evertheless, are never-ending shocks.
I have seldom undergone anything more difficult than the walk in broad
daylight, across that courtyard to the mouth of the salt mine. We were
borne up by the fact that perhaps one hundred other women were similarly
attired, and that both men and women looked upon it as a huge joke and
nothing more. One rather incomprehensible thing struck us as we left the
attiring-room. This was the use of the leather apron. The attendant
switched it around in the back and tied it firmly in place, and when we
demanded to know the reason, she said, in German, "It is for the swift
descent."

Jimmie was similarly arrayed when he met us at the door, but he seemed
to know no more about it than we did. At the mouth of the salt mine we
were met by our conductor, who took us along a dark passage, where all
the lights furnished were those from the covered candles fastened to
our belts, something on the order of the miner's lamp.

Further and further into the blackness we went, our shoes grinding into
the coarse salt mixed with dirt, and the dampness smelling like the
spray from the sea. Presently we came to the mouth of something that
evidently led down somewhere. Blindly following our guide who sat
astride of a pole, Jimmie planted himself beside him, astride of the
guide's back; Mrs. Jimmie, after having absolutely refused, was finally
persuaded to place herself behind Jimmie, then came Bee, and last of all
myself.

Our German is not fluent, nevertheless we asked many questions of the
guide, whose only instructions were to hold on tight. He then asked us
if we were ready.

"Ready for what?" we said.

"For the swift descent," he answered.

"The descent into what?" said Jimmie.

But at that, and as if disdaining our ignorance, we suddenly began to
shoot downward with fearful rapidity on nothing at all. All at once the
high polish on the leather aprons was explained to me. We were not on
any toboggan; we formed one ourselves.

When we arrived they said we had descended three hundred feet. But we
women had done nothing but emit piercing shrieks the entire way, and it
might have been three hundred feet or three hundred miles, for all we
knew. After our fierce refusal to start and our horrible screams during
the descent, Jimmie's disgust was something unspeakable when we
instantly said we wished we could do it again. Our guide, however, being
matter of fact, and utterly without imagination, was as ind