Fire and ruins.--Through sylvan scenes.--The cave of Luray.--A
jewelled city underground.--The white savages of Wise County.
After spending a delightful week in Richmond, we begin to think it is
time to be “moving on.” So anxious are we to resume our journey
southward, we decide to go by the evening train, but unfortunately about
mid-day a thick smoke fills the air, and over-spreads the city like a
funeral pall. We learn that the railway bridge is on fire, burning so
furiously, and spreading so rapidly, that in the space of an incredibly
short time the buildings on either side are gutted, and the wind carries
the flying sparks over the city, and for a time it is in danger of total
destruction; people rush out of their houses, and watch breathlessly the
result; but the sparks fly over the house-tops in a flaming shower,
setting fire to one roof after another; and at last, after scaring half
the town, catching at the tindery thatch of the Allan House, threatening
to destroy one of the chief landmarks of the ill-starred poet’s life,
but the passers by rush to the rescue, and the old house is saved for
the benefit of new generations of relic hunters.
We fear that the destruction of the railway bridge will cause us
difficulty, and detain us in Richmond to our inconvenience; but our
landlord assures us we shall be able to start in the evening, as we had
originally designed. “Things are sure to be fixed all right,” he says.
Wonderfully expressive, and variously applied is that little word “fix,”
in the idiomatic language of this “Greater Britain.” Never did so small
a word mean so much! It does duty as a “word of all work,” in the
kitchen, in the stable, and in the lady’s chamber; the ladies “fix”
their hair, the gentlemen “fix” their whiskers, they “fix” their
dinners, they “fix” their babies, they “fix” their weddings, they “fix”
their funerals--in fact that little insignificant monosyllable is
imported into all the articles of their daily life, and they live in a
general atmosphere of “fixing.”
In accordance with our host’s kind assurance, things are pleasantly
“fixed” for our departure, the only inconvenience being that we have to
drive across the foot-bridge (so called because it is a wide carriage
drive) over the river, and take the train from Manchester on the other
side. The shades of evening are fast falling round us as we drive down
the narrow streets towards the river, and thence take our last view of
these Richmond hills, which remind us so strongly of that other
Richmond, girded by our winding river Thames.
The Capitol with its silent groups of heroic dead is dimly shadowed
forth in the fading light; here and there the street lamps are lit, and
look like glimmering glow-worms crawling up the narrow winding ways; and
from the stained glass windows of many churches the mellow light streams
through, revealing a fantastic kind of mosaic in brilliant hues--blue
and crimson, green and gold, blending harmoniously together; the roll of
the organ, and the united voices of the singers follow us down through
the hilly street until they are lost in the distance.
The dark river is rushing beneath the foot-bridge at our feet; and on
our right the foaming flood is lighted by the fading fires of the still
burning wreck of the railway bridge. The whole structure is down, and
the huge beams lying like fiery serpents on the river’s surface, now
smouldering in red sullen fires, then up-leaping in tiny flickering
tongues of blue flame, licking round and feeding upon every remnant that
remains of the bridge that only at noon had stood proud and strong
against the sky, its iron limbs spanning the dark water. It had been
supported by twelve brick pillars, which are still left standing; each
one wearing its crown of jewelled flames, burning in lurid flashes, like
altars of the Eastern fire-worshippers, or beacon lights at sea, showing
the gloomy gaps between, whence the burning masses had fallen into the
sea. These colossal pillars blazing in the darkness, between the sable
shadows of the river, and the moonless midnight of the sky, threw a
light bright as the brightest day around us. On both banks of the broad
river, before and behind us, rise the gaunt ruins that were prosperous
factories in the morning, now mere blackened shells, yet picturesque and
radiant in the soft golden ruddy glow of the beautiful cruel flames,
that still lick and twist serpent-like in and out of the empty window
frames. Successful commonplace prosperity at noon, they are transfigured
into resplendent ruin at night. Well, the train awaited us on the
opposite side, and there the owners of the destroyed property were
already talking together, planning the rebuilding of their factories
with improvements; wasting no words in useless regrets; they were
scheming, and in their mind’s eye reconstructing the works, while the
ruins still smouldered before their eyes.
