ding. It then
enlarged to a rather spacious cavern, and took a southwest direction,
after which there was another perpendicular hole, leading, by means of
a rude and rickety ladder, to a steep, low, crooked, and crawling
passage, descending until it opened into a large broken chamber, at one
end of which was a deep hole or basin of water.

This account may not be perfectly accurate in all the details, but it
is not exaggerated. Probably some of the turnings and windings, ascents
and descents, are omitted; and the truest and most faithful description
that could be given of it would be really the most extraordinary.

The water was in a deep, stony basin, running under a shelf of
overhanging rock, with a pole laid across on one side, over which the
Indians leaned to dip it up with their calabashes; and this alone, if
we had wanted other proof, was confirmation that the place had been
used as a well.

But at the moment it was a matter of very little consequence to us
whether any living being had ever drunk from it before; the sight of it
was more welcome to us than gold or rubies. We were dripping with
sweat, black with smoke, and perishing with thirst. It lay before us in
its stony basin, clear and inviting, but it was completely out of
reach; the basin was so deep that we could not reach the water with our
hands, and we had no vessel of any kind to dip it out with. In our
entire ignorance of the character of the place, we had not made any
provision, and the Indians had only brought what they were told to
bring. I crawled down on one side, and dipped up a little with one
hand; but it was a scanty supply, and with this water before us we were
compelled to go away with our thirst unsatisfied. Fortunately, however,
after crawling back through the first narrow passage, we found some
fragments of a broken water-jar, with which the Indians returned and
brought us enough to cool our tongues.

In going down we had scarcely noticed anything except the wild path
before us; but, having now some knowledge of the place, the labour was
not so great, and we inquired for the passage which the Indians had
told us led to Mani. On reaching it, we turned off, and, after
following it a short distance, found it completely stopped by a natural
closing of the rock. From the best information we could get, although
all said the passage led to Mani, we were satisfied that the Indians
had never attempted to explore it. It did not lead to the wate