The_Complete_Chronicles_of_Narnia_(volumes_1-7,_in_order_of_publication)

of the cave, which must have been a long way overhead. Across the mild, soft, sleepy
place they were now made to march. It was very sad, but with a quiet sort of sadness like
soft music.
Here they passed dozens of strange animals lying on the turf, either dead or asleep, Jill
could not tell which. These were mostly of a dragonish or bat-like sort; Puddleglum did
not know what any of them were.
"Do they grow here?" Scrubb asked the Warden. He seemed very surprised at being
spoken to, but replied, "No. They are all beasts that have found their way down by
chasms and caves, out of Overland into the Deep Realm. Many come down, and few
return to the sunlit lands. It is said that they will all wake at the end of the world."
His mouth shut like a box when he had said this, and in the great silence of that cave the
children felt that they would not dare to speak again. The bare feet of the gnomes,
padding on the deep moss, made no sound. There was no wind, there were no birds, there
was no sound of water. There was no sound of breathing from the strange beasts.
When they had walked for several miles, they came to a wall of rock, and in it a low
archway leading into another cavern. It was not, however, so bad as the last entrance and
Jill could go through it without bending her head. It brought them into a smaller cave,
long and narrow, about the shape and size of a cathedral. And here, filling almost the
whole length of it, lay an enormous man fast asleep. He was far bigger than any of the
giants, and his face was not like a giant's, but noble and beautiful. His breast rose and fell
gently under the snowy beard which covered him to the waist. A pure, silver light (no one
saw where it came from) rested upon him.
"Who's that?" asked Puddleglum. And it was so long since anyone had spoken, that Jill
wondered how he had the nerve.
"That is old Father Time, who once was a King in Overland," said the Warden. "And now
he has sunk down into the Deep Realm and lies dreaming of all the things that are done in
the upper world. Many sink down, and few return to the sunlit lands. They say he will
wake at the end of the world."
And out of that cave they passed into another, and then into another and another, and so
on till Jill lost count, but always they were going downhill and each cave was lower than
the last, till the very thought of the weight and depth of earth above you was suffocating.
At last they came to a place where the Warden commanded his cheerless lantern to be lit
again. Then they passed into a cave so wide and dark that they could see nothing of it
except that right in front of them a strip of pale sand ran down into still water. And there,
beside a little jetty, lay a ship without mast or sail but with many oars. They were made to
go on board her and led forward to the bows where there was a clear space in front of the
rowers' benches and a seat running round inside the bulwarks.