Page:The Boy Travellers in the Russian Empire.djvu/32

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the direction of the officials who accompanied us. When all was ready the signal was given, the trap-door was opened once more, and we began our downward journey into the earth.

"As the trap-door closed above us, I confess to a rather uncanny feeling. Below us gleamed the lights in the hands of the lamp-bearers, but above there was a darkness that seemed as though it might be felt, or sliced off with a knife. Nobody spoke, and the attention of all seemed to be directed to hanging on to the rope. Of course the uppermost question in everybody's mind was, 'What if the rope should break?' It doesn't take long to answer it; the individuals hanging in that cluster below the gloomy trap-door would be of very little consequence in a terrestrial way after the snapping of the rope.

"We compared notes afterwards, and found that our sensations were pretty much alike. The general feeling was one of uncertainty, and each one asked himself several times whether he was asleep or awake. Fred said a part of the journey was like a nightmare, and the Doctor said he had the same idea, especially after the noise of the machinery was lost in the distance and everything was in utter silence. For the first few moments we could bear the whirring of the wheel and the jar of the machinery; but very soon these sounds disappeared, and