The Louisiana Democrat. [volume] (Alexandria, La.) 1845-1918, 1889-07-03
THE MINERS coRNET.
How Its Notes Preached Sermon Amid
Wretched Scene.

The MINERS CORNET.
| How Its Notes Preached a Sermon Amid q
Wretched Scene.
San incident that touched me
deeper than any thing ever did before
or since occurred on a visit | paid to
the coal regions some years ago." said
a gentleman of this city. ''There had
been a serious cavern at the Bellevue
mine, along the Lackawanna river, on
the outskirts OF Scranton. | went to
the spot day or so after the cave had
occurred. 1t was dreary day, late in
November--a dark, rainy, dismal day.
The great coal breaker at the mine
was in operation, as work had not
been entirely suspended. The rattle
and crash and whirr of the ponderous
machinery was deafening. From
windows and doors, and every
crack and Granny, black clouds of
coal dust poured out into the open air,
and were beaten by the rain into inky
ooze that fell in besmirching drops on
every thing about and below. A mar
row road, cut into gullies by the rain,
and lying ankle deep in the sooty mud,
led past the breaker, and from it up a
steep hill to the clusters of dilapidated
huts where the miners and their fam
lilies lived, called by courtesy the vii
! lage.'
Through the village, without any ap-
parent reason for their being, unless it
might be that they were parade grounds
for the geese and goats that disputed
the way with me, ran narrow streets,
with here and there great seams and
crevices crossing or running parallel
to them, results of the sinking of the
mine roofs beneath. Here and there a
hut also had sunk half way to its roof
into the unstable earth.
"On the summit of the hill, which
overlooked miles of dreary, desolate
landscape, stood little church, which
had itself settled foot or more with
the sudden caving. The scores of
simple grave-stones in the church.
yard, standing askew, some of them
protruding out few inches above the
surface, told their sad tale of mine
fatality. The bottoms of many of the
graves had fallen in with the tumbling
mine roof, and the crumbling remains
the graves contained had dropped into
the depths-the remains, perhaps, of
miners who had previously been car
ried dead or mangled beyond recovery
from the very mine to which their
bones had been so ruthlessly returned.
Looking down from the summit of
the hill upon that struggling collection
OF most wretched habitations; upon the
grooming breaker, with the inky
drainage dripping from it's grimy
caves; the swollen, yellow river, be-
meath the very bed of which many of
the occupants of the miserable novels
were even then delving for subsistence,
down deep in the mines, it seemed to
me that nowhere on Gods footstool
could there be scene more desolate,
more utterly bereft of all that could
give to any living soul one single ray
of hope or thought of contentment.
But even as Igazed around, think
ing how little the outside world kne
of the actual Indebtedness that
hedged about these patient toll
ers, the sound of a cor
net broke upon my ear.
Clear and plaintively sweet its
not-s swelled out upon the air.
They issued from one of the most
dilapidated of the dwellings,; one that
stood on the very edge of one of the
threatening seams that marked the
course of the dismantled mine roof.
And what was the air, think you, that
aoated up from the unknown musicians
instrument amid these dismal sur
roundings?
ut was Home, Sweet Home God
help him! OF all things in the world,
Home, Sweet Homen Never was
pathos so personifed. Tears welled to
my eyes, and | was proud of them.
I emptied all the coin I had
into the hand of a pale, gaunt
little boy, who had been eys:ng
me curiously rs I stood OH
the hill, and babe him carry them 10
the house and give them to whoever
might live there. The lads thin hand
closed convulsively on the money. and,
with frightened look, he ran away
toward the house.
Il did not stay to learn more of the
inmates of that hut. That they could
have heart to dwell there aud think of
it as home, sweet home, was enough
for me. | fastened from the desolate
spot to the rich and happy city just
beyond, in the shadow of whose
heaven-pointing spires a sermon had
been preached to me such as none of
their well-paid pastors, with all their
eloquence, could have preached. IN.
Y. Mail and Express.
The Great San Diego FIume,