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"Fro' Lancashire," he repeated in a voice as wearied as his action "fro' th' Deepton coalmines theer. You'll know th' name on 'em, I ha' no doubt. Th' same company owns 'em as owns these." "What!" said an outsider "Langley an 'em?" The boy turned himself round and nodded. "Ay," he answered "them. That was why I comn here. I comn to get work fro' fro' him."
Now it might have been expected that, instead of the floor rising up, the ceiling would sink down, and this effect, called a "thrust," does, in fact, take place where the pavement is more solid than the roof. But it usually happens, in coalmines, that the roof is composed of hard shale, or occasionally of sandstone, more unyielding than the foundation, which often consists of clay.
Iron horses, which feed on coal and drink only water, go screaming over the country at a gigantic pace, dragging with them the whole produce of coalmines and ironworks. Marine monsters, related to these, plough the ocean, and scatter our natural riches over the world, receiving in exchange the produce of other climes.
The inconvenience caused the public by strikes has often been very great, especially where the coalmines or railways have been affected. Only a few years ago a veritable tragedy was barely averted, when President Roosevelt succeeded, after the most strenuous efforts, in ending the general coal strike in the winter season.
It owned a line of iron steamships that carried the ore to the Pittsburgh railroad connections. It owned the railroads that brought the ore from the mines to the docks, and it owned the docks. It owned vast coalmines in Pennsylvania, and it owned a controlling interest in the Connellville coke-ovens, whence five miles of freight-cars, in fair times, were daily sent to the mills, loaded with coke.
When H. H. Rogers coupled the coalmines of West Virginia with tidewater, he proved himself a Businessman. When James J. Hill created an Empire in the Northwest, he proved his right to the title. The Businessman is a salesman.
It never had any vitality of its own, no manufactures or products, unless the wretched coalmines adjacent, with their dirty output, which is scoffed at by the grimiest tug afloat, could be dignified by the name.
Then there is Herr August Thyssen "King Thyssen" who owns coalmines, rolling mills, harbours, and docks throughout Germany, iron-ore mines in France, warehouses in Russia, and entrepôts in nearly every country from Brazil and Argentina to India. He has declared that German interests in Asia Minor must be safeguarded at all costs.
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