Wausau pilot. [volume] (Wausau, Wis.) 1896-1940, 1907-02-05


us food to cease hammeri1, ant candles
to put out the fire for fear we should
succeed in betraying our Imprisonment
TO the coast guard. who passes probably
once or twice a day along he cliff. 1t
never occurred to me that we might at
tract attention by those means; but now
it is obvious, the question arises whether,
instead of going on with our tunnel,
which we cannot hope to complete with
out weeks and weeks of patient toll, it
would not be better TO devote all our
energies in this new direction. shouting,
hammering, sending up cloud of smoke,
and doing anything else that might excite
the curiosity of anybody passing near.
We might even make rod .ong enough
to thrdst through the hole up there by
splitting the slaves and binding them to-
gether, and tying my handkerchief to
the end we might agitate it from morn
ing till night in addition to the means
we already have The notion is tempt
ing; what are the arguments against it?
I'm not more afraid of old Peter than
he ls of me. But he might square the
coast guard, and he might find means
of rolling rubbish down to choke up the
hole above US, and he certainly would
stop the supply of food We know what
that means If we did not make our
selves heard in few days il would be
all up with any chance Of escape, so
that, on the whole, l doubt if any openly
offensive policy is wise"
Psyche, listening with the greatest at
tention, shook her head obviously, see
ing me do so.
Besides" / continued there is this
20 consider. If an investiga ion should
be made these two old reprobates would
cut and run, and we should never see
them again. At first sight that does not
look like a misfortune. But there's your
future welfare to consider, my poor
Psy che, and that depends very much upon
bringing the wretches to justice who have
blighted your youth. Revenge can do
US no good, but we must wiring out the
secret of your captivity we must find
out your family, and restore you to those
from whom you were taken, that you
may have friends to love and to take care
of you when we two part"
when we two part" she echoed
blankly. and yet in tone so full Of
mournful regret that 1 could almost be-
leve she understood the meaning of my
words. The sound alone was language
to her.
Then We'll make up our minds to
lake the slow and safe course, and go
pegging away at this hole steadily till we
burrow through to freedom. Gloves,
Psyche
That word being one that was quite
understand able she dashed off with de-
light and returned with the stockings on
her arms ready for anything l might
bid her DO. Dropping down into the pit
| lit q candle. and scraping the sand
away, examined the face OF the cliff.
Near the bottom l discovered an angu-
lar fracture With the crowbar we had
brought away from French Peters cave
| succeeded in wrenching out a large
block of chalk, when to my great delight
| found that there was nothing below but
sand and shingle. showing that we had
come to the bottom of the fallen cliff.
The disengaged block l pried into that
portion of the pit which had fallen in
through the action of the water as a be-
ginning to the wall with which we had to
surround the lower part, and then as
there was still water at the bottom |
fetched the bucket from the well, and
getting down again into the pit filled it
with the loose sand, and pashed it up
while Psyche hauled from the top where
she emptied 1t. Working down lower
and lower, the vertical line that marked
the bottom of the chalk became more
and NOR distinct as the sand dropped
away from its base. In couple of hours
| had reached a depth that seemed suffi-
cient to permit of opening the lateral bor-
ing, but as it was necessary to secure
the sides of the pit from falling in with
the next rising tide. we spent the rest
of the morning in snoring it round with
the barrel slaves, kept in place by Jumps
of chalk, which we rolled in from the
great cave in the empty tubs. This was
hard work, and We had to Jose no time
for fear the water should rise before the
job was done, but, happily, we got the
sides fairly well protected before the tide
rose, so that | don't think there was
above dozen bucketfuls OF sand to take
away when it fell again, and the best
part of this had washed in from under
the cliff in the direction our boring was
TO take, which was so much to our ad
vantage.
had looked at my watch when the
water disappeared from the bottom of the
pit, and again when it rose and found
that the interval between was a little
over four hours so that we could reckon
on having eight hours uninterrupted work
IL the boring out of the twenty-four,
which left us sixteen for clearing away
the sand thrown up from the pit. for any
= ~ A.
in this order we worked thenceforth.
never failing to take advantage of low
water, only that as the days went on
we found il necessary to change our
hours of rest, sometimes sleeping in the
day to take advantage of the ebb that
came In the night. But this was of lit
tie consequence to US. for as we burrow-
ed further under the cliff we worked con-
stantly by candle light and could make
night in the cave at any moment by sim
ply blowing out the light.
II must not be imagined that we had
no difficulties or hardships to contend
with. We had TO proceed like moles,
scraping the wet stuff away before US, and
pushing it back until tha bucket In our
rear was full, when il LsI to be dragged
out into the shaft and shot up to the
surface The mere labor of dragging the
stuff out and returning for more occu-
pied much time. and increased material
ly as we got further from The pit. At
one point we found our progress COM
pletely stopped by a rock embedded in
the sand, aud after attempting for three
days to work it out by means of the
crowbar, We were forced 10 turn aside
and burrow round il. The rising tide
was a continual source of trouble and
anxiety, for besides washing in the sides
of our tunnel. it sspped the snoring OF
the pit, which gave way twice, despite
our watchfulness. In addition to this,
We were in continual dread of being
blocked in by the fall OF the ragged
and unequal mass above US.
l shall never forget our horror one
night, on feeling a difficulty in breath
ing and observing our candle burn low.
On backing along the tunnel l discov-
cred that the thing l dreaded lad come
to pass: mass of sand and shingie had