white the surroundings change to red | or blue or black. Biologists have been l unable to explain these changes, which | come together and blend in a few feet | of space. Red Halp' is only short | distance from the Brides Chamber" but the formation of walls and ceiling | changes from pure white to dark red, | which is almost carmine in places. "Samson's Palace" has huge pillars ex- tending from floor to roof, straight and true as, if fashioned by the hand Of man. Adjoining this is room where kho cf,,