THE UNDERGROUND CITY
OR
THE BLACK INDIES
(Sometimes Called The Child of the Cavern)
Verne, Jules. -Works of Jules Verne-. Ed. Charles F. Horne. Vol. 9. New
York: F. Tyler Daniels Company, 1911. 277-394.
THE UNDERGROUND CITY
CHAPTER I. CONTRADICTORY LETTERS
To Mr. F. R. Starr, Engineer, 30 Canongate, Edinburgh.
IF Mr. James Starr will come to-morrow to the Aberfoyle coal-mines,
Dochart pit, Yarrow shaft, a communication of an interesting nature will
be made to him.
“Mr. James Starr will be awaited for, the whole day, at the Callander
station, by Harry Ford, son of the old overman Simon Ford.”
“He is requested to keep this invitation secret.”
Such was the letter which James Starr received by the first post, on the
3rd December, 18--, the letter bearing the Aberfoyle postmark, county of
Stirling, Scotland.
The engineer’s curiosity was excited to the highest pitch. It never
occurred to him to doubt whether this letter might not be a hoax. For
many years he had known Simon Ford, one of the former foremen of the
Aberfoyle mines, of which he, James Starr, had for twenty years, been
the manager, or, as he would be termed in English coal-mines, the
viewer. James Starr was a strongly-constituted man, on whom his
fifty-five years weighed no more heavily than if they had been forty.
He belonged to an old Edinburgh family, and was one of its most
distinguished members. His labors did credit to the body of engineers
who are gradually devouring the carboniferous subsoil of the United
Kingdom, as much at Cardiff and Newcastle, as in the southern counties
of Scotland. However, it was more particularly in the depths of the
mysterious mines of Aberfoyle, which border on the Alloa mines and
occupy part of the county of Stirling, that the name of Starr had
acquired the greatest renown. There, the greater part of his existence
had been passed. Besides this, James Starr belonged to the Scottish
Antiquarian Society, of which he had been made president. He was also
included amongst the most active members of the Royal Institution; and
the Edinburgh Review frequently published clever articles signed by him.
He was in fact one of those practical men to whom is due the prosperity
of England. He held a high rank in the old capital of Scotland, which
not only from a physical but also from a moral point of view, well
deserves the name of the Northern Athens.
We know that the English have given to their vast extent of coal-mines
a very significant name. They very justly call them the “Black Indies,”
and these Indies have contributed perhaps even more than the Eastern
Indies to swell the surprising wealth of the United Kingdom.
At this period, the limit of time assigned by professional men for
the exhaustion of coal-mines was far distant and there was no dread
of scarcity. There were still extensive mines to be worked in the two
Americas. The manufactories, appropriated to so many different uses,
locomotives, steamers, gas works, &c., were not likely to fail for want
of the mineral fuel; but the consumption had so increased during the
last few years, that certain beds had been exhausted even to their
smallest veins. Now deserted, these mines perforated the ground with
their useless shafts and forsaken galleries. This was exactly the case
with the pits of Aberfoyle.
Ten years before, the last butty had raised the last ton of coal from
this colliery. The underground working stock, traction engines, trucks
which run on rails along the galleries, subterranean tramways, frames to
support the shaft, pipes--in short, all that constituted the machinery
of a mine had been brought up from its depths. The exhausted mine was
like the body of a huge fantastically-shaped mastodon, from which all
the organs of life have been taken, and only the skeleton remains.
Nothing was left but long wooden ladders, down the Yarrow shaft--the
only one which now gave access to the lower galleries of the Dochart
pit. Above ground, the sheds, formerly sheltering the outside works,
still marked the spot where the shaft of that pit had been sunk,
it being now abandoned, as were the other pits, of which the whole
constituted the mines of Aberfoyle.
It was a sad day, when for the last time the workmen quitted the mine,
in which they had lived for so many years. The engineer, James Starr,
had collected the hundreds of workmen which composed the active and
courageous population of the mine. Overmen, brakemen, putters, wastemen,
barrowmen, masons, smiths, carpenters, outside and inside laborers,
women, children, and old men, all were collected in the great yard of
the Dochart pit, formerly heaped with coal from the mine.
Many of these families had existed for generations in the mine of
old Aberfoyle; they were now driven to seek the means of subsistence
elsewhere, and they waited sadly to bid farewell to the engineer.
James Starr stood upright, at the door of the vast shed in which he
had for so many years superintended the powerful machines of the shaft.
Simon Ford, the foreman of the Dochart pit, then fifty-five years of
age, and other managers and overseers, surrounded him. James Starr took
off his hat. The miners, cap in hand, kept a profound silence. This
farewell scene was of a touching character, not wanting in grandeur.
“My friends,” said the engineer, “the time has come for us to separate.
The Aberfoyle mines, which for so many years have united us in a
common work, are now exhausted. All our researches have not led to
the discovery of a new vein, and the last block of coal has just been
extracted from the Dochart pit.” And in confirmation of his words, James
Starr pointed to a lump of coal which had been kept at the bottom of a
basket.
