The Iola register. [volume] (Iola, Allen County, Kansas) 1875-1902, 1881-11-11
Cornish Working Wemes.


Picking our way through the purplish
mud and stones below the Karn, we
discovered a little old woman laboring
over pile of unmilled copper ore. We
had to look twice before we could as
sure ourselves of her sex; not only was
her dress perplexing, but there was an
unreality and weirdness in her person.
She was very small. almost dwarfish,
with bent shoulders and wfinkled hands
and face, her skin had the texture of
parchment, and was curiously. mottled
with blue; her hair was thin and wiry.
She seemed very old, but her eyes had
shrewd and penetrating quickness,
and her movements were utterly with
out decrepitude. Indeed, she applied
herself to her work with the willing
vigor of q strong young man, and the
work consisted of shoveling the heavy
blocks of ore into q small wagon rest
ing on temporary tramway. Shovel
full after shOvelful was thrown in with
an easy muscular swing, and with much
more activity than the average ''navvy"
ever exhibits. Her petticoats ended
above the ankle, and were stained with
the hue of the copper ore; her shapeless
legs were muffied up in wooden wraps,
and her feet incased in substantial bro
gans. She was not apparently uncom-
Portable bodily, but her face had in it a
look of accomplishing suffering. of un-
alterable gravity, of habituated sor-
row which had extinguished all posi-
bility of a smile. Not understanding a
question which we put to her, she used
the words. ''Please. sir?"-a form of
interrogation which we often heard in
the neighborhood of Redruth. "You
seem to be old for such hard work."
we repeated. "'Deed. sir. don't know
how old 1 am. but I've been at it this
forty years. I'm not young any longer,
that's sure" she answered, in a clear
voice with scarcely any accent. ''Are
you married?' "No, sir; nobody would
ever have me-" she continued, without
relaxing from her gravity or delaying
her work for mOment-''nObody
would have me or 60 with me, as I
was always subject to tits-terrible they
are. I still have 'em once or twice q
week sometimes, always with a change
in the MOON" ''How do you account
for it?'' ''Why, before my twenty
fourth year 1 was in the service of q
lady who threw me down stairs, and
that changed my blood; so, when the
moon changes l have the fits. Little
can be done for them when the blood's
changed" This superstition was q
matter of profound faith with her, but
otherwise her manner was remarkably
intelligent. She told US that her wages
were fourteen pence-twenty-eight cents
"a day; and when we unnecessarily
said that she must be tired of work at
such a price. she answered, in a bitter
tone, ''No use being tired; when you
are tired. there's the work-house for
you.''
She had nearly filled the wagon by
this time, and two younger women,
dressed as she was, but more vigorous
looking, came to help her, and after
splitting on their hands, which were as
large and as. hard as any mans, they
applied themselves with shovels to the
heap of ore, falling into a machine like
swing of the body as they scooped up
the heavy rock. Two men afterward
joined them, and when the wagon was
loaded they propelled it along the track
toward the mill, the women sharing the
work equally with the men, if, indeed,
they did not use even greater exertions.
The employment of women under
ground is now forbidden by law, the
degradation resulting from it having
been perceived by English Legislators
only when it had become flagitious; but
of thirteen thousand persons engaged
in the mines about two thousand are
women, who are employed in various
parts of the process of dressing the ore.
In the simpler operations very young
girls are useful, and at the mill we
found large number of them-the
daughters of miners usually-some of
them pretty, and all of them neatly
clothed and intelligent, even pert in
manner. They can all write, and they
have an appetite for literature of the
Adolphus-Adelina sort, which they de-
YOUR in penny instalments when their
work is slack.-W II. Ridesng, in Har-
s,eT's MnOGziue,