Thus, in the year 1835, in a colliery near Liège, seven workmen were already seated in a corf that was about to descend into the shaft, when one of their comrades, anxious to seize the opportunity, came hurrying along, and, in spite of all remonstrances, jumped into it; but the rope, unable to bear the shock and the increased weight, suddenly snapped, and all eight were precipitated into the abyss, from which not one of them came forth alive.
In the Swedish mines small barrels or tuns are generally used as vehicles of descent, and the workmen are uncommonly dexterous in preventing their little aërial skiff from striking against the rugged rock-walls, when it would run the danger of being wrecked. Women, and even children, who find occupation in the mines, are often seen standing on the narrow edge of one of these swinging, turning, or oscillating tuns, with an arm slung round the rope; and such is the power of habit that they will quietly knit where even a stout-nerved man would be appalled by the frowning cliffs above or the black abyss below.
In the year 1785 a girl, descending alone into the pit of Fahlun, and unable to direct the tun, could not prevent it from striking against a rock. Jerked out of her conveyance by the violence of the shock, she fell upon a narrow ledge, about one hundred feet from the bottom of the pit, to which she clung with all the energy of despair. Her position was indeed terrific, for the least motion would have precipitated her into the dark grave which seemed to yawn for her reception, and to have given her but a momentary respite in order to make her feel more bitterly the pangs of approaching death. Already her strength was giving way, already a cloud swam before her eyes, when some bold miners, venturing their own lives in the hazardous undertaking, succeeded in rescuing her from her awful position, and snatching her as it were from the very jaws of death.
Another method much adopted, and preferred by the pitmen in our collieries, was passing down and up in the loop. The pitman inserted one leg into a loop formed by curving the terminal chain and hooking it back upon an upper link, and then twined his arm tightly round the rope above. In this way he descended through any depth, and, as he alleged, with greater safety than in a bucket, out of which he might be ejected, while nothing except the breaking of the rope could harm him in loop.
At present the safety-cage is generally used. This is simply a vertical railway carriage running down and up upon guides, and thereby introducing into the shaft the improvements of the iron road. Into one of its square narrow compartments two or three men crouch together, others get into an upper compartment, and down the cage moves easily and safely, the men needing only to take care that hands or fingers do not hang beyond the edge, while four or five minutes of easy motion carry them down a thousand or fifteen hundred feet below the surface of the earth.
MINERS DESCENDING SHAFT IN OWEN’S SAFETY CAGE.
In many mines the workmen climb up and down the shafts on fixed ladders, with landing-stages for resting; and it may easily be imagined how severely their strength must be taxed when, after their hard day’s labour, they have still to ascend step by step a thousand or even two thousand feet, before they can return to their families. Some of the Cornish mines require a full hour to rise from the lowest depths to ‘grass,’ and besides this considerable loss of time, diseases of the lungs and heart, which often terminate fatally, or prematurely make the miner an invalid, are the consequence of these fatiguing journeys.
‘O thou grumbling clerk in London city,’ exclaims the author of ‘Cornwall and its Mines,’[[37]] ‘whose daily fatigues only extend to the ascent into and descent from the trim omnibus that takes you to or from Peckham or Kennington! Only think for a moment of travelling some four or five times the height of St. Paul’s daily—before and after work! O thou querulous socialist, demagogue, or artisan, who canst sit in a comfortable coffee-house, under a flaming gas-light, immediately before and after work—or in your own snug parlour, by your own fireside or murmuring kettle—do but think for a moment of the Cornish miner, and what he must do before he can reach home or house! I fully believe that the best cure for discontent and gloom in fortunate workmen would be to put them upon the treadmill of a deep Cornish mine—for a temporary treadmill it is.’
It had long been deemed of the utmost importance to devise some easier mode of locomotion; but it was not till 1833 that the circumstance of two water-wheels having been thrown out of work by the opening of the deep Georg Adit in the Hartz mines suggested the idea of employing the pump-rods for aiding the ascent of the miners. The trial was first made with a portion of one hundred fathoms. This was divided into twenty-two portions; and on each portion iron steps were fixed, at intervals of four feet, while hand-holds were fixed at convenient distances. A reciprocating motion of four feet was given to each rod, and the miners stepped to and fro from a bracket or ledge on one rod to the parallel one on the other. As one rod is always descending while the other is ascending, and vice versâ, it is easy to understand how this alternate stepping on to the little platforms must lead to the ascent or descent of the miner. At the division between each two of the twenty-two portions, there is a larger platform on which he may rest awhile; and nothing is lost by his rest, for the reciprocal motion goes on, and is ready again for his use when he is ready for it. This first machine surpassed expectation. Short as the length of ascent was, many invalids of the district were now able to resume their underground labours, as the fatigue of mounting or descending was reduced, by the alternate action of the machinery, to a mere easy lateral motion.