the side
of a little hill, a blackened brick arch leading into thick night. A
stationary engine was hauling a procession of coal-laden trucks--"tubs"
is the technical word--out of its depths. The tubs were neither pretty
nor clean. "We are going down in those when they are emptied. Put on
your helmet and _keep_ it on, and keep your head down."

There is nothing mirth-provoking in going down a coal-mine--even though
it be only a shallow incline running to one hundred and forty feet
vertical below the earth. "Get into the tub and lie down. Hang it, no!
This is not a railway carriage: you can't see the country out of the
windows. Lie _down_ in the dust and don't lift your head. Let her go!"

The tubs strain on the wire rope and slide down fourteen hundred feet of
incline, at first through a chastened gloom, and then through darkness.
An absurd sentence from a trial report rings in the head: "About this
time prisoner expressed a desire for the consolations of religion." A
hand with a reeking flare-lamp hangs over the edge of the tub, and there
is a glimpse of a blackened hat near it, for those accustomed to the
pits have a merry trick of going down sitting or crouching on the
coupling of the rear tub. The noise is deafening, and the roof is very
close indeed. The tubs bump, and the occupant crouches lovingly in the
coal dust. What would happen if the train went off the line? The desire
for the "consolations of religion" grows keener and keener as the air
grows closer and closer. The tubs stop in darkness spangled by the light
of the flare-lamps which many black devils carry. Underneath and on both
sides is the greasy blackness of the coal, and, above, a roof of grey
sandstone, smooth as the flow of a river at evening. "Now, remember that
if you don't keep your hat on, you'll get your head broken, because you
will forget to stoop. If you hear any tubs coming up behind you step off
to one side. There's a tramway under your feet: be careful not to trip
over it."

The miner has a gait as peculiarly his own as Tommy's measured pace or
the bluejacket's roll. Big men who slouch in the light of day become
almost things of beauty underground. Their foot is on their native
heather; and the slouch is a very necessary act of homage to the great
earth, which if a man observe not, he shall without doubt have his
hat--bless the man who invented pith hats!--grievously cut.

The road turns and winds and the roof becomes lower, but those