Australian Tales - Setis

the roof of a coach. I was glad to see even that small bit, but was not
allowed to look at it very long. Following my leaders round a mass of hot
brickwork, I beheld an enormous fiery furnace, many times larger than
the stoke hole under Messrs. Tooth's big brewery copper, and the air
rushed towards it with the force of a brisk gale. While I stood silently
sympathising with the half-roasted man, who was stirring the fire with a
long poker, I decided, that if I were forced to select one of two trying
services, I should prefer his red hot post, to that of the lookout man, of
the middle watch, rounding Cape Horn, with a double reef breeze
blowing icicles from the South Pole.
I rested but a short time in the melting vicinity of the furnace, for my
friend the manager is perpetual motion personified. Off he started again
through Fungus Alley, and anon, after a ramble of several miles in sum
total, we returned to the foot of the main shaft; a sort of “Charing Cross,”
or grand junction, for all the tramways which branch off in every
direction. Here my friends paused to draw breath, which they had
scarcely given me time to draw before; and as I fancied they were
beginning to consider which way they should go next, I plaintively
assured them, “that I was more than satisfied with what I had already
experienced, and would willingly take their joint testimony for all the
rest. I had seen sufficient coal for the present generation, gluttons though
they be, and my mind was at rest on the subject. At any rate, I positively
could not walk any further, if it were to save the next generation from
being driven to charcoal, or faggots. Finally I remarked, “that if my
friends were fully bent upon showing me through any more long
passages, they must carry me a pig-a-back.”
The latter proposition seemed to have more weight than all the others;
and being evidently indisposed to take such a troublesome burden on
their shoulders, they smilingly accompanied me to the cage. The
telegraphic hammer then struck two, and in another minute I was hoisted
up into the sunshine, very weary, but somewhat wiser than I was when I
descended the shaft, four hours before.