Republican news item. [volume] (Laport, Pa.) 1896-19??, 1898-04-14
IN THE MAMMOTH CAVE.
ExHILARATlNc EFFECT OF THE COOL
AND CERMLESS AIR.

mOsphere 1S SterlllZeO- ~ -'-S-N-
y-wonderfuI Effect of Music In the
Cayerns in Kentucky's Natural Wonder.
John r. Proctor, formerly state ge.
ologist of Kentucky, writes of ''The
Mammoth Cave of Kentucky" for the
Century, the article having many
striking illustrations by Castaigne
Mr. Proctor says:
The entrance to Mammoth Cave is
reached by descending picturesque
pathway leading from the hotel down
the hillside over jutting moss and fern
covered limestone cliffs into a beauti-
full glen extending from the top of the
hill down to Green river, which is l94
feet below the mouth of the cave and
about half mile distant. If the
weather is warm, as we near the en-
trance we step into a bracing, cool,
pure air, yelling up from the cave and
flowing down the glen beneath the
stratum of lighter and warmer air. 1
have stood near the entrance and eX-
tended one hand into temperature of
30 degrees, while the other hand was
extended into cool flowing river of
cir with temperature of about 60 de-
grees. The air within the cave has a
uniform temperature, summer and
winter, of "a degrees. The cave may
be said to breathe twice a year-in-
haling during the winter and exhaling
during the summer. This breathing
of the cave, and the purity of the air
and its freedom from germs, are among
the most interesting problems to be
studied. By what process the air in
the cave becomes steriliZed remains to
be determined.
But our faithful negro guide has
counted the party, selected the requi-
site number of lamps and given the
word, and we follow him in single file
down the rude stone steps into the
vestibule of the cave. Turning, we
look up at the beautiful effect of day
light which we are leaving, and ad-
mire the delicate cascade falling from
the overhanging arch at the entrance.
Here our lamps are lighted and we
enter this silent, mysterious, change
less abode of eternal night, where the
heat of summer and the cold of winter,
the storms and thunders of the outer
world, never penetrate. A few hun
dred yards and we feel the peculiar
sensation of emerging into expanding
space. We catch only glimpses OF
white limestone projecting out of black
shadows of the far-away walls and
ceiling of an immense, almost circular
room about 70 feet high, which oul
guide proclaims the Rotunda.
We note the peculiar musical effect
of the human voice. Years ago it was
my good fortune to hear a celebrated
German musical society sing in this
Rotunda. I went FIR away in one of
the great avenues leading from here,
blew out my light and sat alone in the
darkness and listened while the great
anthems rolled and reverberated
through the lofty corridors in majestic
waves of melody. 1 could then ap-
preciate the inestimable privilege of
the few who heard Jenny Lind sing
here, and who in the Star Chamber
heard member of her party render on
his violin the prayer from ''Der Frei-
schultz"
When the Rotunda is illuminated,
we note the perfect clearness of the
atmosphere, the freedom from dust
particles of any kind; and we soon
learn that nowhere in the cave viii.
even dust rise upon our shoes. We
note also the exhilarating effect of the
air upon the members of our party. II
is believed that the air has become
oxygenated by chemical process; cer-
tainly, from its purity and dryness, it
enables one to undergo exercise for
hours without a sense of fatigue
uaro hafo,a &c 80 avid Janoo Df ~, a x,o,
derful dpeness of the air. The salt
petre watts erected in 1912, and the
timbers which have remained in their
present position since then, show no
evidences of decay. In these vats the
saltpetre was leached from the nitrous
earth abounding in the upper and
middle dry avenues, and used for the
manufacture of gunpowder. The war
of 1912 was fought, on the American
side, with gunpowder made from salt
petre taken from caves, and Mammoth
Cave supplied the greater part. One
wonders how, in the absence of germs
and of decay, the earth becomes
charged with nitrogen. 1t has been
: claimed that nitric acid in the atmos-
phere, combining with the limestone,
forms nitrate of calcium, and the dis
integrated waste from the walls and
ceiling yields the great supply of nj
trogen abounding in the cave.
1t requires day and half to make
the regulation journeys through the
cave; one half day to what is known
as the Short route, and an entire day
to the Long or River route. But that
hv no means exhausts the objects OF
st. and one may spend days in
avenues and chambers and
included in the regular