Hopkinsville Kentuckian. [volume] (Hopkinsville, Ky.) 1889-1918, 1896-05-01
IN A TENNESSEE CAVE.
Fate Of Young Man on an Explor-
ing Expedition.

They were telling stories over the
walnuts and wine, or the peanuts
and beer, or something like that, a
Washington Star reporter, as usual,
taking his out in listening, when a
man whose reputation for veracity
has never been questioned off the
floor of congress INDUCED in a fresh
chew of "long green" and began
talking.
"One Of the saddest events of my
life, he said, slowly, and as if the
memory of it had lost none of the
poignancy of the cause Of his sorrow,
twas my connection with the ex-
ploration of a cave in the mountains
of Tennessee, more than 20 years
ago. was then not boy, and ! had
as friend, very near and dear, a
young professor Of geology in one of
our colleges. He was ten years
younger than l, that is, about 20,
and was an enthusiast in all matters
geological. One day l told him of
this cave in the mountains, and, at
once, he wanted to explore it, for it
had never been explored, and there
was evidence that it was miles in eX-
tent
"That it was beautiful know, for
! had visited it on several occasions
and had brought out some fine speci-
mems of stalactites and stalagmites.
Wishing to please the young geolo-
gist, / agreed to act as escort and do
the cave with him, so we made prepa-
rations for a big trip, taking along
with us oil enough to last our lamps for
two days and provisions for the same
time. Then we carried balls Of Irvine
and a sack Of shelled corn to drop
along the way so as to have land
marks to guide us out again.
"All went we'll the first day and
we slept that night in the cave and
had breakfast Of hot coffee and
ham and eggs done in pan we
brought along. Immediately after
breakfast we separated where the
cave seemed to divide, and we were
to meet again at the point of separa-
ton at noon to confer as to which
route should be explored first. In
an hour OF more my progress was
blocked, and l went back and started
on his side, following his string of
corn. Presently l noticed a great
gray rat dash across my path and it
almost scared me to death, for had
no idea of rats in such a place. l
knew, though, by that that the cave
could not be very deep at that point,
but the walls were filed with cracks
not more than three or four inches
wide and there was no other outlet
visible.
I thought no more about the rats
after the first scare, for they were
wild and ran away quickly, but in a
minute or two I discovered some
thing that made the cold chills run
down my back and / nearly tainted
The corn dropped by my friend had
been carried off by the rats and I
could not 60 further ahead. This
awful discovery came to me at
point where there were three or four
openings in the cave, any one of
which was large enough for wagon
to 90 in. Which one he had taken I
could not tell and was so overcome
that I sat down or fell down upon a
rock almost paralyzed.
"Then l began to yell for him and
to shoot my pistol, but he had hours
the start of me and of course could
not hear Then I thought of myself
and started to go out. Fortunately
our point of starting that morning
had been where there were no side
halls and I managed to get out. l
went at once for help and, with a
large force of men, we searched the
cave for a whole week, and at the
end of that time we found my young
friend, dying of hunger and a raving
maniac. We got him out, but when
he stepped forth in the beauty of the
sunshine he gave a scream that
seemed to be joyous rather than any
thing else and fell into my arms,
dead Since that time," concluded
the narrator, 81 have not gone I'M
der the ground on exploring expedi-
tions, and nobody ventured to sug-
gest that he ought to keep on explor-
ing caves.
Absent-Minded Typewriter.