The Denison review. [volume] (Denison, Iowa) 1867-current, 1901-02-22

a, y
! had to send for drills, Now quarter
of the time was lost by the use of dyna
mite. 1t was difficult to keep up the
ventilation
"It's an i'll wind that brings no
luck, > said Bill. We've something to
set the timbers on now
HWe never reckoned on rock work, :"
answered Kelley, land it soaks the
time and the dollars up y
i There was quarter of the tunnel at
the west end done before the concrete
came in sight At the east end they
struck it at it's highest, six feet above
the level. and there the work was slow
Now the brothers were somber. They
stood half the day at one end of the
work or the other, but, though they
walked together, they rarely spoke
1 THE Mormon boys look glum, said
J the foreman to himself And he felt
it too.
''If we come ont as we went in,
! we're lucky. said Kelley.
But Bill hoped yet.
1.-The timbering holds SO far!'' he
cried
Yet that night at l O'Clock, when the
world was quiet save for the song of
the mountain river, he left his tent
and his sleeping brother and went out
| to the tunnel.
Tomorrow we should see daylight
through it. he said.
The moon was full AT distance the
lower valley was haze. but in the loft
Ter attitudes the peaks pierced the sky
with silver spears The heavens were
deep and splendid. Here and there a
brilliant star or softer planet showed
like the lighted summit of some more
tremendous mountain. The air was
calm. No wind moved in the forest
The pulse of the river was the one
sound in sleeping world.
Fifty yards from the brothers tent
was the cut in the hill that led to the
mud tunnels black mouth Every OBJ
stacle in the path, bar or pick or shovel
or overturned barrow, was as visible
as in daylight. But suddenly the south.
ern shoulder of the hill lifted itself
against the round moon and for min
ute Bill Holdredge walked blinded. He
went down a plank laid on the fine clay
!. that was now puddle and came to the
heavy timber of the tunnels entrance
He walked in, and again night fel
upon him, thick night, Egyptian an(
, Cimmerian darkness. He turned round
and outside the air was like the thin
, ghost of day. Sitting down upon bar
row, he rested his head upon his hand
And as he sat the hill talked to him il
faint whispers, at first hardly audible
but presently he heard very plainl,
and lifted his head to listen
The hill spoke in language intelli
! gible to an engineer, who, standing
: there, might have interpreted what i
said as the pathologist interprets oh
scure phenomena to the bedside physi
a clan.
t Have you cubed my contents?'
b asked the hin. Have you weighed IN
/, in your scales and balances? For l al
: not rock, bus gravel Listen"
t And the Atlantean timbers groane
b family till the young mans skin bris
tied and his hair moved. This mario,
b world seemed alive.
: As he sat there with open ears, whic
e gradually grew acute in the stiffness {
e midnight, he heard a thousand voice
n inaudible in the busy day Every bal
a laid fiat for the great uprights had il
d word every upright whispered, the roc
a timbers complained. there was SCUM
:, that was no sound or like no know
d sound in the world. If it was lik
aught. it resembled most a breath {
is wind in tuft of grass in a tree.
was like the sound of fine wheat grow
e ing in calm after rain A mouse's CT
II would have seemed shrek. AS til
e man who listened held his breath b
heard his heart beat like pulsomete
It working. But he understood what til
d minute chol as of the night meant Th
e wood in the tunnel was beginning
a take the strain
n Beginning, he said, beginning
And when he slept again ne dreame
e that he and his brother were back i
a Utah without red cent He spoke
: Kelley as they breakfasted, just whe
g the men were turning to-