Show antiquities DISCOVERY IN A CAVE IN chere thi THERE THE WERE IVERE GIANTS MANTS IN THOSE DAYS rhe The ohio valley and this immediate in section in particular is rich in the remains of that wonderful historic race the evidences of whose civilization have been perpetuated in those curious eurious pieces of or engineering gi from which we derive the euphonious builders bunders given them the past few days wonderful discoveries have been mado made in this vicinity it 1 1 1 which open up a new chapter in the th thy history of this remarkable race and throw much h hilt light lit upon their manner of living their social nature and wid their physical character in dif dlf different sections of the world at different periods of its history there have been found the remains of enormous fauna and flora and of a gigantic race raco of men merl so rare and far apart have been tb these ese discoveries however that wo we have looked upon historical accounts of them as cleverly constructed pieces of fiction and been loth to believe that there ever existed a race of men able abie ab I 1 e to do battle with the savage mastodon ma or the fierce mega therium it remains for adams county to come foreward with a startling confirmation of the scriptural text and there were giants in those days for in adams county have been found not only the bones of a gigantic naca race rade of men but their implements clements ts of warfare and husbandry and excellently preserved specimens of their art in sculpture painting engraving and writing whether whether these prehistoric giants had a hand in the erection of those splendidly designed de gried and durably constructed VZ pieces of engineering which stretch across the country from the head waters of the ohio to the mouth of the rio grande there to commingle with a similar chain of roads mounds and fortifications coming down the pacific slope and continue on through mexico central america and the south american states to be finally lost in the unexplored barrens abna of patagonia will bo be left for the solution of a wiser head than your carre correspondent spon dent possesses ho simply relates mates the facts the scientists may build thereon the tho theories in con with some soine of the oldest citizens of bf this county I 1 have been enabled to leam learn the date of the discovery of a cave on the old smith farm hi in tiffin township its ex istance was proven to the ithe earliest settlers and they probably learned of it from the indians for years it has been a place of resort for the efi curious rious and was always esteemed a great natural curiosity the smith farm is on the thle portsmouth pike between 15 and 16 miles northeast of here the farm is now owned by samuel grooms and isa fertile well cultivated body of land Abou about tone one mile from the pike piko is a level plateau of odd acres surrounded on all sides by lofty hills As you near the mouth of the cave there is a gradual de depression of the ground on ev every er y slie sije side forming what in the local n nomenclature 0 lature is denominated a sink hole at the bottom of this circular basin is a hole three feet in diameter and about 25 feet in depth at which distance from the top of the ground you strike the floor of the first chamber in the cave a dry cavern 30 x 20 feet with smooth floor roof and walls of freestone crossing the room you enter a corridor five feet wide connecting it with another cli cil chamber amber smaller than the first and this in turn is connected with a third chamber by a similar corridor the third room is about the size of the first but has a lofty arched dome and the walls floor and roof are of limestone through this rock water has oozed for countless ages and formed thousands of glistening stalactites and mites nowhere else in the cave do you find the limestone cropping out and nowhere else do you find these slow growing formations to gain access to the fourth chamber it is necessary to climb a steep bank and press through a narrow fissure in the rock in one comer corner of this chamber is an elevation which when surmounted discloses a yawning well with a mouth ten feet in diameter and of unknown dath depth apply your ear to the edge g of I 1 th the e well and you can hear the hollow roaring of a stream of water hundreds of feet below beyond this chamber are five others connected by narrow galleries the cave comes to an end against a perpendicular wall of solid rock in the nin ninth th chamber and about yards from its in mouth auth the floors of all the chambers except the one where the limestone crops out are dry all the chambers are mathematically regular in au shape except this one they differ in length but are all of the same width and height it is a romantic place for a picnic and has been given up to such rural festivities forbears for years every comer of tiie tile cave has been thoroughly explored a thousand times and the walls of the limestone chamber chamber are covered with the names of visitors and the