“This piece of coal, my friends,” resumed James Starr, “is like the last
drop of blood which has flowed through the veins of the mine! We shall
keep it, as the first fragment of coal is kept, which was extracted
a hundred and fifty years ago from the bearings of Aberfoyle. Between
these two pieces, how many generations of workmen have succeeded each
other in our pits! Now, it is over! The last words which your engineer
will address to you are a farewell. You have lived in this mine, which
your hands have emptied. The work has been hard, but not without profit
for you. Our great family must disperse, and it is not probable that the
future will ever again unite the scattered members. But do not forget
that we have lived together for a long time, and that it will be the
duty of the miners of Aberfoyle to help each other. Your old masters
will not forget you either. When men have worked together, they must
never be stranger to each other again. We shall keep our eye on you, and
wherever you go, our recommendations shall follow you. Farewell then, my
friends, and may Heaven be with you!”
So saying, James Starr wrung the horny hand of the oldest miner, whose
eyes were dim with tears. Then the overmen of the different pits came
forward to shake hands with him, whilst the miners waved their caps,
shouting, “Farewell, James Starr, our master and our friend!”
This farewell would leave a lasting remembrance in all these honest
hearts. Slowly and sadly the population quitted the yard. The black soil
of the roads leading to the Dochart pit resounded for the last time to
the tread of miners’ feet, and silence succeeded to the bustling life
which had till then filled the Aberfoyle mines.
One man alone remained by James Starr. This was the overman, Simon Ford.
Near him stood a boy, about fifteen years of age, who for some years
already had been employed down below.
James Starr and Simon Ford knew and esteemed each other well. “Good-by,
Simon,” said the engineer.
“Good-by, Mr. Starr,” replied the overman, “let me add, till we meet
again!”
“Yes, till we meet again. Ford!” answered James Starr. “You know that I
shall be always glad to see you, and talk over old times.”
“I know that, Mr. Starr.”
“My house in Edinburgh is always open to you.”
“It’s a long way off, is Edinburgh!” answered the man shaking his head.
“Ay, a long way from the Dochart pit.”
“A long way, Simon? Where do you mean to live?”
“Even here, Mr. Starr! We’re not going to leave the mine, our good old
nurse, just because her milk is dried up! My wife, my boy, and myself,
we mean to remain faithful to her!”
“Good-by then, Simon,” replied the engineer, whose voice, in spite of
himself, betrayed some emotion.
“No, I tell you, it’s TILL WE MEET AGAIN, Mr. Starr, and not Just
‘good-by,’” returned the foreman. “Mark my words, Aberfoyle will see you
again!”
The engineer did not try to dispel the man’s illusion. He patted Harry’s
head, again wrung the father’s hand, and left the mine.
All this had taken place ten years ago; but, notwithstanding the wish
which the overman had expressed to see him again, during that time Starr
had heard nothing of him. It was after ten years of separation that he
got this letter from Simon Ford, requesting him to take without delay
the road to the old Aberfoyle colliery.
A communication of an interesting nature, what could it be? Dochart pit.
Yarrow shaft! What recollections of the past these names brought back
to him! Yes, that was a fine time, that of work, of struggle,--the best
part of the engineer’s life. Starr re-read his letter. He pondered over
it in all its bearings. He much regretted that just a line more had not
been added by Ford. He wished he had not been quite so laconic.
Was it possible that the old foreman had discovered some new vein?
No! Starr remembered with what minute care the mines had been explored
before the definite cessation of the works. He had himself proceeded
to the lowest soundings without finding the least trace in the soil,
burrowed in every direction. They had even attempted to find coal under
strata which are usually below it, such as the Devonian red sandstone,
but without result. James Starr had therefore abandoned the mine with
the absolute conviction that it did not contain another bit of coal.
“No,” he repeated, “no! How is it possible that anything which could
have escaped my researches, should be revealed to those of Simon Ford.
However, the old overman must well know that such a discovery would be
the one thing in the world to interest me, and this invitation, which I
must keep secret, to repair to the Dochart pit!” James Starr always came
back to that.
On the other hand, the engineer knew Ford to be a clever miner,
peculiarly endowed with the instinct of his trade. He had not seen him
since the time when the Aberfoyle colliery was abandoned, and did not
know either what he was doing or where he was living, with his wife and
his son. All that he now knew was, that a rendezvous had been appointed
him at the Yarrow shaft, and that Harry, Simon Ford’s son, was to wait
for him during the whole of the next day at the Callander station.
“I shall go, I shall go!” said Starr, his excitement increasing as the
time drew near.
Our worthy engineer belonged to that class of men whose brain is always
on the boil, like a kettle on a hot fire. In some of these brain kettles
the ideas bubble over, in others they just simmer quietly. Now on this
day, James Starr’s ideas were boiling fast.
But suddenly an unexpected incident occurred. This was the drop of cold
water, which in a moment was to condense all the vapors of the brain.
About six in the evening, by the third post, Starr’s servant brought
him a second letter. This letter was enclosed in a coarse envelope, and
evidently directed by a hand unaccustomed to the use of a pen. James
Starr tore it open. It contained only a scrap of paper, yellowed by
time, and apparently torn out of an old copy book.
