Washington standard. [volume] (Olympia, Wash. Territory) 1860-1921, 1883-06-08
TMPS OF DARKNESS
Animals that Live for Years Underground
and grow Fat; Effects of Confinement on
stubborn Quadrupeds,s

cltic Coast so extended that mules
are used to transport the ore from
the recesses to the bottom Of the
shaft. but only of late years has
mining been carried on to great
depths under vast area of ground
Our mines even now are mere pros
poets when compared with the great
coal mines of Pennsylvania, where
the work has become so extended
that mules have been underground
in one mine for fifteen years. The
history of some Of these imps of dark
ness Is remarkable
Every mule that is taken into a
colliery is kicked and bitten by his
long cared stable-mates until he be-
comes vicious enough to retaliate.
Then, after sharpening his teeth on
his iron-bound manger and kicking
at space until he has acquired perfect
control over his heels, he becomes
thoughtful, and centers his mind on
the necessity of manning men in gen.
cral and driver-boys and visitors in
particular. In every drove of colliery
mules there is one or more that is
hated on account of his thorough
depravity
Big joe" a fifteen-year-old bay
mule in the Koh-i-Noor Colliery, has
kicking record that is known from
one end of Schuykill county to the
other, and scores of miners bear his
heel-marks on their bodies. The
miners in Packer Colliery venerate
mule called Mack" His age is un.
known, but it's believed to be some.
thing like twenty years. He has
worked in this mine ten years with.
out seeing daylight, and, strange to
say, he is not known to hayr Kicked
any one. The miners carr c.lobage-
leaves, apples, green coru I'd other
delicacies down to this mulish veteran,
who is fat, happy and playful. There
are three mules in Dunbar Colliery,
near Shamokin, that have not been
above ground for thirteen years. In
Wadesville Shaft there is q mule
which, for five or six years, never
approached the foot of the shaft with
car without looking at the little
hole of light 600 feet above him.
This beast is called "Peepin' Tom"
No matter how long he remains stand
ing at the foot" he viii not take his
eyes Off the mouth of the shaft. He
reaches the foot" as often as thirty
times day, and yet he never neglects
to look up. A year or two ago mule
broke his traces in the Pottsyille shaft
and crowded himself into the cage.
When found he was looking up, as
if expecting the cage to be hoisted.
When driven out of the cage he
watched it intently as it ascended.
John p. Nicholson, an old and we'll
known miner, who was at the foot of
the shaft, declares that after the cage
had gone up four or five hundred
feet the mule deliberately plunged
into the "sumph" and drowned him
self. Turkey Run Colliery has a
phantom mule, which many miners
believe in implicitly. Dozens declare
they have seen the spectre and de-
scribe it as double the size of an
ordinary mule. The vision haunts
the old breasts, and no one is said to
have seen it in the main gangway,
where fieshy, mules work. When q
miner declares that he has seen the
spectral beast, superstitious people
working about him believe that a
catastrophe is at hand Three men,
two of whom, John Devine and David
Thomas Williams, now living in this
place, VOW that they saw the appari-
tion an hour before the big explosion
in August, 1881, when four menlwere
killed and several others We're injured.
An ordinary mule cannot be induced
to enter parts Of the mine where
damp exists in dangerous quantities
There are instances on record, how
ever, where mules have been over
powered with damp. When the mules
and rats in a mine start for the foot
of the shaft or mouth of the drift the
miners rarely fail to follow, as it is
considered sure indication of
danger.
The confinement of mules in coal
mines has no evil effect on their con-
stitutions. They are always well fed
and cared for, and the coal dust gives
their coats gloss rarely seen on the
hair of mules living in the open air,
While mine is worked the mules
never come out. Some months ago,
water in the lower workings of the
largest colliery at st. Clair caused a
suspension of work and all the mules
were brought up. More than dozen
of the animals had been'in the colliery
eleven years. When turned out to
pasture near the village they dii not
pay the slightest attenti,n % the
scant herbage about them, bu, devoted
their whole time to gazing at the sky,
the mountains and the horizon. They
were evidently lost in open-eyed as;
tonishment, and failed to realize
where they were. They stood for
hours in silent contemplation of the
scenery, and appeared SO stupefed
that not one of the lot offered to make
war ON his mates. The strangeness
of the scene had driven all the com.
bativeness out of them for a time.
On the first day they did not even
make circuit of the ten-acre field
they were in, and the food offered to
them was refused. That night, how.
ever, they devoured the food, and at
daylight again huddled, and remained
SO until nightfall. Their astonish-
ment did not wear off until week
went by, and hundreds of people
visited the place to see them. Just
as they were becoming accustomed to
the place and were beginning to in
dulge in kicking matches, they were
lowered into the colliery again, and
renewed work in the dark.
A Chicago exchange praises the
skill of a contractor who raised a
large dry goods establishment six
feet without injuring the building or
causing an hours cessation in bust
ness, and an esteemed contemporary
in another city sneeringly says that
it Is only in Chicago that the profess
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