main ravine. Here, too, we were disappointed, although we found and
brought up with us a musket.

On the seventeenth we set out with the determination of examining more
thoroughly the chasm of black granite into which we had made our way in
the first search. We remembered that one of the fissures in the sides
of this pit had been but partially looked into, and we were anxious
to explore it, although with no expectation of discovering here any
opening.

We found no great difficulty in reaching the bottom of the hollow as
before, and were now sufficiently calm to survey it with some attention.
It was, indeed, one of the most singular-looking places imaginable, and
we could scarcely bring ourselves to believe it altogether the work of
nature. The pit, from its eastern to its western extremity, was about
five hundred yards in length, when all its windings were threaded; the
distance from east to west in a straight line not being more (I should
suppose, having no means of accurate examination) than forty or fifty
yards. Upon first descending into the chasm, that is to say, for a
hundred feet downward from the summit of the hill, the sides of the
abyss bore little resemblance to each other, and, apparently, had at
no time been connected, the one surface being of the soapstone, and the
other of marl, granulated with some metallic matter. The average breadth
or interval between the two cliffs was probably here sixty feet, but
there seemed to be no regularity of formation. Passing down, however,
beyond the limit spoken of, the interval rapidly contracted, and the
sides began to run parallel, although, for some distance farther,
they were still dissimilar in their material and form of surface.
Upon arriving within fifty feet of the bottom, a perfect regularity
commenced. The sides were now entirely uniform in substance, in colour,
and in lateral direction, the material being a very black and shining
granite, and the distance between the two sides, at all points facing
each other, exactly twenty yards. The precise formation of the chasm
will be best understood by means of a delineation taken upon the spot;
for I had luckily with me a pocketbook and pencil, which I preserved
with great care through a long series of subsequent adventure, and to
which I am indebted for memoranda of many subjects which would otherwise
have been crowded from my remembrance.

This figure [No figures in text] gives the general outlines of the
chasm,