was by no
means free from the awe with which these _gouffres_ inspired the
country-people, and his soldiering had still left him a Cadurcian
Celt, with much of the superstition that he had drawn in with his
native air. One morning he found that his donkey had nearly strangled
himself over-night with the halter, and Decros could not shake off the
impression that this accident was an omen intended to convey some
message from the other world. He was ready to go with me into any
cavern; but I am sure he would have much preferred scaling dangerous
rocks in the broad sunlight, for there he would have felt at home.

There was not too much water to offer any danger, so we stooped down
and entered the low vault after lighting candles. The roof soon rose,
and we were in a spacious cavern, the sides of which had evidently
been washed and worn away into hollows by the sea that rolled here
long before the mysterious race raised its dolmens and tumuli upon the
surrounding knolls. The passage was wide enough for us to walk on the
margin of the stream, or where the water was very shallow; but had
much rain fallen, the expedition would have been perilous, for the
descending torrent would then have been strong enough to carry a man
off his legs.

Stalactites hung from the rocks overhead, and as we proceeded they
became more numerous, more fantastic, and more beautiful. They were
just as the dropping water had slowly fashioned them in the darkness
of ages, where day and night were the same, where nothing changed but
themselves, save the voice of the stream, which grew louder or softer
according to the play of winds and sunshine and clouds upon the upper
world. Some tapered to a fine point, others were like pendant bunches
of grapes; all were of the whiteness of loaf-sugar. No tourists
stricken with that deplorable mania for taking home souvenirs of
everything, and ready to spoil any beauty to gratify their vanity or
their acquisitiveness, had cast stones into the midst of the fairy
handicraft of the wizard water for the sake of a fragment; nor had the
village boys amused themselves here at the expense of the stalactites,
for happily they had been well trained in the horror of the
supernatural. The cavern ran for a certain distance south-west; then
the gallery turned at a sharp angle north-north-west, and continued in
this direction. We followed the stream some three or four hundred
yards, and then it entered a deep pool or lake under l