The road to Western Virginia leads through some of the most beautiful
scenery of the south. Lying near, and around us, are soft swelling hills
and undulating valleys, with here and there dark pine woods, grouped in
sombre masses; their branches standing out stiff and grim, like serried
ranks of swords, pricking the skies--a standing army of nature’s wild
recruits rooted to her breast, their only warfare being carried on with
the raging elements, when the storm king comes crashing down from the
distant mountains in a whirlwind of raging wrath, and armed with the
invisible horrors of the air hurls itself upon the woodland kings,
tearing their stiffened limbs, wrenching and twisting their tall
straight trunks, and leaving them a shapeless shivering mass upon the
ground, broken like a gallant army, but not vanquished; the earth still
holds them fast, wrapping her soft moss about their bleeding wounds,
fanning them with sweet airs, and lifting them up again to flourish in
the face of the sun. Here and there broad bands of the silver stream
sandal the foothills, and lace the ragged fringes of the earth together.
We look round on a wide panoramic view of variegated green, where hill
and valley, wooded knolls and rocky ridges, frowning forests and smiling
meadows, are blended in one harmonious whole, and a soft hazy atmosphere
lies like a heavenly mystery over all. The view is bounded and shut in
by the lofty range of the Blue Ridge Mountains. Winding slowly and
almost by imperceptible gradations downwards, we soon reach the
beautiful Shenandoah valley, _en route_ for the wonderful cave of
“Luray,” which lies in the centre of Page county.
The earth’s surface here and for miles round is rugged and broken, as
though by some great upheaval centuries ago; huge grey boulders are
lying in all directions, as though some ancient Titan had flung them
down in sport. Giant rocks, the work of the great sculptor Nature, lie
in folded ridges, their stony draperies falling about them in massive
magnificence that is beyond the reach of art. Rivulets of living water
trickle down their gaping sides, and gather, and swell, and flow through
darkened chasms half hidden from the light of the sun, playing an
everlasting game of hide and seek, then rushing forth sparkling and
laughing in its light.
Eastward about a mile from the pretty village of Luray, and partially
screened by the dense thickets which crown the hilltops, there exists an
extensive cave. Concerning its first discovery, many years ago,
tradition tells an interesting story, indicating a man named Ruffner as
its first discoverer. He with his family, it is said, was among the
first settlers in the valley below, and one day he went out on a hunting
expedition and never returned. After a search of many weeks, his gun was
found at the entrance to the cave, and in due time he was discovered,
having wandered among its labyrinthine courts and passages till he was
lost and dead of starvation. From this event it was called “Ruffner’s”
cave, and is so printed on the maps both of that period and since.
Little interest, however, attached to the cave, and for a time it seemed
to have passed from the memory of man, and remained neglected and hidden
away in the heart of the mountain until the summer of 1878, when a
number of gentlemen formed themselves into a company not only for the
more complete exploration of the old cave, but for a regularly organised
search for new wonders. They hoped to discover even a more extensive
cave, which from their geological survey they believed to exist in the
neighbourhood. They ranged the hillside, penetrated dense thickets and
tangled woods; crept and groped under rocky ledges--first taking care to
rout the brood of rattlesnakes from their slimy bed, and hunting the
frightened foxes from their burrows under the ground, where for ages
they had lived in savage security--but for many weeks their search was
in vain. However, on returning one evening, exhausted and disheartened,
along the northern side of the hill, they observed a suspicious looking
hollow choked up with straggling bushes, loose stones, weeds, and
rubbish of all kinds, the accumulation of years. They set to work at
daydawn, clearing away the tangled brushwood, tossing out the loose
stones, and plunging deeper and deeper into the dark abyss, till they
felt a rush of cool air creeping up through the broken earth, and after
a few hours’ laborious endeavour they found themselves in a lofty
passage, which formed a kind of antechamber to a vast palace of wonder
which had been building since the world began. Thus was the Luray cave
discovered; but it is only during the last year that it has been
rendered accessible to the public. Nature hides her most beautiful
secrets so closely within her breast, and surrounds them with so many
mysteries, that art and labour, hand in hand, must come to the fore
before they can become the property of the world outside.
Surely Aladdin’s magical lamp never lighted up such jewelled wonders as
are to be beheld here! Here are halls and corridors, stairways and
galleries, chasms and bridges, built or hollowed out with a weird
architectural magnificence wonderful to behold. We stand in the spacious
nave of the cathedral, and gaze at its groined and glittering roof, and
Gothic columns of many-coloured stalactite. The utter silence (which
never exists in the outer world, where there is always the whirr of
invisible insects, the stir of leaves, the whispering of grasses, and a
thousand other nameless sounds) here is supremely impressive; the air,
laden with solemn stillness, lies heavy and close round us. We listen
for the roll of some hidden organ to fill the darkening shadows with
music, and tempt us to fall upon our knees in worship of the Great
Unknown. We pass through a narrow jagged passage full of grotesque
shapes and caricatures of things real and unreal, till we come to a
damp, low-roofed opening called the bridal chamber, which is profusely
ornamented with fantastic formations of crystalline rock. It is said, I
don’t know how truthfully, that some benighted imbeciles have already
been married on this spot. The roof is everywhere supported by hundreds
of columns of various gradations of colour and size, from a thin walking
cane to the grand pillar in the “giant’s hall,” which is nearly twenty
feet in circumference, and is ribbed and rugged like the bark of a tree.
