"No, but it would be very ugly if those two were to quarrel and fight."

CHAPTER TWENTY TWO.

A MENTAL KINK.

The time went on, with the carpenters and engineers hard at work. As
fast as the water was lowered enough, fresh platforms were placed across
the shaft. After a little consideration and conference with Hardock, it
was decided not to let the men go up and down the mine by means of
ladders on account of the labour and loss of time, but to erect one of
the peculiar beams used in some mines, the platforms being at equal
distances favouring the arrangement.

The boys were present at the consultation, and when it was over they
went off for a stroll, Grip following in a great state of excitement,
and proceeding to stalk the gulls whenever he saw any searching for
spoil on the grassy down at the top of the cliffs.

But the dog had no success. The gulls always saw him coming, and let
him creep pretty near before giving a few hops with outstretched wings,
and then sailing away just above his head, leaving him snapping angrily
and making his futile bounds.

After a time the boys threw themselves on the grass at the top of one of
the highest cliffs, from whence they could look down through the
transparent sea at the purply depths, or at the pale-green shallows,
where the sand had drifted, or again, at where all the seaweed was of a
rich golden brown.

It was a lovely day, and in the offing the tints on the sea were
glorious, but the boys had no eyes for anything then. So to speak, they
were looking back at the meeting which had just taken place at Colonel
Pendarve's.

"Father looked very serious about these lift things," said Gwyn, at
last.

"Enough to make him; it's nothing but pay, pay, pay. I want to see them
get to work and make money. It will be skilly and bread for us if the
mine fails."

"'Tisn't going to fail. Don't be a coward. See what a grand thing this
new apparatus will be."

"Will it?" said Joe. "I don't understand it a bit."

"Why, it's easy enough."

"I can understand about a bucket or a cage, let up and down by a rope
running over a wheel, but this seems to me to be stupid."

"Nonsense! It's you who are stupid. Can't you see that a great beam is
to go from the top to the bottom of the mine?"

"That's nonsense. Where are they going to get one long enough?"

"Can't they join a lot together till it is long enough, old Wisdom
teeth? Of course, it will have to be made in