2-752-521 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

'Scenes in Mammoth Cave', 1874. Tourists visit limestone caverns in Kentucky, USA, the longest cave system known in the world: 'The Lovers Leap; The Altar; The Star Chamber; The Dead Sea; The Vestibule, Kentucky Cliffs; on the Lake, The Giant's Coffin'. 'The next halt is in another wide room, in the middle of which rests an immense rock, in the exact shape of a sarcophagus. This is called the Giant's Coffin, and the guide, leaving you alone for a minute or two, reappears on its lid, his form, shadowed on the wall, imitating all his movements. Above the shadow you will notice the figure of an ant-eater, one of the many shapes with which the ceilings of the caverns are adorned by the oxide of iron'. From "Picturesque America; or, The Land We Live In, A Delineation by Pen and Pencil of the Mountains, Rivers, Lakes...with Illustrations on Steel and Wood by Eminent American Artists" Vol. II, edited by William Cullen Bryant. [D. Appleton and Company, New York, 1874]