A curious feature in this particular cave is the profusion of thin
icicles--I do not know by what other name to call them; it seems as
though threads of ice had been woven together in a veil of frost work
unknown to decorative art. They hang from the edges, and drape the walls
in falling folds like a tapestry curtain; they droop in graceful folds
before Diana’s bath, and are drawn round the couch of the “sleeping
beauty”--for a symmetrical form that is almost human lies shrouded in
ice beneath it. Fancy has found some appropriate name for every nook and
corner, form and figure, of this underground world. However fantastic
these stalactite embellishments may be they are never inharmonious, one
thing never seems out of keeping with another. Here we may gather to
ourselves lessons of loveliness, and the mysterious mingling of the
beautiful in form and colour that æstheticism tries in vain to teach.
We wander through the “garden,” and gaze round with still greater
amazement upon the gorgeous colouring and delicate formation of these
stalactite flowers, so airy and fragile; they look as though a breath
would wither them, yet they have been in bloom for ages, and will bloom
on for ages more. The grey stone is covered with this growth of glassy
flowers, with quivering petals of pink and violet and white. We are
inclined to smell them, scarce believing they are cold and scentless.
Presently we come upon a glacial forest scene, where the fluted columns,
uprising like knotted trunks of trees, spread their thin, brittle
branches till we fancy we see them quivering in the still air. Let fancy
take the bit in her mouth and run away with our reason, and we shall
believe we are standing amid a spectral group of ancient willow and elm
trees which have perished from the upper world, and live out their
frozen life of ages here below. Here and there a tiny rill of water
trickles like a silver thread down among the folded draperies, till it
is lost among the fretted frostwork below. Then crossing a rude stony
balcony we look down into a wide, deep chasm, which yawns beneath our
feet, and it is not difficult for the imagination to evolve the most
uncanny creatures of weird, unearthly forms from the depths of darkness
which the magnesium lights illuminate but cannot penetrate.
At last we come up from those vast underground realms to the light of
the living sun, awestruck and impressed with the wonders thereof. While
we are carrying out our small human lives, taxing our intellect, our
imagination and our skill to build up vast edifices of brick and stone
on this outer earth, which in a few short years must crumble away, an
unknown and invisible world is being slowly perfected beneath our
feet--a world not made by hands--every touch and tint the work of a
passing age; silently and slowly the viewless workers labour on, under
the land and under the sea, while cycles and ages pass! Will not this
outer crust whereon we live slowly crack like a shell, and one day fall
away, and leave a world such as the Revelation tells of, whose jewelled
palaces are of silver and gold, the glory and wonder whereof this world
knoweth not! We feel as though we had stood on the outermost edge and
caught a glimpse of the wonder-land where nature is working her will in
silence and darkness.
Some of the most picturesque and sublime scenery of the South may be
found in the regions of Western Virginia, where nature in her wildest
mood holds sovereign sway among her everlasting hills, clothed with
majestic woods running down to the narrow valleys and winding lands
which intersect the mountains. Here in these solitudes, scattered
through these lonely regions, live a primitive people, leading a
primitive life.
They are supposed to be the descendants of the Irish and Scotch who came
over to this country about two hundred years ago, and wandered on and on
till they reached these solitudes and then settled down in sparse and
scattered groups far apart, not in villages but in single families,
where they have been living undisturbed through all these changing
years, marrying and intermarrying with some kind of ceremony peculiar to
themselves, from generation to generation. Children have been born,
grown to be old men, and died, having never passed out from their own
solitary homes.
