Southward from Louisville runs the railroad to Nashville, and
proceeding along it, Green River is reached, which, flowing northwest,
falls into the Ohio near Evansville. At the Green River crossing were
fought the initial skirmishes of the Civil War, in various conflicts
between the western armies of Generals Buell and Bragg in 1862.
Farther southwestward is Bowling Green, now a quiet agricultural town,
but then a location at the crossing of Barren River of great strategic
importance, it having been occupied and strongly fortified by the
Confederates in 1861, to defend the approach to Nashville. But after
the capture of Forts Henry and Donelson in February, 1862, the
Confederates being outflanked abandoned the town, retiring southward.
Between these places, and adjoining Green River, about ninety miles
south of Louisville, is the famous Mammoth Cave of Kentucky. This is
the largest known cavern in the world, extending for a distance of
nine or ten miles, the various avenues that have been explored having
a total length approximating two hundred miles. The carboniferous
limestones of Kentucky, in which the cave is located, occupy an area
of eight thousand square miles, and the geologists estimate that there
are probably a hundred thousand miles of open caverns beneath this
surface. There is a hotel near the cave entrance, and it has several
thousand visitors annually. Its mouth is reached by passing down a
rocky ravine through the forest, and is a sort of funnel-shaped
opening about a hundred feet in diameter at the top, with steep walls
fifty feet high. A hunter accidentally discovered the cave in 1809,
and for years afterwards it was entered chiefly to obtain nitre for
the manufacture of gunpowder, especially during the War of 1812, the
nitre being found in deposits on the cave floor, mainly near the
entrance, and owing its origin to the accumulation of animal remains,
mostly of bats, in which the cave abounds. It subsequently became a
resort for sight-seers, and yields its owners a good revenue.
Upon entering the cave, the first impression is made by a chaos of
limestone formations, moist with water oozing from above, and then is
immediately felt what is known as "the breath" of the cave. It has
pure air and an even temperature of 52° to 56°, and this is maintained
all the year round. In summer the relatively cooler air flows out of
the entrance, while in winter the colder air outside is drawn in, and
this makes the movement of "the breath," at once apparent from the
difference of temperature and currents of wind when passing the
entrance. For nearly a half-mile within are seen the remains of the
Government nitre-works, the vats being undecayed, while ruts of
cart-wheels are traceable on the floor. The Rotunda is then entered, a
hall seventy-five feet high and one hundred and sixty feet across,
beginning the main cave, and out of which avenues lead in various
directions. The vast interior beyond contains a succession of
wonderful avenues, chambers, domes, abysses, grottoes, lakes, rivers,
cataracts, stalactites, etc., remarkable for size and extraordinary
appearance, though they are neither as brilliant nor as beautiful as
similar things seen in some other caves. But their gigantic scale is
elsewhere unsurpassed. There are eyeless fish and crawfish, and a
prolific population of bats. In the subterranean explorations there
are two routes usually followed, a short one of eight miles and
another of twenty miles. Various appropriate names are given the
different parts of the cave, and curious and interesting legends are
told about them, one of the tales being of the "Bridal Chamber," which
got its name because an ingenious maiden who had promised at the
deathbed of her mother she would not marry any man on the face of the
earth, came down here and was wedded. Bayard Taylor wrote of this
Mammoth Cave, "No description can do justice to its sublimity, or
present a fair picture of its manifold wonders; it is the greatest
natural curiosity I have ever visited, Niagara not excepted."
Seventy miles south of Bowling Green, at the Cumberland River, and
occupying the hills adjoining both banks, is Nashville, the capital
and largest city of Tennessee, having eighty thousand population. It
is in an admirable situation, and is known as the "Rock City," its
most prominent building, the State Capitol, standing upon an abrupt
yet symmetrical hill, rising like an Indian mound and overlooking the
entire city, its high tower seen from afar. In the grounds are the
tomb of President James K. Polk, who died in 1849 and whose home was
in Nashville, and a fine bronze equestrian statue of General Andrew
Jackson, the most famous Tennesseean, whose residence, the Hermitage,
was eleven miles to the eastward. Nashville has considerable
manufactures, but is chiefly known as the leading educational city of
the South. The most prominent institution is the Vanderbilt
University, attended by eight hundred students and endowed by
Commodore Cornelius Vanderbilt with $1,000,000, his colossal statue,
unveiled in 1897, standing on the campus. The University of Nashville,
originally begun by charter of the North Carolina Legislature as an
Academy in 1785, has four hundred students in its Normal Department,
which trains teachers for Southern schools, and as many more in its
Medical Department. There are also the Fisk University, Roger Williams
University, and Central Tennessee College, all endowments for colored
students and having about thirteen hundred in attendance. The city has
various other educational institutions and public buildings, and in
the southwestern suburbs is the famous Belle Meade stock-farm, where
was bred Iroquois, the only American horse that was a winner of the
English Derby. Nashville was in the midst of the Civil War, and four
miles to the northward is a National Cemetery with over sixteen
thousand soldiers' graves. The great battle of Nashville was fought
just south of the city December 15 and 16, 1864. In November of that
year General Sherman had captured Atlanta, Georgia, to the southeast,
and the Confederate General Hood, who had lost it, marched in
Sherman's rear northward and began an invasion of Tennessee, advancing
upon Nashville and forcing General George H. Thomas to fall back
within its fortifications south of the Cumberland. For two weeks
little was done, the weather preventing, but Thomas suddenly attacked,
and in the two days' battle worsted Hood and put his army to flight,
pursuing them over the boundary into Alabama, where the remnants
escaped across the Tennessee River, a demoralized rabble. Hood's army
being thus destroyed, Sherman, who had been waiting at Atlanta, began
his famous march to the sea.
The Ohio River below Louisville passes Evansville, the chief town of
southwestern Indiana, having sixty thousand people and a large trade.
A short distance beyond, the Wabash River flows in, the boundary
between Indiana and Illinois. Shawneetown in southern Illinois and
Paducah in Kentucky are passed, and the Ohio River finally discharges
its waters into the Mississippi at Cairo, the southern extremity of
Illinois, the town being built upon a long, low peninsula protruding
between the two great rivers, around which extensive levees have been
constructed to prevent inundation. The place has about twelve thousand
people and considerable manufacturing industry. All about is an
extensive prairie land, which in times of great spring freshets is
generally overflowed.