a-workin' in a mine! If you've formed the habit of makin' an ass of yourself, young man, you'd best take warnin'.

"I hear they're goin' to put in electric motors to haul the cars," he went on as if he had not heard the laugh of the coal brokers at Scidmore's expense. "If that's so, I guess the Lord an' the Hatton Coal Company must love the mules. An' the mule ain't a very lovable kind o' creetur. Not particularly. 'Specially after he's been in the mines without seein' daylight for a year or so. They have all sorts of drivers an' the boys lick 'em an' gash 'em an' burn 'em with their lamps on the belly an' all sorts o' places to make 'em pull more cars than they ought to pull up the steep pitches. By the time a mule's been through that kind o' picknickin' for eighteen months or so, he's apt to get a leetle irritable, unless he's jest naturally too good tempered for this world. If he's that way, he'll lay down an' die. Fact is, most of 'em gets so infernal ornery before that time that nobody can do nothin' with 'em."

"What happens then?" asked Scidmore, who was interested in spite of his pique.

"O, when he gets so naturally cantankerous that nobody can drive him, we h'ist him up the shaft, an' let him spend a Sunday or a week out doors. Say, I don't suppose you ever saw a mule when he got off the cage at the top o' the shaft? It'd do you good. I went to school once-you wouldn't believe it, but I did. I was there about a month an' durin' that time. I did somethin' that made the teacher mad. She said

she'd keep me in an' whip me after school. That afternoon her beau come to the school for her, an' the teacher let me off. I ain't been back since. But I wasn't no gladder than them mules is when they find themselves on top o' ground 'stead of under it. Why they jest jump sideways all over the pen. Sometimes one of 'em will tremble all over, as if he was scairt o' the light or the big broad earth or something. Sometimes he'll go feelin' his way 'round with his forefeet. Sometimes he'll lay down. Sometimes he'll bray! It's all accordin' to his disposition. Just like men. But he's glad all right enough!"

Then the party must see the actual work of mining. Half an hour later as they left a chamber where they had been watching the process, a number of men came running down the gangway. For a moment Hatton held up his lamp and watched the flame. Then he said. very quietly, "We go back now."

"I'm glad that miserable wind has stopped blowing," said Scidmore. "On the way in it blew so hard that I could hardly keep my lamp burning."

"Mr. Scidmore," said Hatton, slowly, "if that wind doesn't blow again, in a little while you won't be able to breathe this air. Something is wrong, and we must reach the foot of the shaft as quickly as possible."

Arriving at the shaft, the word which had been telephoned down went round that there had been an explosion in the boiler-room, which had stopped the ventilating-fans and the hoisting machinery. There was nothing for it but to climb the ladders to reach the