50 
HAROLD’S DISCUSSIONS. 
out some drawbacks, and coal is no exception. There 
are thousands of people engaged in mining coal. 
Many of them scarcely ever see the daylight, being 
obliged to work below the surface of the earth. In 
many places wages are so low that the wives and 
children of miners are in poverty, which means neg¬ 
lect in education, and too often in cleanliness. 
I once went to visit some coal-mines in central 
Illinois. The first mine I saw was one that w^as 
entered on a hillside, almost on a level. This coal- 
seam was rather near the surface of the 
earth, and the coal was of comparatively 
poor quality. The cars were run into the 
Fig. 28.—Fruits of the Carboniferous age. 
hillside on a track, and the miners loosened the coal 
with a pickax and shoveled it into the car. 
All the important mines in that region, however, 
are one hundred feet or more below the surface. 
First a hole is dug down to the coal, called the shaft, 
and its sides are “ boxed,” that is, boards are nailed in 
against the soil, so that it will not cave in. In this 
shaft the ‘‘cage” is lowered. The manager of the 
mine let us down in a cage lowered by means of a 
wire rope, much like an elevator in our city. 