date of their visit one high upon the wall reads von brady 1709 11 von brady was a pioneer indian fighter and hunter who came here liere in advance of the ohio company in 1786 1788 he was a daring man and had sent many of the red men to their happy hunting grounds A few days ago a party of gentlemen gent Temen visited the cave provided with a plentiful supply of lanterns lanteri isy igi ropes and tools for the purpose of exploring the mysterious well the following were the gentlemen composing I 1 tile tiie party at K R brittingham a and andrew long leading manchester merchants ernest T kirker one of tile the editors of the manchester independent S newton griffiths of the adams county bar samuel grooms the owner of the cave and the commercial correspondent arrived at the cave it was thoroughly explored and then a rope ladder feet in length with which we had provided ourselves before starting out was lowered down the well and mr kirker headed the exploration when about 50 feet from the tho top of the well lie ho called out to the party above to come down we hastily descended to find our friend standing atthe at the entrance of a narrow gallery leading out from the well this gallery led back a considerable distance and got wider debouching debou ching finally into a spacious chamber the distance from the mouth of the well to the top of the gallery is 47 reet feet from the roof of the gallery galler yr to tile tiie floor is 10 feet 6 inches at its mouth it ife measures 5 feet 4 inches in width the gallery is straight 50 feet long has a gradual descent and where it enters the main chamber is 25 feet in fir width the chamber is 22 05 5 feet lonai long iong feet wide and 24 feet high thereof rho roof floor and walls of both the tile gallery and chamber arc smoothly Mil mii finished shed in the centre of this chamber is a sarcophagus and mausoleum combined the mausoleum measures at ita base 55 by 35 feet it is of simple though wonder i ful design an and d car carved ed out of the solid rock its bascas base baso is panne led on all sides these panels containing bas re liell s which are supposed t to 0 illustrate the four season seasons s in mans ilfe life childhood youth manhood and old age at the ends of the bas aro are tablets full of written characters resembling sem bling the hebraic hebra I 1 c presumed pr es umed to be memoria memorials ms of the person or persons in whose honor the mausoleum is erected the carving on the bas is of the most delicate description and fully equal to the grecian school of sculpture the limits of a newspaper article will not suffice to fitly describe them from the floor to the top of the base is six feet the base is hollowed out at the four corners and these excavations are covered with slabs of freestone accurately fitted and so firmly cemented that a cold chisel struck with a heavy hammer made little or no impression oil on the cerri celli cement ent they are of uniform size measuring nive five by twelve feet in the centre of the mausoleum rises a couch two feet five live inches in height twelve feet in length and five feet in width on the couch is extended the figure of a man it is probably of life size and measures nine nino feet fed four inches in length the limbs are finely proportioned and disposed in an an easy casy and graceful manner the arms are folded across the breast and the fingers clasp a bunch of leaves resembling sem bling the oak reproduced with such a fidelity to nature that they jook look like me petrifactions petri factions factious every eveny vein and serration of the leaf is perfect tile the figure is partially nude a mantle or scarf crossing the breast and folding over the loins in graceful folds the face is strong and robust in outline and the contour of the features is decidedly ah the head is covered with a winged cap gap or helmet at each corner of the couch is a vase four feet nive uvo inches high covered with beautifully carved flowers and leaves each vase is in shape something like an amphora except that the bettem is flat and tile the handles handl affixed to the body of the vase the neck is thirteen inches in length and tapers gradually and gracefully the vases are of uniform size although the carved designs are ire tre diali different erent they measure in circumference four feet five inches iii ili I 1 suspended from the roof by delicate copper rods directly over the head of the recumbent figure Is is a copper lamp of unique design elegantly chased at each corner of the mausoleum rises pyramidal column surmounted by caps that are dorie doric on two sides of the room aro are toombs toomb of humbler design they are side by Y side of uniform size and twenty in in number ten on a side like the mausoleum they are carved out of oho the solid rock and embel ebbel lashed with bas their dimensions are as follows Length twelve feet width five feet heigh heights th five live feet the tops are covered with slabs securely cemented on the front of each is a raised scroll covered