120
THE SEASIDE LIBEAET.
Vol. L
" Mr. James," said Simon Ford, " it is not
your ears, but your legs that I need. Are you
thoroughly rested ?"
" Rested and refreshed, Simon. I am ready
to go with you wherever you please."
"Harry," said Simon, turning to his son,
" light our safety-lamps."
" Safety-lamps !" cried James Starr, much
surprised, for explosions of fire-damp are not
to be feared in mines absolutely empty of coal.
" Yes, Mr. James, for prudence."
" My brave Simon, are you not going to
offer me a miner's dress ?"
" Not yet, Mr. James—not yet," said the old
overseer, his eyes flashing singularly in their
deep sockets.
Harry, who had entered the cottage, soon
came out, carrying the safety-lamps.
He handed one to the engineer, another to
his father, and taking the third in his left hand,
armed himself with a long stick.
" Forward !" cried Simon Ford, grasping a
stout pick which rested near the cottage door.
" Forward !" repeated the engineer. '^Good-
bye, Madge !"
" God be with you !" said the Scotchwoman.
" A good supper, wife, you know," cried
Simon Ford. " We shall be hungry when we
get back, and we'll do it honor."
j                         CHAPTER VI.
I           SOME  INEXPLICABLE   PHENOMENA.
The superstitions of Scotland are well
known. In certain clans the land's tenants,
gathered for a vigil, love to relate stories taken
from hyperborean mythology. Education,
though largely and liberally spread over the
country, has not yet been able to confine the
legends to the category of fiction. They seem
to be inherent in the soil of old Caledonia. It
is still the land of spirits and ghosts, of goblins
and fairies. There always appears the evil
genius, who only departs by means of ready
money ; the Seer of the Highlanders, who, by
a gift of second sight, predicts approaching
deaths ; the May Moullach, which shows itself
under the form of a young girl, with hairy
arms, and predicts the misfortunes with which
the families are menaced ; the fairy Branshie,
who announces fatal events ; the Brawnies, to
whom is confided the care ofthe household fur-
niture ; the Urish, who frequents more particu-
larly the wild gorges of Loch Katrine, and
many others.
It is natural that the population of the Scotch
mines should furnish its share of legends and
fables to this mythological repertory. If the
mountains of the Highlands are peopled with
fanciful beings, either good or bad, with much
more reason should the dark mines he haunted
to their lowest depths. Who makes the de-
posit tremble during the stormy nights ; who
puts the miner on the track ot the vein yet un-
worked ; who lights the fire-damp, and pre-
sides over the terrible explosions, if not some
genius of the mine ?
It wa§, at least, the belief, wide-spread
among these superstitious Scotch. In truth,
the majority of the miners willingly believed in
the supernatural, when only physical phe-
nomena were in operation, and it would have
been a loss of time to endeavor to convince
them of the truth. Where should credulity be
more freely developed than at the bottom of
these abysses?
Now, the Aberfoyle mines, precisely because
worked in the land of legends, would abound
most naturally in all the incidents of the super-
natural.
Then legends are numerous there. Besides,
it is necessary to add, that certain phenomena,
hitherto unexplained, could not help furnishing
new food to public credulity.
In the first rank of the superstitious miners
of the Dochart Pit figured Jack Ryan, Harry's
comrade. He was the very strongest partizan
of the supernatural. He transformed all those
fantastic histories into songs, which made him
very popular during the winter evenings.
But Jack Ryan was not the only one who
showed his credulity. His comrades affirmed,
not less positively, that the pits of. Aberfoyle
were haunted; that certain imperceptible beings
wandered there frequently, the same as in the
Highlands. In fact, it would be very extraor-
dinary if this belief in spirits did not prevail.
Is there, indeed, any place better arranged than
a dark and deep mine for the frolics of the
genii, the goblins, the elfs, and other actors of
the melodrama? The scenery was all ready ;
why should not supernatural personages come
to play their parts ?
Thus reasoned Jack Ryan and his comrades
ofthe Aberfoyle mines It has been said that
the different pits communicated with each other
by long subterranean galleries cut between the
veins. Thus, there was under Stirling County
an enormous, massive rock, crossed in every
direction by tunnels, full of caves, perforated
with shafts—a kind of hypogeum, of subter-
ranean labyrinth, which presented tho appear-
ance of a vast ant-hill.
Tho miners of the different pits often met,
either when they were going to the works or
returning from them. Thus there was con-
stant facilities for intercourse, and to circulate
from one pit to another the stories which origi-
nated in the mine. The tales thus spread with
marvelous rapidity, passing from mouth' to
mouth, anil increasing, as is the custom.
Meanwhile, two men, better instructed, and
of a more practical temperament than the
others, had always opposed this delusion. They
did not admit, in any degree, tlie intervention
of goblins, genii, or fairies.
These were Simon Ford and his son.
And they proved it well by continuing to in-
habit the dark crypt after tho abandonment of
the Dochart Pit. Perhaps good Madge had
some leaning toward the supernatural, like all
Scotch women from the Highlands. But she
was obliged to repeat these histories of appa-
ritions to herself, which she dfd conscientiously,
so as not to lose the old traditions.
If Simon and Harry Ford had been as credu-
lous as their comrades, they would not have
abandoned the mine either to the genii or the
faries. The hope of discovering a new vein
would have made them bravo all the fantastic
cohorts of goblins.
