338 



The National Geographic Magazine 



fact that Cornish, Welsh, and English 

 miners long controlled the working out 

 of our mining methods, and that Ger- 

 man and English metallurgists guided 

 our first steps in utilizing our more 

 complex silver, lead, and copper ores. 



One of the most brilliant reports on 

 the state of the art ever written, that of 

 the late Abram S. Hewitt on the Paris 

 Exposition of 1867, is a confession of 

 superiority of European methods in iron 

 manufacture, which is almost staggering 

 to one who reads it in the light of the 

 present day. I cannot help feeling that 

 the recognition of our indebtedness to 

 European practice in the earlier days 

 should be insisted upon, since it is be- 

 coming altogether too common to assume 

 that we are the chosen people so far as 

 the mechanic arts are concerned. That 

 feeling is so often encountered that the 

 fear of the danger of overconfidence is 

 naturally aroused. 



A striking fact is the growing interde- 

 pendence of the various branches of the 

 mechanic arts as contrasted with the 

 conditions prevailing 25 years ago. The 

 one relies upon the other, not alone for 

 its products, but is aided, too, by sug- 

 gestions and support. The metallur- 

 gist's progress is accelerated by the 

 mechanical engineer, and the latter 

 looks to the former for increasingly 

 strong and reliable materials. The elec- 

 trician has greatly widened the capacity 

 for improving methods on the part of the 

 copper producer, and in turn is under a 

 debt to the copper miner, and the 

 achievements of the rail-maker are re- 

 turned in kind by the railroad builder, 

 who has taught both much of value in 

 transporting; materials. Thus all are 

 shoulder to shoulder in the march of 

 progress, mutuall}' helpful and united — 

 all powerful. 



To a constantly increasing degree 

 pure science, primarily in search of the 

 truth for its own sake, sheds its search- 

 light along the path, and has become a 

 closer and more valued ally year by 



year. The majority of active workers 

 looked askance at this meddler, pre- 

 ferring to allow their own fancy full 

 sway whenever they stopped to seek for 

 causes or explanations. Practical men 

 may sometimes become impatient when 

 the laborious and apparently hypercrit- 

 ical methods of the scientist do not more 

 promptly clear an obscure point or fur- 

 nish him with a suggestion for success- 

 ful new lines of work, but the day has 

 long passed when research was treated 

 with grudging respect, if not with open 

 hostility. No one is now readier to 

 acknowledge his indebtedness to the 

 chemist or the physicist than the man- 

 ager or the practicing engineer. The 

 fear is disappearing of impracticable 

 science on the one hand and of unscien- 

 tific practice on the other. 



The mining industry has suffered and, 

 unfortunately, will suffer, particularly 

 in its relation to labor, from one appar- 

 ently trifling circumstance, and that is 

 the impression which a visit to under- 

 ground operations makes upon the aver- 

 age layman. To be dropped suddenly 

 into the dark depths with only a flick- 

 ering candle to guide the uncertain 

 steps, appalled by the dead silence or 

 alarmed by strange noises, the rumble 

 of the distant car, the reverberation of 

 a shot far away, the rushing of unseen 

 streams of water — the visitor is im- 

 pressed with a sense of insecurity and 

 danger. The bright sunlight has never 

 seemed sweeter to him than upon his 

 return to the surface, and if he happens 

 to have access to the columns of the 

 press he describes in lurid language the 

 awful experience which incidentally 

 convinces him that he is braver than he 

 gave himself credit for in his innermost 

 heart. Mining in the popular mind be- 

 comes one of the most hazardous of call- 

 ings when, as a matter of fact, there are 

 man}' others above ground which in- 

 volve greater risks. With some excep- 

 tions, of course, the conditions which 

 surround the work of the miner are 



