Scenes And Incidents From The Life Of A Practical Miner
With A Treatise On The Ventilation Of Coal Mines

60 understood by you miners. You know well from what source your misfor- tunes spring, and to counteract the danger is the inspection yon require. What will those great and good men, the governors of our country think, when they reflect upon such conduct as is even here, in the face of the accident, pursued by the man they have appointed to inspect and superin- tend the whole, for the protection of the miners and the country’s general good. Yet amidst all this confusion and official defect, what a pleasing consolation it must be, to my worthy friend, and all the others officially engaged at Walker Colliery, to meet with and accept the grand eulogium passed on them, by those truly eminent men who assisted in the exami- nation, and who expressed their admiration of the scientific arrangements and ventilation of the mine. This, too, must be a solace to the bereaved, to a certain extent, and a satisfaction to the workmen in general. What a difference is here to be seen, between this stealthy and deceptive, perhaps purely accidental disaster, and the nature and circumstances of the explosion, at Burradon, that monster sacrifice to negligence. The man I alluded to, who almost wilfully set fire to a volume of hydrogen gas, was a person introduced into the- coal trade at the strike of 1844. Having being previously a country servant, he came into the pits to hew coals during that disagreeable and costly dispute between the masters and the men; after the strike was over and everything was reduced to a calm business-like order, he was made a deputy, and on this occasion, he was in the fore-shift in the broken or pillar working district, there being also some whole places, where they had wrought with candles a few weeks previous to the day in question. At this time, however, the ventilation was precarious, and it was not without danger to allow candles or firing off shots in the district at all. It appeared this man had continued his habit of inspecting the whole of the working places situated to the east and south of the goaf, now only three walls. On this particular morning, just as the night shifters had finished their work, and the hewei'S had arrived at the crane, he according to his wont passed through the double and sepai’ating doors, with his lamp ready trimmed and lighted hanging on his fore finger, and with the candle also in his hand, he proceeded on his inspection. He met some shifters, and others putting on their clothes, who emphatically told him that the east head- ways and northernmost places had been foul all night, and that they were sure that the foulness came from the goaf. Regardless of this important information, he with self-sufficient incredulity went on as if saying to himself, “ What! would nature presume to practice her freaks upon me, a deputy ( When he got up to the stenting, and entering to pass into the east headways, he lighted, up the collected volume of hydrogen gas. What earthly power could then stay its ravages, or mitigate the destruc- tive flame expanding blast. The men who were the moment before in quiet conversation on the labours of the past night, were now lying maimed, mutilated, and deeply scorched by the intense flame. The hewers at the crane were all injured, some seriously so; and the deputy himself was terribly burnt, but he recovered. Now, if in this case all had suffered death, you see no one would have been able to tell the taJe of how or by what means the explosion bad occurred. The cause would