the underground city.txt

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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 direc-



tion 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