Chapter 13 Chapter Thirteen Coal City

Three years after the events just described, the guide Yona or Murray, with "extreme fascination," suggested that the numerous sightseers, browsing Stirlingshire, spend a few hours visiting the coal mines at New-Aberfoyle. No matter which country in the New World or the Old World, there is no mine that can present a more exotic appearance. First, visitors are brought safely and effortlessly to the mining face, 1,500 feet below the county surface. In fact, seven kilometers southwest of Callander, a crooked tunnel, adorned with a grand entrance, with small peepers, serpentine decorations and porticoes, is level with the working surface.This tunnel, with a gentle slope and wide hollows, leads directly to this dungeon so curiously excavated in the Scottish Highlands.

A double-track railway, whose carriages are driven by a hydraulic power, stops every hour in this village built under the county, perhaps with an ambitious name, "Coal City", that is, the city of coal. Upon arrival in Coal City, visitors are placed in a center where electricity plays a primary role as the prime mover of heat and light. In fact, the ventilation shafts, however numerous they were, could not have mixed enough sunlight into the deep darkness of New-Aberfoyle.At the same time, an intense light filled the center of the darkness, where a multitude of electric wheels took the place of the sun.Suspended below the soffits of the vaults and resting on natural pillars, they were continuously powered by electric currents produced by electro-magnetic machines - some the sun, others the stars - which illuminated the field extensively .When it's time to rest, a switch is enough to create an artificial night in these deep abysses of the coal mine.

All these devices, large and small, operate in a vacuum, that is, their glowing arcs never touch the surrounding air.As a result, when the gas mixed in the air reaches the ratio of explosion, there is no need to worry about any explosion.The prime mover of electricity is equally invariably employed in all the needs of industrial and domestic life, in the houses of the Coal Town as in the digging alleys of New-Aberfoyle. First, it must be said that the foresight of the engineer James Starr - concerning the opening of new coal mines - was fully realized.The abundance of carbonaceous veins is difficult to quantify.To the west of the Dungeon, a quarter of a mile from Coal City, the miners' pickaxes struck the first veins.Workers' housing estates therefore do not occupy the center of mining.The underground engineering is directly connected to the ground engineering through ventilation shafts and mining shafts, so that different mine layers are connected to the ground.The large tunnels of the railway lines, which use hydraulic traction, are used only to transport the inhabitants of the Coal City.

Everyone remembers the curious construction of the vast cavern in which the old foreman and his companions were imprisoned during their first explorations.There, over their heads, was a rounded, curved dome.The pillars supporting the dome disappear into vaults of slate at a height of 300 feet—almost as high as the cavernous "Mammoth Dome" in Kentucky. The sprawling Great Hall—the largest underground structure in the United States—is known to comfortably accommodate 5,000 people.In this part of New-Aberfoyle, the proportions are the same and the layout is the same.Here, however, instead of the wonderful stalactites of the famous cave, there are raised carbonaceous veins that burst out of all the rock walls as if under the pressure of the fractured fissures of the flaky veins. .It can even be said that some of the flakes in the round carvings of coal fines will burn in the sun.

Below this dome stretches a lake whose extension can be compared to the Dead Sea in "Mammoth Dungeon"-the transparent water in the deep lake is full of eyeless fish.Engineers named the lake Malcolm Lake. It was there, in that great natural cave, that Simon Ford built his new cottage, which he would not exchange for the prettiest mansion in Edinburgh's Princes Street.The home sits on the edge of a lake, with its five windows looking out onto the dark water that stretches as far as the eye can see. Two months later, a second dwelling stood adjacent to Simon Ford's cottage.That was the residence of James Starr.Engineers put their hearts and souls into the new-Aberfoyle.He was just as happy to live there, and if he agreed to go out again, it would be his business imperiously forcing him to do so.He was, indeed, living there among his miners' society.

Since the discovery of the new seam, all the workers in the old coal mine hastily abandoned the plow and the spiked harrow, and took up the pickaxe and pickaxe again.Convinced that they would never lose their jobs, and that the boom in mining would lead to high wages for the labor force, they left the above ground and went underground to live in the coal mines, whose natural configuration befits such a settlement. These brick miners' dwellings, arranged little by little in a curious fashion, some on the shore of Malcolm Lake, some on those arches like cathedral buttresses against the thrust of the arches. under.Coal miners who hammer rocks, mine cart pushers who transport coal, engineering drivers, installers who use pillars to support mine tunnel supports, road maintenance workers who are responsible for road repairs, and use rocks for mining parts The earth-fillers who replaced coal, in short, all these workers who worked more underground, made their homes in New-Aberfoyle, and gradually in the north of Stirlingshire, formed the Coaltown at the foot of the eastern head of Lake Catlin.

So it's a kind of Flemish country that stands on the shores of Lake Malcolm.A chapel built for the blessing of St. Giles overwhelms all of this with a gigantic overhang, the bottom of which is submerged in the waters of the subterranean sea. When this subterranean village is illuminated by the glare cast by the discs suspended from the pillars of the domes or the arches of the side temples, it takes on a curious effect under its somewhat magical appearance, attesting to the Recommendation from guides Murray or Yona.That's why tourists flock in droves. It goes without saying that the residents of Coal City exude pride in their settlement.They also seldom leave their workers' quarters, imitating Simon Ford in this, who never wanted to leave.The old foreman asserted that it had been raining "up there" and, having said the climate of the United Kingdom, it must be admitted that he could never be wrong.The New-Aberfoyle family prospered as a result.In three years these families had reached a certain level of well-off that they never wanted to go to the county grounds.Many babies born when work restarted had never breathed outside air.

