bony coal and the refuse of the mine, on the other you can reach out your hand and touch the heavy wooden props that support the roof, and beyond the props there is darkness, or if the rib of coal is visible it is barely distinct. Up at the face there is a scene of great activity. Bare-armed men, without coat or vest, are working with bar and pick and shovel, moving the fallen coal from the face, breaking it, loading it into the mine car which stands near by. The miners are at the face prying down loose pieces of coal. One takes his lamp in his hand and flashes its light along the black, broken, shiny surface, deciding upon the best point to begin the next drill hole, discussing the matter with his companion, giving quick orders to the laborers, acting with energy and a will. He takes up his drill, runs his fingers across the edge of it professionally, balances it in his hands, and strikes a certain point on the face with it, turning it slightly at each stroke. He has taken his position, lying on his side perhaps, and then begins the regular tap, tap, of the drill into the coal. The laborers have loaded the mine car, removed the block from the wheel, and now, grasping the end of it firmly, hold back on it as it moves by gravity down the chamber to the gangway. You may follow it out, watch the driver boy as he attaches it to his trip, and go with him back to the foot of the shaft. You have seen something of the operation of taking out coal, something of the ceaseless activity which pervades the working portions of the mine. But your visit to the mine has been at a time when hundreds of men are busy around you, when the rumble, the click, the tap, the noise of blasting, the sound of human voices, are incessant. If you were there alone, the only living being in the mine, you would experience a different set of sensations. If you stood or sat motionless you would find the silence oppressive. One who has not had this experience can have no adequate conception of the profound stillness of a deserted mine. On the surface of the earth one cannot find a time nor a place in which the ear is not assailed by noises; the stirring of the grasses in the field at midnight sends sound-waves traveling through space. Wherever there is life there is motion, and wherever there is motion there is sound. But down here there is no life, no motion, no sound. The silence is not only oppressive, it is painful, it becomes unbearable. No person could be long subjected to it and retain his reason; it would be like trying to live in an element to which the human body is not adapted. Suppose you are not only in silence but in darkness. There is no darkness on the surface of the earth that is at all comparable with the darkness of the mine. On the surface the eyes can grow accustomed to the deepest gloom of night. Clouds cannot shut out every ray of light from hidden moon or stars. But down in the mine, whether in night-time or daytime, there is no possible lightening up