“All right, mother, I won’t forget. But tell me, why do they call coal black diamonds?”
“I haven’t time to talk about it now. Perhaps Mr. Carr will tell you. You have just ten minutes to get to school.”
On his way home Wallace stepped into the little office of the big coal yard.
“How are you, my boy; what can I do for you to-day?” asked Mr. Carr, who was a rather tall man with a bent back and one shoulder higher than the other.
“How do you do, Mr. Carr?” replied Wallace. “Mother wants you to send a ton of coal to-morrow—the same kind as the last you sent.”
Wallace waited until the coal man entered the order in the book and then asked, “Mr. Carr, will you tell me why they call coal black diamonds?”
Mr. Carr smiled pleasantly. “Certainly, son, certainly. You see, coal shines like diamonds, and then, it’s worth more.”
“Worth more? Why, I thought diamonds were worth more than anything else.”
“No, indeed! If there weren’t any coal in the ground, all the diamonds in the world wouldn’t heat a house, cook a meal, pull a railway train, or run a machine.”
“Well, I never thought of that,” said Wallace. “You certainly could not burn diamonds in a cook-stove.”
“No, indeed!” said Mr. Carr, who seemed much pleased at Wallace’s interest.
“Were you ever down in a coal mine, Mr. Carr?” asked Wallace.
“Was I ever down in a coal mine?” repeated Mr. Carr. “Yes, sir, I was a miner for years in the coal regions, and would have been in a mine yet, probably, if it hadn’t been for this,” pointing to his shoulder and bent back.
“Is it very dangerous work?” asked Wallace, with wide-open eyes.
“Well, if the roof doesn’t fall on you, and if the mine doesn’t catch fire, and if the gas doesn’t choke you, or explode and blow you up, it isn’t dangerous; it is perfectly safe.”
“But how did it get hurt—your shoulder, I mean?” asked Wallace.
“Oh, that! I’ll tell you. One day we were getting out coal at the far end of a tunnel. Suddenly, before we had time to run, the roof came tumbling down and buried us. When they pulled us out, my helper was dead, and my back was as you see it now.”
“What makes mining so dangerous?” asked Wallace, in surprise.
“Well, you see, it’s this way. When you step into the cage, that is the elevator, you leave the sunlight behind. The cage sinks down, down into pitch darkness, sometimes hundreds of feet. At the bottom of the shaft it is like an under-ground city. Street-like tunnels, with car tracks laid on them, run out in every direction. The coal cars are drawn by mules or by electricity.