On this paper was written a single sentence, thus worded:
“It is useless for the engineer James Starr to trouble himself, Simon
Ford’s letter being now without object.”
No signature.
CHAPTER II. ON THE ROAD
THE course of James Starr’s ideas was abruptly stopped, when he got this
second letter contradicting the first.
“What does this mean?” said he to himself. He took up the torn envelope,
and examined it. Like the other, it bore the Aberfoyle postmark. It had
therefore come from the same part of the county of Stirling. The old
miner had evidently not written it. But, no less evidently, the author
of this second letter knew the overman’s secret, since it expressly
contradicted the invitation to the engineer to go to the Yarrow shaft.
Was it really true that the first communication was now without object?
Did someone wish to prevent James Starr from troubling himself either
uselessly or otherwise? Might there not be rather a malevolent intention
to thwart Ford’s plans?
This was the conclusion at which James Starr arrived, after mature
reflection. The contradiction which existed between the two letters only
wrought in him a more keen desire to visit the Dochart pit. And besides,
if after all it was a hoax, it was well worth while to prove it. Starr
also thought it wiser to give more credence to the first letter than to
the second; that is to say, to the request of such a man as Simon Ford,
rather than to the warning of his anonymous contradictor.
“Indeed,” said he, “the fact of anyone endeavoring to influence my
resolution, shows that Ford’s communication must be of great importance.
To-morrow, at the appointed time, I shall be at the rendezvous.”
In the evening, Starr made his preparations for departure. As it might
happen that his absence would be prolonged for some days, he wrote to
Sir W. Elphiston, President of the Royal Institution, that he should be
unable to be present at the next meeting of the Society. He also wrote
to excuse himself from two or three engagements which he had made for
the week. Then, having ordered his servant to pack a traveling bag, he
went to bed, more excited than the affair perhaps warranted.
The next day, at five o’clock, James Starr jumped out of bed, dressed
himself warmly, for a cold rain was falling, and left his house in the
Canongate, to go to Granton Pier to catch the steamer, which in three
hours would take him up the Forth as far as Stirling.
For the first time in his life, perhaps, in passing along the Canongate,
he did NOT TURN TO LOOK AT HOLYROOD, the palace of the former sovereigns
of Scotland. He did not notice the sentinels who stood before its
gateways, dressed in the uniform of their Highland regiment, tartan
kilt, plaid and sporran complete. His whole thought was to reach
Callander where Harry Ford was supposedly awaiting him.
The better to understand this narrative, it will be as well to hear a
few words on the origin of coal. During the geological epoch, when
the terrestrial spheroid was still in course of formation, a thick
atmosphere surrounded it, saturated with watery vapors, and copiously
impregnated with carbonic acid. The vapors gradually condensed in
diluvial rains, which fell as if they had leapt from the necks of
thousands of millions of seltzer water bottles. This liquid, loaded
with carbonic acid, rushed in torrents over a deep soft soil, subject to
sudden or slow alterations of form, and maintained in its semi-fluid
state as much by the heat of the sun as by the fires of the interior
mass. The internal heat had not as yet been collected in the center of
the globe. The terrestrial crust, thin and incompletely hardened,
allowed it to spread through its pores. This caused a peculiar form of
vegetation, such as is probably produced on the surface of the inferior
planets, Venus or Mercury, which revolve nearer than our earth around
the radiant sun of our system.
The soil of the continents was covered with immense forests. Carbonic
acid, so suitable for the development of the vegetable kingdom,
abounded. The feet of these trees were drowned in a sort of immense
lagoon, kept continually full by currents of fresh and salt waters.
They eagerly assimilated to themselves the carbon which they, little by
little, extracted from the atmosphere, as yet unfit for the function
of life, and it may be said that they were destined to store it, in the
form of coal, in the very bowels of the earth.
It was the earthquake period, caused by internal convulsions, which
suddenly modified the unsettled features of the terrestrial surface.
Here, an intumescence which was to become a mountain, there, an abyss
which was to be filled with an ocean or a sea. There, whole forests sunk
through the earth’s crust, below the unfixed strata, either until they
found a resting-place, such as the primitive bed of granitic rock, or,
settling together in a heap, they formed a solid mass.
As the waters were contained in no bed, and were spread over every
part of the globe, they rushed where they liked, tearing from
the scarcely-formed rocks material with which to compose schists,
sandstones, and limestones. This the roving waves bore over the
submerged and now peaty forests, and deposited above them the elements
of rocks which were to superpose the coal strata. In course of time,
periods of which include millions of years, these earths hardened in
layers, and enclosed under a thick carapace of pudding-stone, schist,
compact or friable sandstone, gravel and stones, the whole of the
massive forests.
And what went on in this gigantic crucible, where all this vegetable
matter had accumulated, sunk to various depths? A regular chemical
operation, a sort of distillation. All the carbon contained in these
vegetables had agglomerated, and little by little coal was forming
under the double influence of enormous pressure and the high temperature
maintained by the internal fires, at this time so close to it.
Thus there was one kingdom substituted for another in this slow but
irresistible reaction. The vegetable was transformed into a mineral.
