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 so profound that they were obliged to grope their way cautiously along. Fearing alike to remain or to advance, they proceeded with trembling steps slowly along a narrow passage; their minds filled with that vague sense of danger that generally attends the want of light, when Imagination pictures terrors which do not really exist, and Fancy lends her aid to magnify those which do.

By degrees, however, the Queen and her companion became accustomed to the darkness; and as the pupils of their eyes dilated, they were enabled to discern the objects around them. Innumerable fantastic shapes, however, now appeared to flit before them, and grim giants to frown awfully from every corner of the gloomy vault they were traversing. The dim and indistinct light threw a misty veil round the projecting corners of the rocks that gave them a fearful and unnatural grandeur; whilst the fair friends, overpowered with terror, gazed timidly around, and stood a few moments not daring to advance into the darker abysses of the caverns, and yet dreading alike to remain where they were, or to return.

"We must go on," said Elvira at length,