Excerpt from The Netherworld of Mendip: Explorations in the Great Caverns of Somerset, Yorkshire, Derbyshire, and Elsewhere The objects of this work are twofold: to describe the actual incidents of various interesting episodes in the modern sport of cave exploring, and to give an account of the scientific results of underground investigations in the Mendip region of Somerset. Speleology is the latest of the sporting sciences: like orology and Arctic exploration, it has two sides, sport and adventure being the lure to some, whilst others are chiefly attracted by the new light thrown by these researches on the geology, the hydrology, and the natural history of the subterranean regions explored. The chapters dealing with the scientific results are by H. E. Balch, who has been working on the geology of Mendip, more especially among the caves, for upwards of twenty years: the accounts of actual experiences, in which the sporting side is predominant, are by E. A. Baker, who described the recent exploration of the Derbyshire caves in his Moors, Crags, and Caves of the High Peak, 1903. No attempt is made to traverse the ground so perfectly covered by Professor Boyd Dawkins in his fascinating volume on Cave Hunting, and elsewhere, most of the work described here being supplementary to that done by him, and, largely, outside the scope of his aims. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.