Number 3, whose duty it will be to pack the earth when it is hauled out, stays outside the tunnel mouth and sees that the rope attached to the basin is running clear, and then hands the basin to Number 2, who puts it in front of him ready to be pulled to the face by Number 1 with that half of the rope which extends from the pump chamber to the face. We shall see what the basin was for if we accompany Number 1 on his journey to the tunnel face. For the first few yards he goes down a slight slope, then again for a few yards up an incline to the place where it was originally intended to make the exit—just beyond the boundary wall. Here he can hear the thud-thud of the sentry’s footsteps above his head. Then he goes down again pretty steeply for three or four yards and flattens out, the tunnel swinging slightly, first to the right and then to the left. All this time he has been going through fairly soft stuff—a sort of sandy yellow clay, which has been easy enough to dig—but now he comes to the stony part. Working in this stretch has been terribly difficult. A dense, seemingly interminable stratum of large stones has been encountered. The stones are smooth and flat, tightly pressed together in a horizontal position and cemented with the stickiest of clay. Number 1’s progress becomes positively painful: he barks his shoulders on the stones which project from the walls, his toes and elbows suffer from the stones beneath him, occasionally he bumps his head on the uneven roof, and all the time he must keep the candle alight, and swear only in an undertone. Soon he begins to ascend again—steeply this time—and comes to the face, but not before he has had yet one more unpleasant experience. Out of the gloom in front of him appears suddenly a pair of wicked little eyes, horribly bright and menacing. He clenches his teeth and digs his chin into the soil beneath him. The large rat, whose solitude he has disturbed, crawls over him and leaves him sweating with fright and almost faint with the eerie sensation of it.