The face of the fisherman seemed to undergo a change as his companion passed out of his sight—from looking stolid and soured it suddenly became animated and full of excitement; the perspiration stood out upon it in a heavy dew, and muttering to himself, “I sha’n’t let him go down far,” he slowly lowered away.
For the first few yards of his descent Will could easily scrutinise the walls of the carefully-cut square hole by the light of clay, the flame of his candle looking pale and feeble; but as he sank lower, swinging to and fro with a pendulum-like motion, which now took him to one side of the shaft, now to the other, so that it needed little effort on his part to be able to carefully examine fully half of the cutting, the light from the candle grew more clear and bright, and he thrust it here and there wherever there was a glitter in the time-darkened stone.
Lower and lower, with now his elbow chafing against the rough wall, now his boots, but nothing to reward his search. There was a bright glitter here, but it was only the large flakes of mica in the stone. Lower down there was a sign of ore—of little black granules bedded in deep-red stone, and before this he paused for a minute, for he knew that there was here a vein of tin; but as far as he could tell it looked poor, and not so good as some that miners had told him hardly paid for crushing.
“All right, Josh; lower away!” he cried; and his words went echoing up to where the fisherman slowly allowed the strong line to glide through his hands.
Some twenty feet lower Will shouted to his companion to halt, for there was a broad band of glittering-yellow metallic stone crossing the shaft-wall diagonally.
The lad’s heart beat wildly for a few moments, but he calmed down as he felt that had this been of any value the old adventurers would not have passed it by.
“Only mundic,” he said, as he inspected it more closely. “Lower away, Josh!” and the band of sulphuret of iron was left behind.
Lower and lower, with the top of the shaft looking a comparatively small square hole, and as the lad glanced up at it for a moment the first symptom of fear that he had felt attacked him. For as he saw how frail was the cord by which he hung, and realised that he was depending entirely upon his companion’s strength of arm, his brain swam, his eyes closed, and he clung tightly with both hands to the rope.
The attack passed off directly.
“Josh thinks I’m a coward,” he muttered, “and I suppose I am; but I won’t show it;” and shouting a cheery order to the fisherman to lower away, the lad descended farther and farther, with the right of his candle flashing now from the walls, which were wet and shining with the oozings of the surrounding rock. This moisture had gone on coating the walls in patches for many a long year, so that in these places it was impossible without scraping for the keenest of eyes to detect even the composition of the stones, and with a sigh of dissatisfaction the searcher shouted to Josh to lower away.