ys, and many a poor lad has got run over with them.
Oh dear, oh dear!"

"Well, mother, I hope the lad will be found," said the young stranger.
"I didn't think the place was like that; may be you'll tell me something
more about it."

The poor widow was too glad to have some one to talk to, so she told the
lad all about the mine, the number of hours the boys worked, and the
wages they got, and the way they were treated generally. The young
sailor thanked her heartily. "I thought as how I'd been forced to lead
something like a dog's life at sea, and I had a mind to come and have a
turn at mining; for thinks I to myself, I'll have a dry jacket and
plenty of grub, and a turn in to a quiet bed every night, but now I hear
what sort of work it is, I'll go back to the old brig; we've daylight
and fresh air and change of scene, and though we are dirty enough at
times, I'll own we haven't to lie on our backs and peck away at coal in
a hole three feet high, with the chance of being blown to pieces any
moment."

"I can't say that you are wrong, my lad," said the poor widow, looking
up at the sailor. "It has been a fatal calling to those belonging to
me, and I would advise no one to enter it who has any other means of
living."

"Thank ye, mother, thank ye," answered the stranger, "I'll take your
advice, but I should like to know if they find that poor boy of yours; I
hope they will, that I do." The sailor could not stop any longer, as it
was getting late; but he asked the widow where she lived, that he might
come back and learn if her son was found. Then off he set, running as
hard as he could go, to get back to the high-road, by which he might
reach the river before it was dark.

Meantime Dick and his father and the other men went down the pit with
their lamps, to look for David. "It's like hunting for a needle in a
rick of hay, I'm thinking," said one of the men. "If we could learn
what way the little fellow was going when he was last seen; you know
there are more than sixty miles of road, taking all into account, and it
will be a pretty long business to walk over them."

"Right, mate, but the poor boy won't have got very far," observed Joseph
Kempson. "Come along now."

The men hurried on along the dark, low galleries. Dick every now and
then shouting out with his young, shrill voice, "David, David Adams!"

But there was no answer. It was a work of danger too; for they had to
pass along several passages in whic