Plants which had lived the vegetative life in all the vigor of first
creation became petrified. Some of the substances enclosed in this
vast herbal left their impression on the other more rapidly mineralized
products, which pressed them as an hydraulic press of incalculable power
would have done.
Thus also shells, zoophytes, star-fish, polypi, spirifores, even fish
and lizards brought by the water, left on the yet soft coal their exact
likeness, “admirably taken off.”
Pressure seems to have played a considerable part in the formation of
carboniferous strata. In fact, it is to its degree of power that are due
the different sorts of coal, of which industry makes use. Thus in the
lowest layers of the coal ground appears the anthracite, which, being
almost destitute of volatile matter, contains the greatest quantity
of carbon. In the higher beds are found, on the contrary, lignite and
fossil wood, substances in which the quantity of carbon is infinitely
less. Between these two beds, according to the degree of pressure to
which they have been subjected, are found veins of graphite and rich or
poor coal. It may be asserted that it is for want of sufficient pressure
that beds of peaty bog have not been completely changed into coal. So
then, the origin of coal mines, in whatever part of the globe they have
been discovered, is this: the absorption through the terrestrial crust
of the great forests of the geological period; then, the mineralization
of the vegetables obtained in the course of time, under the influence of
pressure and heat, and under the action of carbonic acid.
Now, at the time when the events related in this story took place, some
of the most important mines of the Scottish coal beds had been exhausted
by too rapid working. In the region which extends between Edinburgh
and Glasgow, for a distance of ten or twelve miles, lay the Aberfoyle
colliery, of which the engineer, James Starr, had so long directed the
works. For ten years these mines had been abandoned. No new seams had
been discovered, although the soundings had been carried to a depth of
fifteen hundred or even of two thousand feet, and when James Starr had
retired, it was with the full conviction that even the smallest vein had
been completely exhausted.
Under these circumstances, it was plain that the discovery of a new seam
of coal would be an important event. Could Simon Ford’s communication
relate to a fact of this nature? This question James Starr could not
cease asking himself. Was he called to make conquest of another corner
of these rich treasure fields? Fain would he hope it was so.
The second letter had for an instant checked his speculations on this
subject, but now he thought of that letter no longer. Besides, the son
of the old overman was there, waiting at the appointed rendezvous. The
anonymous letter was therefore worth nothing.
The moment the engineer set foot on the platform at the end of his
journey, the young man advanced towards him.
“Are you Harry Ford?” asked the engineer quickly.
“Yes, Mr. Starr.”
“I should not have known you, my lad. Of course in ten years you have
become a man!”
“I knew you directly, sir,” replied the young miner, cap in hand. “You
have not changed. You look just as you did when you bade us good-by in
the Dochart pit. I haven’t forgotten that day.”
“Put on your cap, Harry,” said the engineer. “It’s pouring, and
politeness needn’t make you catch cold.”
“Shall we take shelter anywhere, Mr. Starr?” asked young Ford.
“No, Harry. The weather is settled. It will rain all day, and I am in a
hurry. Let us go on.”
“I am at your orders,” replied Harry.
“Tell me, Harry, is your father well?”
“Very well, Mr. Starr.”
“And your mother?”
“She is well, too.”
“Was it your father who wrote telling me to come to the Yarrow shaft?”
“No, it was I.”
“Then did Simon Ford send me a second letter to contradict the first?”
asked the engineer quickly.
“No, Mr. Starr,” answered the young miner.
“Very well,” said Starr, without speaking of the anonymous letter. Then,
continuing, “And can you tell me what you father wants with me?”
“Mr. Starr, my father wishes to tell you himself.”
“But you know what it is?”
“I do, sir.”
“Well, Harry, I will not ask you more. But let us get on, for I’m
anxious to see Simon Ford. By-the-bye, where does he live?”
“In the mine.”
“What! In the Dochart pit?”
“Yes, Mr. Starr,” replied Harry.
“Really! has your family never left the old mine since the cessation of
the works?”
“Not a day, Mr. Starr. You know my father. It is there he was born, it
is there he means to die!”
“I can understand that, Harry. I can understand that! His native mine!
He did not like to abandon it! And are you happy there?”
“Yes, Mr. Starr,” replied the young miner, “for we love one another, and
we have but few wants.”
“Well, Harry,” said the engineer, “lead the way.”
And walking rapidly through the streets of Callander, in a few minutes
they had left the town behind them.
CHAPTER III. THE DOCHART PIT
HARRY FORD was a fine, strapping fellow of five and twenty. His grave
looks, his habitually passive expression, had from childhood been
noticed among his comrades in the mine. His regular features, his deep
blue eyes, his curly hair, rather chestnut than fair, the natural grace
of his person, altogether made him a fine specimen of a lowlander.
Accustomed from his earliest days to the work of the mine, he was strong
and hardy, as well as brave and good. Guided by his father, and impelled
by his own inclinations, he had early begun his education, and at an age
when most lads are little more than apprentices, he had managed to make
himself of some importance, a leader, in fact, among his fellows, and
few are very ignorant in a country which does all it can to remove
ignorance. Though, during the first years of his youth, the pick was
never out of Harry’s hand, nevertheless the young miner was not long in
acquiring sufficient knowledge to raise him into the upper class of the
miners, and he would certainly have succeeded his father as overman of
the Dochart pit, if the colliery had not been abandoned.
