but as one mine is very much like another, we declined to
make the rounds of all of them. The one that we entered was about four
hundred feet underground. We were lowered in a cage to the bottom of the
mine, and then walked through a tunnel to where the men were at work,
dodging on our way several loaded cars that were going towards the
shaft, as well as empty ones coming from it. The cars were pushed along
by men, each of them carrying a little lantern on the front of his hat;
in fact, every man whom we saw working underground had one of these
lights for his guidance. The tunnel itself was lit up with electric
lights, extending from the shaft to the front of the working; and in
addition to these, each of us carried a lantern, which was of material
assistance in showing us where to place our feet. We had a few stumbles
on the way, but nobody experienced a fall.

"When we reached the front of the working, the sight was a curious one.
A dozen men--I think there must have been that number at least--were
attacking the coal seam, most of them lying on their sides and digging
away with picks at the lower part of it. Some of them had worked their
way in two or three feet, and were almost out of sight, and I shuddered
to think of the possibility that the mass above might fall upon and
crush them. I asked our guide if this did not happen sometimes.

"'Unfortunately, yes,' he replied. 'It does happen now and then, and the
men on whom the coal falls are more or less severely injured, and
perhaps killed. We have to watch the miners constantly, to see that they
do not run too great a risk. If we let them have their own way,
accidents would be much more frequent than they are.'

"'Why do they burrow under the coal in that way?' I asked. 'Couldn't
they get it out in some manner less dangerous than that?'

"'That is the way to which they have been accustomed,' the guide
answered, 'and it is difficult to get them to change. Most of these
people come from the coal-mining districts of England, and they are very
conservative. Machines have been invented for doing this kind of work,
and they are in use in some of the mines, but the men are opposed to
them, and in some instances they have disabled or destroyed the
machines.'

"Then he went on to explain that the miner makes an opening below the
mass of coal in the manner that we saw, and then drills a hole some
distance above it, in which to explode a charge of powder. This brings
down