We all laughed over papa’s ghost during the breakfast, and by and by old Mary made her appearance.
“Yes,” she said, “it is quite true, as Nanny as a told you. I have often heard all sorts of strange noises; but I b’lieve they all come from the lode of tin which runs under the house. Wherever there is a lode of tin, you are sure to hear strange noises.”
“What, Mary! was it the knockers I heard last night?”
“Yes; ’twas the knackers, down working upon the tin—no doubt of it.”
This was followed by a long explanation, and numerous stories of mines in the Lelant and St Ives district, in which the knockers had been often heard.
After a little time, Mary, imagining, I suppose, that the young ladies might not like to sleep in a house beneath which the knockers were at work; again came with her usual low courtesy into the parlour.
“Beg pardon, sir,” says she; “but none of the young ladies need be afraid. There are no spirits in the house; it is very nearly a new one, and no one has ever died in the house.”
This makes a distinct difference between the ghost of the departed and those gnomes who are doomed to toil in the earth’s dark recesses.[47] The Cornish knocker does not appear to be the “cobal” of German miners. The former are generally kindly, and often serve the industrious miner; the latter class are always malicious, and, I believe, are never heard but when mischief is near.
MINERS’ SUPERSTITIONS.
Miners say they often see little imps or demons underground. Their presence is considered favourable; they indicate the presence of lodes, about which they work during the absence of the miners. A miner told my informant that he had often seen them, sitting on pieces of timber, or tumbling about in curious attitudes, when he came to work.