James Starr was still a good walker, yet he could not easily have kept
up with his guide, if the latter had not slackened his pace. The young
man, carrying the engineer’s bag, followed the left bank of the river
for about a mile. Leaving its winding course, they took a road under
tall, dripping trees. Wide fields lay on either side, around isolated
farms. In one field a herd of hornless cows were quietly grazing; in
another sheep with silky wool, like those in a child’s toy sheep fold.
The Yarrow shaft was situated four miles from Callander. Whilst walking,
James Starr could not but be struck with the change in the country. He
had not seen it since the day when the last ton of Aberfoyle coal had
been emptied into railway trucks to be sent to Glasgow. Agricultural
life had now taken the place of the more stirring, active, industrial
life. The contrast was all the greater because, during winter, field
work is at a standstill. But formerly, at whatever season, the mining
population, above and below ground, filled the scene with animation.
Great wagons of coal used to be passing night and day. The rails, with
their rotten sleepers, now disused, were then constantly ground by
the weight of wagons. Now stony roads took the place of the old mining
tramways. James Starr felt as if he was traversing a desert.
The engineer gazed about him with a saddened eye. He stopped now and
then to take breath. He listened. The air was no longer filled with
distant whistlings and the panting of engines. None of those black
vapors which the manufacturer loves to see, hung in the horizon,
mingling with the clouds. No tall cylindrical or prismatic chimney
vomited out smoke, after being fed from the mine itself; no blast-pipe
was puffing out its white vapor. The ground, formerly black with
coal dust, had a bright look, to which James Starr’s eyes were not
accustomed.
When the engineer stood still, Harry Ford stopped also. The young miner
waited in silence. He felt what was passing in his companion’s mind, and
he shared his feelings; he, a child of the mine, whose whole life had
been passed in its depths.
“Yes, Harry, it is all changed,” said Starr. “But at the rate we worked,
of course the treasures of coal would have been exhausted some day. Do
you regret that time?”
“I do regret it, Mr. Starr,” answered Harry. “The work was hard, but it
was interesting, as are all struggles.”
“No doubt, my lad. A continuous struggle against the dangers of
landslips, fires, inundations, explosions of firedamp, like claps of
thunder. One had to guard against all those perils! You say well! It was
a struggle, and consequently an exciting life.”
“The miners of Alva have been more favored than the miners of Aberfoyle,
Mr. Starr!”
“Ay, Harry, so they have,” replied the engineer.
“Indeed,” cried the young man, “it’s a pity that all the globe was not
made of coal; then there would have been enough to last millions of
years!”
“No doubt there would, Harry; it must be acknowledged, however, that
nature has shown more forethought by forming our sphere principally of
sandstone, limestone, and granite, which fire cannot consume.”
“Do you mean to say, Mr. Starr, that mankind would have ended by burning
their own globe?”
“Yes! The whole of it, my lad,” answered the engineer. “The earth would
have passed to the last bit into the furnaces of engines, machines,
steamers, gas factories; certainly, that would have been the end of our
world one fine day!”
“There is no fear of that now, Mr. Starr. But yet, the mines will be
exhausted, no doubt, and more rapidly than the statistics make out!”
“That will happen, Harry; and in my opinion England is very wrong in
exchanging her fuel for the gold of other nations! I know well,” added
the engineer, “that neither hydraulics nor electricity has yet shown all
they can do, and that some day these two forces will be more completely
utilized. But no matter! Coal is of a very practical use, and lends
itself easily to the various wants of industry. Unfortunately man cannot
produce it at will. Though our external forests grow incessantly under
the influence of heat and water, our subterranean forests will not be
reproduced, and if they were, the globe would never be in the state
necessary to make them into coal.”
James Starr and his guide, whilst talking, had continued their walk at
a rapid pace. An hour after leaving Callander they reached the Dochart
pit.
The most indifferent person would have been touched at the appearance
this deserted spot presented. It was like the skeleton of something
that had formerly lived. A few wretched trees bordered a plain where
the ground was hidden under the black dust of the mineral fuel, but no
cinders nor even fragments of coal were to be seen. All had been carried
away and consumed long ago.
They walked into the shed which covered the opening of the Yarrow shaft,
whence ladders still gave access to the lower galleries of the pit. The
engineer bent over the opening. Formerly from this place could be heard
the powerful whistle of the air inhaled by the ventilators. It was now a
silent abyss. It was like being at the mouth of some extinct volcano.
When the mine was being worked, ingenious machines were used in certain
shafts of the Aberfoyle colliery, which in this respect was very well
off; frames furnished with automatic lifts, working in wooden slides,
oscillating ladders, called “man-engines,” which, by a simple movement,
permitted the miners to descend without danger.
