272 THE MANNERS AND CUSTOMS 



" Thefe are odd afTertions, but they are certainly 

 facts, thotigh we cannot, and do not pretend to 

 account for them. — We have now very good ore at 

 Llwy?i Llwyd^ where the knockers were heard to 

 work, but have now yielded up the place, and are 

 no more heard. — Let v/ho will laiigh, we have the 

 greateft reafon to rejoice, and thank the knockers, or 

 rather God, who fends us thefe notices." 



The fecond letter is as follows : 



" I have no time to anfwer your objedlion againft 

 knockers ; I have a large treatife collecled on that 

 head, and what Mr. Derham fays is nothing to the 

 purpofe. If founds of voices, whifpers, blafts, work- 

 ing, oi' pumping, can be carried oii a mile under- 

 ground, they diould always be heard in the fame 

 place, and under the fame advantages, and not once 

 ill a month, a year, or tv/o years. Jufl before the 

 difcovery of ore laft week, three m.en together, in 

 our work of Llwyn Lkuyd^ were ear-witnefles of 

 -knockers pumping, driving a wheel-barrow, &c. ; but 

 there is no pump in the v/ork, nor any mine within 

 lefs than a mile of it, in which there are pumps con- 

 ftantly going. If they were thefe pumps that they 

 heard, why wfere they never heard but that once in 

 the fpace of a year ? And why are they not now 

 heard ? But the pumps make fo little noife, that 

 they cannot be heard in the other end of Efga'ir y 

 Mwyn mine when they are at y/ork. 



" We have a dumb and deaf taylor in this neigh- 

 bourhood, who has a particular language of his own,. 



by 



