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"But where are we?" demanded the Commandant; for close at hand sounded the boom of heavy waves. "In Piper's Hole." The Commandant stared aloft. Slowly the explanation dawned on him. The adit, piercing its way from the cliff top, broke through the wall of the cave, high up, close to the roof.
The following is an extract from one of Hamilton's letters on the Antrim coast: "About the year 1770 the miners, in pushing forward an adit toward the bed of coal, at an unexplored part of the Ballycastle cliff, unexpectedly broke through the rock into a narrow passage, so much contracted and choked up with various drippings and deposits on its sides and bottom, as rendered it impossible for any of the workmen to force through, that they might examine it farther.
On the morning of that day he had gone up alone to the shallow tunnel which he was driving into the hillside near the top of the ridge, intending to blast down a wide shelf of rock in the face of the adit in order to "square up" his work and leave everything in ship-shape for the next season's new operations.
A gray sky hung over the black tops of the firs and the wet snow threw up a curious livid light. It was an unpleasant raw morning, and Foster felt half daunted. The adit was dark; he was embarking on a rash adventure, and wondered with some misgivings what would happen before he came out again.
After witnessing this process, we visited the mine itself, which outcropped near the apex of the hill, about a thousand feet above the furnaces. It was then, and is now, a most valuable mine. The adit of the mine was at the apex of the hill, which drooped off to the north.
"If anybody runs out, don't let him pass." Pete's nod showed he understood and Foster, moving forward quietly, stopped again for a moment at the mouth of the adit. Pete had vanished, but could be trusted to watch the mine as a terrier watches a rat-hole, and Foster knew that if he were attacked and overcome his assailant would not escape.
To hire labor was in the meanwhile out of the question, and the progress two men could make cutting through hard rock with only the pick and drill was, as they were quite aware, likely to be remarkably small. Saunders made a little dejected gesture. "Then," he said, "they're still in the lean-to behind the shack; and it would be kind of wiser to crawl back into the adit.
"There's an old adit hereabouts eh? that leads down to a cave.... Come, come, my good man, you don't deceive me by putting on that stupid face! We don't allow smuggling on the Islands in these days, and I like to know the secrets of my own property. The cave is called Ogo Vean, or something like it; and if I must explain more precisely, it is where you and your father used to go hunting seals."
You might go much farther and still be blameless. I have no valid excuse to offer, but if I should say that there are extenuating circumstances " He raised a thin hand in protest. "Let us leave it at the point at which there will be the least ill-feeling," he cut in; and from that he switched without preface to a discussion of the varying ore values in a newly opened adit of the mine.
The Terreros family kept their title good to the Real del Monte by retaining a few workmen about the premises; but it was substantially abandoned for twenty-five years before the English Real del Monte Company took possession. In the space of two years this company had cleared out and rebuilt the adit by working gangs of hands night and day.
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