But all these appliances had been carried away, after the cessation of
the works. In the Yarrow shaft there remained only a long succession
of ladders, separated at every fifty feet by narrow landings. Thirty of
these ladders placed thus end to end led the visitor down into the
lower gallery, a depth of fifteen hundred feet. This was the only way
of communication which existed between the bottom of the Dochart pit and
the open air. As to air, that came in by the Yarrow shaft, from whence
galleries communicated with another shaft whose orifice opened at a
higher level; the warm air naturally escaped by this species of inverted
siphon.
“I will follow you, my lad,” said the engineer, signing to the young man
to precede him.
“As you please, Mr. Starr.”
“Have you your lamp?”
“Yes, and I only wish it was still the safety lamp, which we formerly
had to use!”
“Sure enough,” returned James Starr, “there is no fear of fire-damp
explosions now!”
Harry was provided with a simple oil lamp, the wick of which he lighted.
In the mine, now empty of coal, escapes of light carburetted hydrogen
could not occur. As no explosion need be feared, there was no necessity
for interposing between the flame and the surrounding air that metallic
screen which prevents the gas from catching fire. The Davy lamp was of
no use here. But if the danger did not exist, it was because the cause
of it had disappeared, and with this cause, the combustible in which
formerly consisted the riches of the Dochart pit.
Harry descended the first steps of the upper ladder. Starr followed.
They soon found themselves in a profound obscurity, which was only
relieved by the glimmer of the lamp. The young man held it above his
head, the better to light his companion. A dozen ladders were descended
by the engineer and his guide, with the measured step habitual to the
miner. They were all still in good condition.
James Starr examined, as well as the insufficient light would permit,
the sides of the dark shaft, which were covered by a partly rotten
lining of wood.
Arrived at the fifteenth landing, that is to say, half way down, they
halted for a few minutes.
“Decidedly, I have not your legs, my lad,” said the engineer, panting.
“You are very stout, Mr. Starr,” replied Harry, “and it’s something too,
you see, to live all one’s life in the mine.”
“Right, Harry. Formerly, when I was twenty, I could have gone down all
at a breath. Come, forward!”
But just as the two were about to leave the platform, a voice, as yet
far distant, was heard in the depths of the shaft. It came up like a
sonorous billow, swelling as it advanced, and becoming more and more
distinct.
“Halloo! who comes here?” asked the engineer, stopping Harry.
“I cannot say,” answered the young miner.
“Is it not your father?”
“My father, Mr. Starr? no.”
“Some neighbor, then?”
“We have no neighbors in the bottom of the pit,” replied Harry. “We are
alone, quite alone.”
“Well, we must let this intruder pass,” said James Starr. “Those who are
descending must yield the path to those who are ascending.”
They waited. The voice broke out again with a magnificent burst, as
if it had been carried through a vast speaking trumpet; and soon a few
words of a Scotch song came clearly to the ears of the young miner.
“The Hundred Pipers!” cried Harry. “Well, I shall be much surprised if
that comes from the lungs of any man but Jack Ryan.”
“And who is this Jack Ryan?” asked James Starr.
“An old mining comrade,” replied Harry. Then leaning from the platform,
“Halloo! Jack!” he shouted.
“Is that you, Harry?” was the reply. “Wait a bit, I’m coming.” And the
song broke forth again.
In a few minutes, a tall fellow of five and twenty, with a merry face,
smiling eyes, a laughing mouth, and sandy hair, appeared at the bottom
of the luminous cone which was thrown from his lantern, and set foot
on the landing of the fifteenth ladder. His first act was to vigorously
wring the hand which Harry extended to him.
“Delighted to meet you!” he exclaimed. “If I had only known you were to
be above ground to-day, I would have spared myself going down the Yarrow
shaft!”
“This is Mr. James Starr,” said Harry, turning his lamp towards the
engineer, who was in the shadow.
“Mr. Starr!” cried Jack Ryan. “Ah, sir, I could not see. Since I left
the mine, my eyes have not been accustomed to see in the dark, as they
used to do.”
“Ah, I remember a laddie who was always singing. That was ten years ago.
It was you, no doubt?”
“Ay, Mr. Starr, but in changing my trade, I haven’t changed my
disposition. It’s far better to laugh and sing than to cry and whine!”
“You’re right there, Jack Ryan. And what do you do now, as you have left
the mine?”
“I am working on the Melrose farm, forty miles from here. Ah, it’s not
like our Aberfoyle mines! The pick comes better to my hand than the
spade or hoe. And then, in the old pit, there were vaulted roofs, to
merrily echo one’s songs, while up above ground!--But you are going to
see old Simon, Mr. Starr?”
“Yes, Jack,” answered the engineer.
“Don’t let me keep you then.”
“Tell me, Jack,” said Harry, “what was taking you to our cottage
to-day?”
“I wanted to see you, man,” replied Jack, “and ask you to come to
the Irvine games. You know I am the piper of the place. There will be
dancing and singing.”
“Thank you, Jack, but it’s impossible.”
“Impossible?”
“Yes; Mr. Starr’s visit will last some time, and I must take him back to
Callander.”
“Well, Harry, it won’t be for a week yet. By that time Mr. Starr’s visit
will be over, I should think, and there will be nothing to keep you at
the cottage.”
