The Providence news. (Providence [R.I.]) 1891-1906, 1897-03-11
PART1I.


8 Arthur hadn't been gone n week be-
fore / was almost sorry 1 sent him. Ii
was weak-minded, but i couldn't help
lit. i did wish / had made some other
arrangement with Uncle.
] You see, Professor Empsen took il
sup, and he can do almost anything
when he tries. He got the college peo-
ple interested, and they fitted out a
ship, and sent it OF with two or three
lchemists--I think they were chemists
land lot Of special students who
wanted TO do practical work" think
they wanted good time as much as
snything. myself. Arthur was In
Icharge of the expedition, though, be-
cause il was his idea.
1t wasn't quite so bad at first for /
kept getting letters good letters;
hsut after awhile they stopped, and /
didn't hear a word for months. That
was the hard time. never would
have believed beforehand that i could
lie SO worried. Uncle stopped talking
against Arthur, too, but / think that
made it seem worse.
Y Then another letter came--a great
big one, from somewhere in Australia.
i had it torn open In a flash-then L
Maid IL down; i was afraid to read it.
II must have been getting hysterical; /
;never used to be so silly. Anyhow, 1
icarried It to my room and locked the
door before could muster courage TO
jhegin. 1t was as bad as when i was
trying to make up my mind to let Aunt
Julia bore my ears. But when did
lbegin couldn't stop; am sure read
THAT letter twenty times over. Some
tparts of it nobody shall ever see, but
bust me; but here is the part about the
cave where they found the substance"
/ The volcano, which is called Tyana
lTchallu. rises abruptly out of the sea-
ito a considerable altitude. 1t is by no
jmeans entirely extinct-though it is
$50 marked on the charts-but ii was
quiet during our stay. This
was fortunate, for really the mountain
Us the island; and there Is little else.
'Thc cavern lies far up on the west
|ern slope, and we reached it with diff
|ealty. Without the exact bearings
given us by old Captain Jervis we
could never have found it, for the ma
|taves of the neighboring islands, though
they knew of the place, could not be in
kiuced TO go near il. 1 observed, how
ever, that they had razor~like flakes of
"a hard, greemish mineral, similar to the
specimens shown US by Professor Emp
sen. which they used as knsvcs.
"When. after much effort and some
hazard, we attained the mouth of the
cavern, ceased 10 blame them for
their suuerstitious fear. II is indeed
"a grewsome spot. The opening is as
jagged as the mouth of q shark. and Is
coated with a kind of green glaze. ap-
deposited by the acrid,vapors
which almost continually arise from |
the dark interior. This hideous hole |
led downward at very steep angle un-
ill it was lost in the gloom; most ter
rifying sounds of Kissing and rumbling
:ssued out of it, the fumes were unen-
and we despaired of being
lble to explore it.
"At length, however. sharp breeze
from the sea dissipated the vapors for
0 time, and found, to my surprise,
The aperture. 1t was now or never.
Dnd / had everything at stake-just
think. dearest, you were the stake, with
shame and disappointment worse than
death as the alternative. So / fastened
o stout rope under my arms, pressed
the hands of my comrades, murmured
the name love, and with it part of
prayer that 1 learned when i was
baby--science doesn'tseem an adequate
substitute for God at such a moment
then began to scramble down into that
awful pit. For about sixty feet the de-
scent was almost perpendicular. At
that depth I felt beneath my feet
comparatively level floor, but the roof
Of the cavern hung SO low that was