be done, in
good order, without excitement.

The scoopings of the side grew black, and the patch of sky above more
blue, as with many thoughts of Lorna, a long way underground I sank.
Then I was fetched up at the bottom with a jerk and rattle; and but for
holding by the rope so, must have tumbled over. Two great torches of
bale-resin showed me all the darkness, one being held by Uncle Ben and
the other by a short square man with a face which seemed well-known to
me.

'Hail to the world of gold, John Ridd,' said Master Huckaback, smiling
in the old dry manner; 'bigger coward never came down the shaft, now did
he, Carfax?'

'They be all alike,' said the short square man, 'fust time as they doos
it.'

'May I go to heaven,' I cried, 'which is a thing quite out of
sight'--for I always have a vein of humour, too small to be followed
by any one--'if ever again of my own accord I go so far away from it!'
Uncle Ben grinned less at this than at the way I knocked my shin in
getting out of the bucket; and as for Master Carfax, he would not
even deign to smile. And he seemed to look upon my entrance as an
interloping.

For my part, I had nought to do, after rubbing my bruised leg, except to
look about me, so far as the dullness of light would help. And herein I
seemed, like a mouse in a trap, able no more than to run to and fro,
and knock himself, and stare at things. For here was a little channel
grooved with posts on either side of it, and ending with a heap of
darkness, whence the sight came back again; and there was a scooped
place, like a funnel, but pouring only to darkness. So I waited for
somebody to speak first, not seeing my way to anything.'

'You seem to be disappointed, John,' said Uncle Reuben, looking blue by
the light of the flambeaux; 'did you expect to see the roof of gold, and
the sides of gold, and the floor of gold, John Ridd?'

'Ha, ha!' cried Master Carfax; 'I reckon her did; no doubt her did.'

'You are wrong,' I replied; 'but I did expect to see something better
than dirt and darkness.'

'Come on then, my lad; and we will show you some-thing better. We want
your great arm on here, for a job that has beaten the whole of us.'

With these words, Uncle Ben led the way along a narrow passage, roofed
with rock and floored with slate-coloured shale and shingle, and winding
in and out, until we stopped at a great stone block or boulder, lying
across the floor, and as large as my mother's best oaken war