with written characters similar to those on the mausoleum on the wall of the room opposite the entrance are painted awen ty five nive faces no doubt portraits of those whose bones lie in the tombs they are faded and blurred but still distinct enough to be deciphered c lp hered the colors used are red yellow black and white and were evidently laid on with oil the th p portraits are executed in a superior manner and the abato anatomical ini ical proportion r of the features is hi preserve preserved to an exact degree after our first astonishment ment over the wonderful discoveries co llad had in a measure subsided we seized the tools and set to work to open one of the tombs it tt filsno was no easy task our chisels would not cut the cement which held the slab in place and we were at last forced to batter the tomb to pieces the walls were thin and a few blows of a heavy sledge hammer shattered the freestone a to atoms to our great giet surprise 0 there therel jay before us not a few Erld handfuls fuls fuis of crumbling dust but a splendidly preserved mummy swathed swa thed in cloth covered with a thick varnish which emitted a pleasant beasant aromatic odor not unlike balsam of fir the tile mummy measured nine feet ope opo one ono inch in length and the cloth in in it was wrapped although of coarse texture was vas skillfully woven ono one of the party cut tha the wrappings s from the face but did I 1 it t eo so clumsily unis 1 ay that the bead crumbled into dust portions of the hair remained sticking to the cloth and your our correspondent brought some of it away wi with th him it is black curly and of a fine texture I 1 besides the body of the giant glant the tomb contained a spearhead spear head a hatchet two jane xane jances lances es ahr three ma mattocks or orho lioce esia csia a a cup two plates and a small um urn all of copper I 1 all ail appropriated one of the lances jances and the cup up as souvenirs these wonderful people understood the secret setret of hardening copper for an ordinary filo 1110 will barely scratch the lance and tho the edge of a cold chisel turns up like lead when struck against it ah the cup is 18 of softer metal and beautifully atif engraved ed with tr trailing alling vines and d wreaths A square package 11 at the lead head of t the li e tomb wrapped in the varnished cloth was opened and found to contain a book ot of one hundred leaves of thin copper fastened loosely at the top and crowded with finely en engraved grated characters similar to those already described lack of time and the total inefficiency of our tools prevented us from making ing further investigations but wren when we ascended the well we could plainly discern works of the sharp cutting tools used in excavating the cave in the first two awo chambers and the last five we had noticed many curious blocks of stone slone shaped like tables or benches and presumed them to be of natural origin later examination revealed the mark of chisel had pick and these agents were undoubtedly used to fash on the entire cavern the irregularity of the limestone li m i estone cham ber her is due to natural causes in all probability the room was vas dry when the wonderful people who designed and built it were alive the 1 I 1 tite and sand stalagmites mites have formed since I 1 measured one of the largest of the former it was five feet six and one half inches from base to apex allowing that it lengthened atthe at the rate rafe of one inch every nifty fifty years which a geological brierl friend 0 tells me is very rapid growth it guld guid have been years reaching its present plesent length conjecture alone alone can fim nim fe fix the date of the last occupancy of the eave cave ca veIt velt it must b hano have vo been years before the stalactites be gan to form I 1 examined of the cave and discovered traces of v a stairway which h once led to the surface of the ground indeed I 1 found broken fragments of rock which five or six thousand years sears ngo ago a go were un parts of a broad broad d staircase e where there were also traces of a stairway which wound around the sides of the well vell e 1 affording g easy entrance to the 1 lower cam cavern the upper cave must have cellar ot of a residence built abone above ground and used nor for fol domestic p purposes or a as s a place of retreat in time of danger mr grooms intends to open all the tombs and the great mausoleum ar ange convenient means of entrance to the ca eave cave V e and t throw h ro W it ope open n to the general public charging a small price of admission to reimburse him several parties have visited it once since the discovery of the lower cavern and all are I 1 impressed presed pres ed with the vond wonderful erful character of the discoveries mr grooms groonis is anxious to have bave a scientist examine the cave and at his request a description of the discoveries together with the engraved book have been forwarded to the smith institution cincinnati comm corn marcial mer mir an oral cial |