Wausau pilot. [volume] (Wausau, Wis.) 1896-1940, 1903-08-25
ODD DWELLING PLACE.
CRATER IN JAPAN WHICH Shell.
TIERS 10000 PERSONS.


Subterranean City of SaIf-.n the Pc,
ruvian Province of cuzco in Com
munitJ Living in a Quicksilver Mine
Cave DwelIers.
Kelburg, which is Situated in Po-
land, not far from Cracow, is one D,
the most extraordinary cities in the
world; for not only is it entirely SUB
terranean, but the material used in its
construction is not stone or brick, but
salt
Three thousand people are resilient
in its seven hundred houses, and they
are all workers in the great salt
mines. The streets and squares are
paved with rock salt Slabs of purest
white, and are kept exquisitely neat
and clean by a corps of volunteer
scavengers.
The pride of the city, however, is its
cathedral, carved in salt and lighted
with electricity. 1t is gorgeously dec
Grated; and ON the high altar blazes
the magnificent cross which was pres
ented by the late Car of Russia when
he descended from the upper air in
order to worship there for a brief
space eleven years ago.
Disease of an infectious or contagi-
Gus nature is quite unknown in kei-
burg; in fact, the majority of the IN
habitants die of old age A non-fatal
ailment of a scorbutic type is, how
q
mild form of opthalmia, said to be
due to the continual and all-pervadirg
whiteness, is more or less common.
Regarded as a city of salt pure and
simple, Kelburg is, of course, unique.
But there are several other known ex-
amples of cities situated beneath the
surface Of the earth.
In the Peruvian province of Cuzco,
for instance, is an abandoned quick
silver mine 120 fathoms in circumfer-
ence, and about 100 in dep h. And
within this profound abyss are streets,
squares and chapel, where daily re-
ligious worship is carried on.
Among the Inhabitants are many
old men and women, who have never
cared to visit the earth above them
since they left it as little toddling
children in the early years of the last
century.
In Japan, again, thirty miles or so
from Kumanotu, some twenty thous
and, men, women and children are
permanently resident in the crater Of
an extinct volcano.
In this pit-like city, surrounded by
a vertical wall more than 500 feet
high, the entire community lives,
moves and has its being. Rarely, in
deed, does one of it's members make
journey into the outer world; and
they are net often intruded upon, for
they are OF a churlish, not to say re-
vengeful, disposition.
The Etanvans, or Arctic Highland
ers" of Ross, live in ice-caves within
the vast glacier cap which covers all
northern Greenland. Theirs is, per-
haps, the most wretched and isolated
existence it is possible to conceive.
Their dwellings" are always wet,
owing to the melting of tae ice walls
and floor. For full six months of the
year the darkness Of the arctic night
envelops them. The ice is around
them, beneath them, above them. In
nine cases out of ten, if they venture
abroad they breathe the frozen par
ticles. and the sensation is akin to
that which comes from inhaling the
blast of furnace.
Nevertheless they refuse to move
further south with the approach OF
winter, as do all the other Eskimo
tribes. They take sort of perverted
pride in their loneliness as in their
misery. what matter" they say, 1T
we are cold and hungry? We are the
last of all people. We dwell, literally,
at the end of the world. To the north
of us there is snow, there is ice; but
there is no land, and there is nothing
that lives, breathes or has independ-
ent movement"
In 1893 wild tribe of natives was
discovered in the Wentworth district
of New South Wales, whose dwellings
and mode of living Appropriated al
most exactly to those of our troglo-
dyte ancestors. The tribe had its orr
Gin in runaway black fellow hiding
in some little known country for thir-
ty years with few gins.
During that period the horde had
increased to above thirty persons
men. women and children. They
herded together in two low caves,
which they had dug for themselves,
increasing their length as fresh arriv-
ais in the shape of babies necessitated
more room. Their only food consist
ed of kangaroo, wildcat and ant eggs.
There sole weapons were spears and
these were merely stems of malice
wood pointed and barbed. They pro-
duced fire by rubbing two sticks to-
gether, and their water was contained
in bags made from the skins of kan
CARGO logs.
Ii was noted as a curious fact that
when discovered the station blacks
had tae greatest difficulty in making
the wild tribesmen understand them.
although thirty years previously they
must have all spoken the same Ian
Weekly.