- NOTHING IN ALL THE WORLD
LIKE CARLSBAD CAVERNS, LO
CATED DOWN IN NEW MEXICO
Carl C. Magee, editor of the New!
Mexico State Tribune, Albuquerque, j
visited Carlsbad Cavern last week and
: spent three days here. Those who
know him expected that his column
of “Light” would cast some interest- j
ing lights on the cavern—and they1
wem not disappointed. The following
«. acanunt of his trip is taken from the
Saturday issue of the Tribune:
“I. have spent five hurs in the |
Carlsbad Caverns—and I am tongue- j
tied. —The inadequacy of words im- j
rt, nssus me as never before. I would
like- to -see some great descriptive
writer. attempt the task of word- ,
painting .the caverns. He would fail
to get the picture he saw across to his
reader. It simply cannot be done.
Familiar objects, which might be used
for purBoses..of comparison, are lack-1
ing. There-is nothing in all the world
even-remotely like the Carlsbad Cav
erns. The factors of light, life, sea- ■
sons--—and death-play no part here.
If we attempt to think in terms of
great- cathedrals, we- fail. The high
est ceiling man ever made is pigmy.
The widest dome the greatest builder
ever attempted would be but one of a
- hundred alcoves in the caverns.
Heights of 200 to vOO-feet are com
mon. Now and then,—-through a
break in the domecan be seen an elec
tric light hundreds of feet, further up.
The stone dome of luncheon alcove
of the Big Room must be 1,500 feet
in circumference. The Big Room is
three-quarters of a mile long. We
traveled three miles and back -through
- room, opening into room. -'Yet this
three miles of wonderland is only one
seventh of the platted cavern. The
Government has surveyed over 21
miles in these caves. The visitor must
■wait until Uncle Sam can spend the
■ money to build the trails to make the
added caverns accessible. But the
three miles now open are sufficient to
paralyze the powers of the eye to see.
The mind refuses to absorb more, A
week in the caves and new wonders
still would appear moment by mo
mm\t. -The visitor is told that above;
the- highest ceiling is still another
cave, with a great lake of water in it.;
He is shown that below the Big Room |
is another room. This we are assured j
is larger and more beautiful, if that]
is possible, than the present Big (
Room.
As we think in terms of architec-1
ture we find what man can do with
- foundations and walls, and-domes and i
arches so far outdone in strength, j
symmetry and beauty that we are op
pressed by a sense of man’s limita-1
• tions. Alcoves and cathedral caves;
■ are on every hand, the like of which '
no man can build. One immense obe-!
lisk has a great pooi of water about!
and underneath it. The visitor is
puzzled to know why it stays upon a
foundation so apparently off the cen
ter of gravity.
If we think in terms of animate
fife, there is hardly an animal, reptile
or bird which is not reproduced here
fn alabaster. Yet I saw no living
thing, plant or animal, on my trip last
Wednesday—not even a “scooter” on
waters so still and transparent that
formations on the bottoms of the
pools gave the illusion of standing in
the open air. It required a pebble to
ripple the surface to know that water
was there.
If we think in terms of tropical
verdure there is not the shape of a
leaf that is not reproduced there. The
luxuriousness of vegetation in the im
penetrable jungle is there, bewilder
ingly beautiful. Again in places the
the stately cactus tree stands dotting
the floor of the cave and resembling
an Arizona desert—but only in
whites and grays. In places vines
carved in stone cling to the ceiling
and hang in dense foliage.
If we think in terms of fruits the
similarity in form is striking. Ap
ples, oranges and clusters of grapes
are reproduced in the cave formations
with striking fidelity, except that
high colors are lacking.
If we think in terms of ice and
snow we see stalactites, like icicles
from the tiniest and most fragile to
giants 50 feet or more in length. We
see waierisuis iiuz.en iu
We see ripples congealed in onyx. We
see snowdrift piled on snowdrift, upon
the lrest of which a man looks like a
dwarf. Touch them and they are
are stone.
And then nature’s furnishings!
Hanging froom the ceilings are mil
lions upon millions of stalactites of
every size and varying colors. The
primary colors are absent. But shades
shades of every kind, the like of
which 1 have never seen, are there.
Only an expert could name the many
shades and hues of browns and blues
and yellow sand grays.
Beautiful laces woven in stone, by
the hand of God’s lacemakers, adorn
the walls. Great tapestries in onyx
drop in folds as graceful in line as
the dainty fingers of milady ever held
the folds of a velvet gown or an artist
ever draped ah oriental hanging.
