There, in the strange light of the dip candles, and everyone
chaffing, Nelson and the Senator seemed to stand out like two giants,
and there was something aloof in their faces, and apart from the rest.
If one searched the world, Mamma, one could not find two nobler men.
At last we climbed into two great caverns out of which they had taken
the finest gold, nineteen thousand dollars to a ton of rock. The miners
(I am sure not the lovely courtly creatures we saw last night, but some
low other ones) stole so much that now they have to be searched as they
leave the mine. We hated to hear that. They could conceal about twenty
dollars' worth a day on themselves each, and so it got to be called
"high grading." Isn't that a nice word, and what heaps of "highgraders"
there are in different walks of life! Pilfering brains and ideas and
thoughts from other people!
They were blasting in the shaft below and the fumes came up and made us
all a little faint, so we decided to come to the earth's surface without
going down about two hundred feet lower, which we could have done.
In one long gallery we came upon a single miner working away in a
cul-de-sac, with, it seemed, absolutely no air. Think of the courage
and endurance it must take to continue this, day after day! I do admire
them.
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