---"lately died,
Gone to a _blacker pit_, for whom
Grimy nakedness, dragging his trucks
And laying his trams, _in a poisoned gloom_
Wrought, till he crept from a gutted mine
Master of half a servile shire,
And left his coal all turned into gold
To a grandson, first of his noble line."

Intermingled with these sounds were others, the jar and clash of gateways,
the dripping and splashing of water, the rolling thunder of the ascending
and descending iron parachutes in the shaft, the trampling of horses, the
distant report of powder-blasts, and the shrill jargon of human speakers,
near, yet only partially visible.

"Is it a clear day overhead?" said the black bust of one of the miners,
with a lamp in its _hat_!

Just think of it! We had only been divorced from the aerial blue of a June
sky a minute before. Our very horse was so high above us that we could
have distinguished him only by the aid of a telescope--that is, if the
solid ribs of the globe were not between us and him.

As soon as we became accustomed to the place, we moved off after the
foreman of the mine. We walked through the miry tram-ways under the low,
black arches, now stepping aside to let an invisible horse and car,
"grating harsh thunder," pass us in the murky darkness; now through a
door-way, momently closed to keep the foul and clear airs separate, until
we came to the great furnace of the mine that draws off all the noxious
vapors from this nest of Beelzebub. Then we went to the stables where
countless horses are stalled--horses that never see the light of day
again, or if they do, are struck blind by the apparition; now in wider
galleries, and new explorations, where we behold the busy miners,
twinkling like the distant lights of a city, and hear the thunder-burst,
as the blast explodes in the murky chasms. At last, tired, oppressed, and
sickened with the vast and horrible prison, for such it seems, we retrace
our steps, and once more enter the iron parachute. A touch of the magic
lever, and again we fly away; but now upwards, upwards to the glorious
blue sky and air of mother earth. A miner with his lamp accompanies us. By
its dim light we see how rapidly we spin through the shaft. Our car
clashes again at the top, and as we step forth into the clear sunshine, we
thank GOD for such a bright and beautiful world up stairs!

"Do you know," said I, "Picton, what we would do if we had such a devil's
pit as that in the St