Year: 1862

WE extract the following sketch from
/ j. Ross Brownies +" Poland Over-ground
and Underground, in Harper's Month
lIy for December. Mr.. Browne gives a
deeply interesting account of the Polish
Salt Mines, illustrated with admirable
pictures. This alone is worth the price
of the December Harper:


I was greatly impressed by the pro
found silence of these vast cayerns.
When we stood still, the utter absence of
sound was appalling. Not even the
faintest vibration in the air was percep-
tible. No desert could be more silent
no solitude more awful. I stood apart
from the guides and lamp-bearers in a
separate vault, at the distance of few
hundred feet, in order that I might fully
appreciate this profound inertion, and it
really seemed as if the world were no
more.


From some of these tunnels we emerg-
ed into open caverns, where few work
men we're employed at their dreary la
bors. I was surprised that there were
not more to be seen, but was informed
that they are scattered in small parties
through miles of earth, SO that the num-
Der is not apparent to the casual visitor.
As we approached the places where they
we're at work the dull clicking of the
picks and hammers produced a singular
effect through the vast solitudes; as if
the gnomes, supposed to inhabit pits,
we're busily Engaged at their diabOlical
arts.


We came suddenly upon one group Of
workmen under a shelving ledge, who
we're occupied in detaching masses of
crystalized salt from cleft in which
they worked. They were naked to the
middle, having nothing on but coarse
trousers and boots, and wrought with
their crOwbars and picks by the light of
few grease-lamps held by grimy little
boys with shaggy heads-members, no
no doubt, of the same subterranean fam
lily.


Some of the men were lying on their
backs punching away with tremendous
toll at the rugged masses of salt over
head, their heads, faces, and bodies gilt
tering with the showers of salt grit that
fell upon them; while others stood up to
their armpits in dark holes delving into
the the lower creviees. Seeing our
lights, they stopped to gaze at us. Was
/ it possible they we're human beings,
these beaded, shaggy, grimmy looking
monsters? Surely, if so, they well re-
presented the internal character of the
place. Never upon earth (the surface of
it, I meau) had seen such a monsrous
group; shocks of hair all powdered with
salt; glaring eyeballs overhung ywhite
lashes flashing in the ftful blaze of
lamps; braWny forms glitteling with
crystal powder, and marked by dark
currents of sweat? No wonder I stared
at them with something akin to distrust
They might be monsters in reality, and
take a sudden notion to hurl me into one
of their internal pits by way of pastime;
in which case the only consolation would
be, that, where there was such an abun-
dance of salt, there would be no Difficult
ty about the preservation of my remains.


After all there was something sad in
the condition Of these poor Wretches-
shut out from the glorious light Of day,
immured in deep dark pits hundreds of
feet underground roofing, as it were,
for life, in the bowels Of the earth. Sure
ly the salt with which other men flavor
their food is gathered with infinite toll
and mingled with bitter sweat


Yet, strange as it may seem, I was in
formed by the guide that these wOrkmen
are so accustomed to this kind of life
that they prefer it to any other. By the
rules of the directory they are divided
into gangs as on board ship. The
working gang is not permitted to remain
underground more than eight hours; itI
is then relieved. The current belief that
some of them live in the mines is not
sustained by the facts. In former times
it is quite probable such was the case.
At present the administration Of affairs
is more humane than it was at an early
period in the history Of the mines. The
operatives are free to quit whenever