“Indeed, Harry,” said James Starr, “you must profit by your friend
Jack’s invitation.”
“Well, I accept it, Jack,” said Harry. “In a week we will meet at
Irvine.”
“In a week, that’s settled,” returned Ryan. “Good-by, Harry! Your
servant, Mr. Starr. I am very glad to have seen you again! I can give
news of you to all my friends. No one has forgotten you, sir.”
“And I have forgotten no one,” said Starr.
“Thanks for all, sir,” replied Jack.
“Good-by, Jack,” said Harry, shaking his hand. And Jack Ryan, singing as
he went, soon disappeared in the heights of the shaft, dimly lighted by
his lamp.
A quarter of an hour afterwards James Starr and Harry descended the last
ladder, and set foot on the lowest floor of the pit.
From the bottom of the Yarrow shaft radiated numerous empty galleries.
They ran through the wall of schist and sandstone, some shored up with
great, roughly-hewn beams, others lined with a thick casing of wood. In
every direction embankments supplied the place of the excavated veins.
Artificial pillars were made of stone from neighboring quarries, and now
they supported the ground, that is to say, the double layer of tertiary
and quaternary soil, which formerly rested on the seam itself. Darkness
now filled the galleries, formerly lighted either by the miner’s lamp
or by the electric light, the use of which had been introduced in the
mines.
“Will you not rest a while, Mr. Starr?” asked the young man.
“No, my lad,” replied the engineer, “for I am anxious to be at your
father’s cottage.”
“Follow me then, Mr. Starr. I will guide you, and yet I daresay you
could find your way perfectly well through this dark labyrinth.”
“Yes, indeed! I have the whole plan of the old pit still in my head.”
Harry, followed by the engineer, and holding his lamp high the better
to light their way, walked along a high gallery, like the nave of a
cathedral. Their feet still struck against the wooden sleepers which
used to support the rails.
They had not gone more than fifty paces, when a huge stone fell at the
feet of James Starr. “Take care, Mr. Starr!” cried Harry, seizing the
engineer by the arm.
“A stone, Harry! Ah! these old vaultings are no longer quite secure, of
course, and--”
“Mr. Starr,” said Harry Ford, “it seems to me that stone was thrown,
thrown as by the hand of man!”
“Thrown!” exclaimed James Starr. “What do you mean, lad?”
“Nothing, nothing, Mr. Starr,” replied Harry evasively, his anxious gaze
endeavoring to pierce the darkness. “Let us go on. Take my arm, sir, and
don’t be afraid of making a false step.”
“Here I am, Harry.” And they both advanced, whilst Harry looked on
every side, throwing the light of his lamp into all the corners of the
gallery.
“Shall we soon be there?” asked the engineer.
“In ten minutes at most.”
“Good.”
“But,” muttered Harry, “that was a most singular thing. It is the first
time such an accident has happened to me.
“That stone falling just at the moment we were passing.”
“Harry, it was a mere chance.”
“Chance,” replied the young man, shaking his head. “Yes, chance.” He
stopped and listened.
“What is the matter, Harry?” asked the engineer.
“I thought I heard someone walking behind us,” replied the young
miner, listening more attentively. Then he added, “No, I must have been
mistaken. Lean harder on my arm, Mr. Starr. Use me like a staff.”
“A good solid staff, Harry,” answered James Starr. “I could not wish for
a better than a fine fellow like you.”
They continued in silence along the dark nave. Harry was evidently
preoccupied, and frequently turned, trying to catch, either some distant
noise, or remote glimmer of light.
But behind and before, all was silence and darkness.
CHAPTER IV. THE FORD FAMILY
TEN minutes afterwards, James Starr and Harry issued from the principal
gallery. They were now standing in a glade, if we may use this word
to designate a vast and dark excavation. The place, however, was not
entirely deprived of daylight. A few rays straggled in through
the opening of a deserted shaft. It was by means of this pipe that
ventilation was established in the Dochart pit. Owing to its lesser
density, the warm air was drawn towards the Yarrow shaft. Both air and
light, therefore, penetrated in some measure into the glade.
Here Simon Ford had lived with his family ten years, in a subterranean
dwelling, hollowed out in the schistous mass, where formerly stood the
powerful engines which worked the mechanical traction of the Dochart
pit.
Such was the habitation, “his cottage,” as he called it, in which
resided the old overman. As he had some means saved during a long life
of toil, Ford could have afforded to live in the light of day, among
trees, or in any town of the kingdom he chose, but he and his wife and
son preferred remaining in the mine, where they were happy together,
having the same opinions, ideas, and tastes. Yes, they were quite fond
of their cottage, buried fifteen hundred feet below Scottish soil.
Among other advantages, there was no fear that tax gatherers, or rent
collectors would ever come to trouble its inhabitants.
At this period, Simon Ford, the former overman of the Dochart pit, bore
the weight of sixty-five years well. Tall, robust, well-built, he would
have been regarded as one of the most conspicuous men in the district
which supplies so many fine fellows to the Highland regiments.
Simon Ford was descended from an old mining family, and his ancestors
had worked the very first carboniferous seams opened in Scotland.
