THE YOUTH’S CABINET.

189

 

an occupation which might exercise it,
without bringing back my sadness. I
began to amuse myself with counting the
wheel-barrows laden with coal which
passed me. After having seen how
many passed in an hour, I attempted to
calculate how many would pass in a day,
a month, a year. I then recollected that
there were days of rest, and these I de-
ducted. I multiplied the number found,
by that of the galleries from which simi-
lar quantities of coal were dug. I divi-
ded the total into three parts, and thus I
ascertained the portion of each of the
partners in the mine. This calculating,
diversified in innumerable ways, finished
and begun again every day, familiarized
me with the rapid performance by my
head, of all common arithmetical com-
putations.

Having proceeded thus far, I grew
tired of numbers, and began to think
upon something else. I had a Bible, in
which I had been taught while very
small to read. I undertook to learn it
by heart during my hours of rest ; I re-
peated in a low voice the passages which
I knew. I tried to explain to myself all
the words, and to recollect how they
were written. I amused myself with
tracing letters in the air with my fingers,
which made the barrow-men laugh, as
they passed by. It was in this way, sir,
that I learned to express myself with
greater correctness, and acquired some
knowledge of spelling and of the elements
of grammar, which at a later period I
endeavored to perfect.

About this time some of the places of
the young miners became vacant, and I
was promoted to the galleries.

There, the work was more laborious,
but better paid, and at least, we were

not condemned to inaction. I went on
observing and reflecting, questioning the
older miners concerning what I saw, and
endeavoring to remember the informa-
tion which they had derived from expe-
rience.

These lessons were generally given to
me at our meal-times, or in the morning, -
as we were going to work, for we always
quitted the mine at dark to return to our
families or boarding places, and were
obliged the next morning before light to
come back to the shaft. Thus three
years passed, without my beholding the
sun except occasionally when it rose,
and without my seeing the field which I
traversed every day; only sometimes in
the morning, when passing the corn-
fields, I gathered blue-bottles and wild
mint, which I carried with me under
ground, in order to remind myself that
light, air, and flowers still existed above.

I am almost ashamed, sir, of descri-
bing to you these childish nothings, but
you will soon see the reason.

We used to have a meal in the middle
of the day, which suspended all labors,
and at which the children were accus-
tomed to resort to the bottom of a pit,
into which a little daylight entered, and
from which a bit of sky, scarcely as wide
as a hand, yet blue and transparent,
could be seen.

One day, when I was there with the
others, I proposed to a little girl named
Jenny, that we should go and see a pas-
sage which had been opened in the
morning, conducting, it was said, into a
new vein. She followed me, and we
crawled into the opening, which was al-
ready ten metres deep.

Reaching the bottom, I raised the
lamp which I had brought with me, in