Yards in width and thin as cloth, na
ture wove these dressings for the
subterranean rooms of mythical
queens. A light held behind them
makes them translucent as pearls.
In little niches sculptured by the
hand of unknown powers are placed
miniature busts upon pedestals and
all manner of ornamental bric-a-brac.
The wonder of it never ceases. A
new detail delights the eye at every
turn.
In one place in the great room are
thousands of stalagmites from 3 to
15 feet in height and close together.
I a
J. H. McLEAN
General
Merchandise
si
The ’mpression ie" Ot a- vast and very
la cemetery with ■''■ tombstones of
every conceivable shape.
But to me the totem-t^le- -*>t*>lisk3
and monumentst were t.h> most im
pres. Carved apparently with the hi
eroglyphics of the gods, - built' layer
upon layer with surprising, symmetry,
these great structures rear them
. elves before the eye. It is hard to
1 realize that a chisel never touched
j them nor a rule never measured them
! they appear to be the work of snpe*
! craftsmen. One of these, so mad*/
! feet high that I dare not guess, hae
i an immense stalactite reaching from
| the ceiling down to it. A point ap
| parently no larger than a lead pencil,
touches the crown of the giant .monu
ment. I am glad we arrived when we
did. They tell me the stalactite is
still growing. Had our visit been de
layed 5,000 years its point might have
been as big as a man’s forefinger.
At one end of the Big Room a bar
blocks the way. Holding his lantern
overhead, the visitor looks abruptly
down into a vast arena to a floor 150
feet below. Sometime that part of
the floor of the upper cave in which
we stand gave way and fell into the
room below. This is part of the
greater room which the guide tells us
lies below in even more bewildering
beauty.
All this talk is as idle as the wind.
The reader gets no conception of what
his eye will see when he visits the
cavern. And surely everyone will
visit it! The world holds no other
wonder like it. In ten years thou
sands of people each year will be
traveling half way around the world
to see it.
The disagreeable features of a trip
through the caverns are exaggerated.
The temperature : uniformly 56 de
grees, winter or summer. There is
no animal life in the cave to be
dreaded. There is no danger of a
misstep. There is no sensation of
being shut in-—the spaces are too im
mense.
There is only the physical ordeal to
be undergone. The visitor goes down
a fntnl HonfrVi 700 ffinrl walks a
distance of about five and a-half
miles. But the trip covers as many
hours as the visitor travels miles. Fre
quent rests prevent undue fatigue. A
woman of 74 years and a man of 86
have made this journey without in
jury.
With tens of thousands of visitors
in the past three years no one has
ever been carried out of the caverns.
“Take all the time you want, there is
always a guide behind you,” is the
repeated admonition of the head
guide. Any reasonably sound person
physically can make the trip and be
repaid a thousandfold. My friend, Dr.
E. C. Matthews, who loves me so well
that he consented to take out my ton
sils two or three months ago, was in
our party. The doctor’s head and
: hands' are sound and skillful. But a
; frightful automobile accident a few
months ago left him with a “flat
I wheel.” I didn't believe he could pos
j sibly make the grade. But he did—
| and he went all the way, while the
crowd applauded his nerve. If he
could do it any physically sound per
son can, who has ten per cent of his
courage.
Two hundred and fifty years ago
i Dr. John Lightfoot announced that he
: had completed careful calculations
and that God created the world on
: Sunday, October 23, 4004 B. C. I wish
j this religious mathematician were
alive and that we might take him to
i the caves, show him one monument
. there and then ask him if he didn’t
] leave some factors out of his calcula
tions. Scientists say that monument
was 50,000,000.years in the building.
Yet at no time in my life have 1
beeen so impressed with the certainty
[ of a Supreme Architect of the Uni
| verse as when I gazed on this great
est piece of architecture I have ever
seen. It seems silly to me to argue
that it could exist, except in response
to immutable law put in operation by
a limitless intelligence and a divine
artlsary. “God moves in a mysteri
ous way.-* His wonders to perform.’
That H« chose to ktae millions of
years to make the Carlsbad Caverns,
instead of doinp: it in a minute, leaves
[lirr • less the Creator and
none *<• . to be revered.”—New
Mexico State Tribune, Albuquerque,
Ckristmaiia is Over, but don’t forget thst the oldtimer, Bert Eld ridge*
. has plenty of stock left yet.
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i Furs Bought and Sold Clothing
All Kinds of Nice Fresh Groceries and Fruits
? {*fcnned Goods of All Kinds Beds and Bedding
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I Ivar Chtlstrem - - Manager
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