They were credulous, they were full of faith
only on one point ; they could not admit that
the carboniferous deposit of Aberfoyle was en-
tirely exhausted. It may be said, with some
justice, that Simon Ford and his son had on
this subject implicit faith—that faith in God
which nothing could shake.
That is the reason that, for ten years with •
out missing a single day, obstinate, immovable
in their convictions, the father and son took
their pick, their rod and their lamp.
Thus they went together seeking, tapping
the rock with quick blows, listening if it gave
a favorable sound.
As long as the borings had not reached the
granite ofthe primary rocks, Simon and Harry
Ford agreed that the searching, futile to-day,
might bring results to-morrow, and that it
should be undertaken.
Their entire life—they would pass it in en-
deavoring to restore its ancient prosperity to
the Aberfoyle mine. If the father should suc-
cumb before the hour of success, the son would
undertake the work alone. At the same time
these two impassioned guardians of the mine
went through it for the purpose of taking care
of it. They made use of tho fillings-in and
the arches. They looked if a caving-in was to
be feared, and if it were necessary to condemn
any part of the pit. They examined the drip-
pings from the upper waters, they directed
them, they drew them off in canals to a swamp.
In a word, they had voluntarily constituted
themselves the protectors and preserve rs of this
unproductive domain, from which had come out
so much riches, now dissolved in smoke! It
was during some of these excursions that Harry
was more particularly struck with certain phe-
nomena, of which he sought in vain the ex-
planation.
Thus, several times, when he was in some
narrow cross-gallery, he thought he heard
noises similar to those produced by the pick,
when struck on the filled-in walL
Harry, whom the supernatural, no more than
j the natural, could not frighten, had hastened
1 to discover the cause of this mysterious work.
The tunnel was empty. The young miner's
lamp, illuminating the walls, had not shown
any recent trace of the pincers or tho pick.
Harry then asked himself if it were not an
acoustic illusion of some odd or fanciful echo.
I Other times, in suddenly throwing a strong
light toward a suspicious fissure,, he thought he
| saw a shadow pass. He sprang forward. Noth-
! ing, not even an outlet which could permit a.
j human being to hide from his pursuit.
On two occasions within» a month, Harry,
visiting tho western part ofthe pit, heard dis-
! tinctlydistant detonations, a» if some miner had
exploded a dynamite cartridge.
l he last time, after the most careful search,.
j he had discovered that a pillar had just beevr
shivered by a blast.
By the light of his lamp, Harry carefully ex-
! amiiicd the wall affected by the blast. It was
not made of a simple bank of stones, but of a-
pan of schist, which had penetrated to this depth
' in the floor of the coal deposit? Was tho ob-
ject of the blast the discovery of a new vein t
Did soino one only wish, to cause the falling iru
of this nortion of tho mine ? These were the
questions Harry asked himself, and, when he
told the circumstance to his father, neither the
old overseer nor he could answer the question,
in a satisfactory manner.
" It is strange," often repeated Harry, "the
presence of an unknown person in the mine-
seems to he impossible, and, still there can be
no doubt of it ! Is some one else, then, seek-
ing some unworked vein ?    Or rather, is he not
J attempting to annihilate what remains of the-
Aberfoyle mines ?    But with what object ?    ï
¦ will know it, if it costs me my life !"
A fortnight before this day on which Harry-
Ford guided the engineer through   the laby-
I rinth of the Dochart Pit, he was on the point.
I of attaining the object of his search.
He was walking through the southwest ex-
tremity of the mine, a powerful lantern in his.
hand.
Suddenly, it seemed to him that a light was
extinguished, a few hundred feet before him, at
tne end of a narrow chimney, which was cut
obliquely in the solid rock. He sprang toward
the suspicious light.
Useless search. As Harry did not admit a
supernatural explanation of physical things, he-
concluded that certainly an unknown being was
prowling in the pit. But, whatever he did,
searching with the greatest care, scrutinizing
the smallest fissure ofthe gallery, it was all he
had for his trouble, he could not arrive at any
certainty whatever.
Harry then trusted to chance to disclose to>
him this mystery. Farther and farther away,
he again saw lights, which flitted from place to,
place like a Jack's lantern ; but their appear-
ance had only the duration of a flash of light-
ning, and he was obliged to give up all idea of
discovering the cause.
If Jack Ryan and the other superstitious
ones of the mine had perceived these fantastic
flames, they would certainly not have failed to
attribute them to tho supernatural.
But Harry did not even dream of such a
thing. Nor did old Simon. And when the
two ta'ked of tho phenomena, due evidently to
a purely physical cause—
"My boy,"  repeated the old overseer,   "let
us wait. Some day all that will be explained !"
All this time, it must he said, that never up
to this period, had Harry or his father been ex-
posed to an act of violence.
If the stone, fallen that day, even at the feet
of James Starr, had been thrown by the hand
of an evildoer, it was the first criminal act of
its kind.
James Starr, when asked about it, thought
that this stone had become detached from the
arch of the gallery. But Harry did not admit
an explanation so simple. The stone, accord-
ing to him, had not fallen, it had been
thrown. Unless in rebounding it could never
have described a trajectory, if it had not been,
moved by a foreign impulse.
Harry saw in it a direct attempt against him
and his father, or even against the engineer-