Without discussing whether or not the Greeks and Romans made use of
coal, whether the Chinese worked coal mines before the Christian era,
whether the French word for coal (HOUILLE) is really derived from the
farrier Houillos, who lived in Belgium in the twelfth century, we may
affirm that the beds in Great Britain were the first ever regularly
worked. So early as the eleventh century, William the Conqueror divided
the produce of the Newcastle bed among his companions-in-arms. At the
end of the thirteenth century, a license for the mining of “sea coal”
was granted by Henry III. Lastly, towards the end of the same century,
mention is made of the Scotch and Welsh beds.
It was about this time that Simon Ford’s ancestors penetrated into the
bowels of Caledonian earth, and lived there ever after, from father to
son. They were but plain miners. They labored like convicts at the work
of extracting the precious combustible. It is even believed that the
coal miners, like the salt-makers of that period, were actual slaves.
However that might have been, Simon Ford was proud of belonging to this
ancient family of Scotch miners. He had worked diligently in the same
place where his ancestors had wielded the pick, the crowbar, and the
mattock. At thirty he was overman of the Dochart pit, the most important
in the Aberfoyle colliery. He was devoted to his trade. During long
years he zealously performed his duty. His only grief had been to
perceive the bed becoming impoverished, and to see the hour approaching
when the seam would be exhausted.
It was then he devoted himself to the search for new veins in all the
Aberfoyle pits, which communicated underground one with another. He
had had the good luck to discover several during the last period of
the working. His miner’s instinct assisted him marvelously, and the
engineer, James Starr, appreciated him highly. It might be said that
he divined the course of seams in the depths of the coal mine as a
hydroscope reveals springs in the bowels of the earth. He was par
excellence the type of a miner whose whole existence is indissolubly
connected with that of his mine. He had lived there from his birth, and
now that the works were abandoned he wished to live there still. His son
Harry foraged for the subterranean housekeeping; as for himself, during
those ten years he had not been ten times above ground.
“Go up there! What is the good?” he would say, and refused to leave his
black domain. The place was remarkably healthy, subject to an equable
temperature; the old overman endured neither the heat of summer nor
the cold of winter. His family enjoyed good health; what more could he
desire?
But at heart he felt depressed. He missed the former animation,
movement, and life in the well-worked pit. He was, however, supported by
one fixed idea. “No, no! the mine is not exhausted!” he repeated.
And that man would have given serious offense who could have ventured
to express before Simon Ford any doubt that old Aberfoyle would one day
revive! He had never given up the hope of discovering some new bed which
would restore the mine to its past splendor. Yes, he would willingly,
had it been necessary, have resumed the miner’s pick, and with his
still stout arms vigorously attacked the rock. He went through the dark
galleries, sometimes alone, sometimes with his son, examining, searching
for signs of coal, only to return each day, wearied, but not in despair,
to the cottage.
Madge, Simon’s faithful companion, his “gude-wife,” to use the Scotch
term, was a tall, strong, comely woman. Madge had no wish to leave the
Dochart pit any more than had her husband. She shared all his hopes and
regrets. She encouraged him, she urged him on, and talked to him in
a way which cheered the heart of the old overman. “Aberfoyle is only
asleep,” she would say. “You are right about that, Simon. This is but a
rest, it is not death!”
Madge, as well as the others, was perfectly satisfied to live
independent of the outer world, and was the center of the happiness
enjoyed by the little family in their dark cottage.
The engineer was eagerly expected. Simon Ford was standing at his door,
and as soon as Harry’s lamp announced the arrival of his former viewer
he advanced to meet him.
“Welcome, Mr. Starr!” he exclaimed, his voice echoing under the roof
of schist. “Welcome to the old overman’s cottage! Though it is buried
fifteen hundred feet under the earth, our house is not the less
hospitable.”
“And how are you, good Simon?” asked James Starr, grasping the hand
which his host held out to him.
“Very well, Mr. Starr. How could I be otherwise here, sheltered from
the inclemencies of the weather? Your ladies who go to Newhaven or
Portobello in the summer time would do much better to pass a few months
in the coal mine of Aberfoyle! They would run no risk here of catching a
heavy cold, as they do in the damp streets of the old capital.”
“I’m not the man to contradict you, Simon,” answered James Starr, glad
to find the old man just as he used to be. “Indeed, I wonder why I do
not change my home in the Canongate for a cottage near you.”
“And why not, Mr. Starr? I know one of your old miners who would be
truly pleased to have only a partition wall between you and him.”
“And how is Madge?” asked the engineer.
“The goodwife is in better health than I am, if that’s possible,”
replied Ford, “and it will be a pleasure to her to see you at her table.
I think she will surpass herself to do you honor.”
“We shall see that, Simon, we shall see that!” said the engineer, to
whom the announcement of a good breakfast could not be indifferent,
after his long walk.
“Are you hungry, Mr. Starr?”
“Ravenously hungry. My journey has given me an appetite. I came through
horrible weather.”
“Ah, it is raining up there,” responded Simon Ford.
“Yes, Simon, and the waters of the Forth are as rough as the sea.”
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