They hold no communion with the outer world; no “iron horse” steams
through their solitudes, and few and far between indeed are the
travellers who invade their wilderness. Even with each other their
communication is scarce and scant--their nearest neighbour may be
residing from five to twenty miles away; visiting is therefore a rather
difficult process, especially as there are no roads leading from one
place to another. People have to find their way, or rather make their
way, over the rough, stony mountain, and through the tangled woods,
wading through brooks and leaping across dangerous chasms before they
can enjoy the luxury of looking on a human face! These poor people can
neither read nor write, they have no means of learning to do either;
they are beyond the reach of the school-board, without the pale of
civilisation. There are no schools, no books, no newspapers, no post, no
highroads, no church, no law but what their own untaught nature lays
down; no religion save that which they evolve from the mystery of their
own being--for even in the most savage, untutored breast, a still small
voice is always whispering speculations as to the unknown from the
beginning to the end and after. They build their own log huts (some of
which are in the last stage of dilapidation) and make their own rough
furniture. Having cleared as much land as they want, they grow patches
of corn, cabbages, and such like; nuts, fruits and sorrel, and other
kinds of green stuff which they use for food all grow plentifully in
these uncultivated lands. Some own a cow and a few fowls, and wild hogs
are numerous enough to supply them with all they need of animal food.
In all this region cotton grows abundantly, and they weave their own
clothes, the old spindle of two hundred years ago being still in use
among them. The men wear shoes--when they can get them--all the year
round; but the women go barefoot except in the winter time and during
the inclement season, when the streams are turned to frozen ice, and the
earth is shrouded in thick snow. It is the women who do the outdoor
work, while their lords and masters, following the example of savage
Indian tribes, stay by the fireside and smoke their pipes. Occasionally,
once in a year or two, some one of this scattered community will load
his mule and fill his cart with different commodities of his own and his
neighbour’s and make a pilgrimage to the nearest town--which may be a
hundred miles off or more--and sell or exchange them for such
necessaries as they require, and with which they cannot supply
themselves. The existence of these primitive people is very well known
to such travellers as from time to time have penetrated these solitudes;
but this state of things will not be allowed to remain long unchanged;
the spirit of progress is abroad, and is already making a subtle and
invisible progress even among these primeval solitudes.
Some three or four years ago a solitary gentleman of engineering
proclivities started on a voyage of discovery through these desolate
regions, and after long wanderings and many disappointments fell
figuratively upon his feet at last, and after a patient investigation of
certain localities came to the conclusion that some of nature’s rich
resources were hidden away in the heart of these mountains. Having once
convinced himself of this truth he returned to civilisation, and with
little difficulty organised a company, and in the course of a few months
returned with a staff of engineers and workers necessary for the full
development and carrying out of his design. The shaft was sunk, the mine
is now in full working order, and promises to be a great success.
Meanwhile there have been many and great difficulties to be overcome in
the suspicious ignorance and sturdy opposition of these, the original
inhabitants of the soil, who regard the new order of things with evil
eyes, and watch with ill-disguised dissatisfaction, and low, muttered
threats that the invasion of their privacy shall be paid for by the
lives of their invaders, who, however, go steadily on with their work
with a fearless determination to carry it through in spite of the
opposition of this hostile community.
The new comers associated with the old inhabitants, whenever occasion
served, in a frank, friendly fashion, endeavouring to convince them that
any act of violence on their part would be followed by speedy punishment
and the total expulsion of the whole scattered community from the soil
where they had become rooted for generations past. But in vain they
tried to persuade them that the new order of things would be for their
benefit, and would bring them into connection with the great world,
giving to them and to their children an opportunity of rising and
improving their condition. They have no ambition, and being utterly
unconscious of their ignorance are content therewith. They don’t know
anything nor don’t want to know anything; they have many curious
traditions circulating among them, descending from father to son, and
growing and deepening in wonder by the way. They are full too of strange
superstitions, as a people living so utterly apart from the rest of the
world, lost in the speculations and mystery of their own lonely lives
would naturally be; they may have a kind of dreamy conviction that
somewhere across the mountains the inhabitants boil and eat brown
babies, and, if occasion serves, are in no ways loth to indulge
surreptitiously in the luxury of a fine fat white boy!
However, they are day by day getting more reconciled to the presence of
their civilised brethren, who by general tact and little helpful
kindnesses have won their toleration and good will. Though they still
stand aloof and watch the progress of affairs with curious eyes, they
give _no_ assistance and offer no opposition.
Meanwhile public attention having been called to the existence of the
valuable mines throughout these districts, the construction of a railway
is under consideration; and if the projected undertaking be carried out
villages and towns will spring up like magic in these untrodden wilds,
the echoes of life and labour resound through the now silent solitudes,
and the flood of a new strong life will burst among these wandering
weaklings of humanity, and either absorb them into their own strength,
or drive to still deeper and farther solitary wilds the white savages of
Wise County.