Jack Ryan couldn't stop saying: "They have been weaned for 18 months, yet they haven't seen the sun yet!" On this point it must be noted that Jack Ryan was one of the first to arrive at the engineer's call.This happy companion makes it a duty to get back into the old business.Mellows Grange thus lost his singer and permanent bagpiper.But that's not to say Jack Ryan doesn't sing anymore.Instead, the loud echoes of Neo-Aberfoyle echoed him with their stony lungs. Jack Ryan has made his home in Simon Ford's new cottage.They offered him a room, and he, being a simple and frank man, accepted it without ceremony.Mrs. Madge liked his good nature and cheerful disposition.She more or less shared his idea of ​​ghosts haunting coal mines, and when it was just the two of them they told each other macabre tales that would make the Far North The myth is greatly enhanced.

Jack Ryan thus became the joy of the cottage.Besides, this is a good man, a strong worker, and six months after the restart of work, he became the captain of a team working underground. "It's all very well-crafted, Mr. Ford," said he, who was setting up his home a few days ago, "you've discovered a new lode, and if you nearly died for it, Well, the price is not too expensive!" "No, Jack, it's even a good deal for us there!" replied the old foreman, "but neither Mr. Starr nor I shall forget that you saved our lives!" "No," went on Jack Ryan, "your son Harry saved him, because he was going to accept my invitation to Irving's festival..."

"Didn't go there, did you?" Harry retorted, shaking his friend's hand, "No, Jack, it was you, your wound just healing, it was you, who didn't waste a day, an hour, to get us in the Found alive in the coal mine!" "Well, don't say that!" retorted the obstinate boy quickly, "I won't make you say nothing! I'm in such a hurry to find out what's the matter with you, Harry, that's all. But, In order to let everyone know whom to be grateful to, I will add that if there is no little goblin who can't catch..." "Ah! We have thought together," cried Simon Ford, "a goblin!"

"A goblin, a goblin, a fairy's son," repeated Jack Ryan, "a grandson of Mrs. Lighthouse, a Uresk. Call it what you will! It's true, without him we wouldn't be here." Not into that alley you then could never come out of again!" "Without a doubt, Jack," Harry replied, "it remains to find out whether this man is as supernatural as you would like to believe." "Supernatural!" exclaimed Jack Ryan, "but he's supernatural like a house god, and seeing him running with a lantern, trying to overtake him, he evades you like a spirit in the air, and like a shadow Gone like that! Take it easy, Harry, you'll see him again someday!" "Well, Jack," said Simon Ford, "whether he is a household god or not, we will try to find him, and you must help us in this matter." "You'll make a loss, Mr. Ford!" replied Jack Ryan. "Okay! Just wait and see, Jack!" It is easy to imagine how quickly New-Aberfoyle became familiar to the Fords, and especially to Harry.The latter got acquainted with the most mysterious bends there.He could even tell that a certain point on the ground was exactly this or that point of the coal mine.He knew that above this seam stretched the Firth of Creed, and there stretched Loch Softmonde or Loch Catlin.These pillars are branches of a ridge of the Grampians they support.This vault is the bedrock of Dumbarton.Over the top of this wide pond runs the Baruch's Railway.There, the coast of Scotland ends.There, is the starting point of the sea, and in the big storm of the vernal or autumnal equinox, the sound of rumbling and rumbling can be clearly heard.Harry was literally an excellent "guide" for these natural catacombs, and what guides on the snow-tops of the Alps do in full light, he did so in the dark with an unrivaled instinctive accuracy. It can be done in coal mines. So he loves it, this new-Aberfoyle!How many times he has ventured deep into the deepest and deepest parts of New-Aberfoyle with a lamp in his hat.He deftly steered a small boat to explore its ponds.He even shoots pintails, squirrels, and muscovy, because many wild birds fly into this basement, and they feed on the fish, and these black waters are full of fish.Harry's eyes seemed made for this dark space, like a seaman's eyes for the distant horizon. Yet, on such a run, Harry seemed to be drawn irresistibly by the hope of finding the mysterious man whose intervention, to be honest, saved not only him but everyone else, his family and him.Can he find him?Yes, if he trusted his hunch, sure enough.No, if he had to conclude from the ineffectiveness of his search up to that point. There was no repeat of the attack directed at the old foreman's family before New-Aberfoyle was discovered. That's how things are in this strange realm. Don't think that even when the sketches of the Coal City were just drawn, all entertainment was out of touch with this underground city, where life was dull and monotonous. Not at all.This group of residents, with the same interests, the same hobbies, and almost the same wealth, actually formed one big family.People are acquainted with each other, in contact with each other, and seldom feel the need to go outside for entertainment. Besides, walking in the coal mines and picnics on lakes and ponds every Sunday is an equally pleasant pastime. Bagpipes are often played on the shores of Lake Malcolm.The Scots arrived at the call of their national instruments.People danced and Jack Ryan in a Highlander costume was king of the festival that day. In short, it follows from all this that, according to Simon Ford, the Coal City has been able to compete with the Scottish capital, which suffers from severe cold in winter and intense heat in summer, and because of the bad weather No, the air is polluted with factory smoke, which justifies its nickname of "The World".

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