From the bottom of the
dome they ascended the hill to the place to which they had been
lowered from the platform, and continuing thence up a very steep hill,
more than one hundred feet, they reached its summit. Arrived at the
summit, a scene of awful grandeur and magnificence is presented to the
view. Looking down the declivity, you see far below to the left, the
visiters whom you have left behind, standing on the platform or
termination of the avenue along which they had come; and lower down
still, the bottom of the Great Dome itself. Above, two hundred and
eighty feet, is the ceiling, lost in the obscurity of space and
distance. The height of the ceiling was determined by E.F. Lee, civil
engineer. This fact in regard to the elevation of the ceiling and the
locality of the Great Hall, was subsequently ascertained, by finding
on the summit of the hill, (a spot never before trodden by man,) an
iron lamp!! The astonishment of the guides, as well as of the whole
party, on beholding the lamp, can be easily imagined; and to this day
they would have been ignorant of its history, but for the accidental
circumstance of an old man being at the Cave Hotel, who, thirty years
ago, was engaged as a miner in the saltpetre establishment of Wilkins
& Gratz. He, on being shown the lamp, said at once, that it had been
found under the crevice pit (a fact that surprised all,); that during
the time Wilkins & Gratz were engaged in the manufacture of saltpetre,
a Mr.
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