nd by boring, with an iron rod,
one piece screwed on above another, with a place in the end to bring up
the different sorts of earth it passes through. This shaft was more
than a thousand feet deep; some are still deeper. Most people have
heard of Saint Paul's, the highest church in England; just place three
such buildings one on the top of the other, and we have the depth down
which young Dick had to go every day to his work. In the bottom of this
shaft, main passages and cross passages ran off for miles and miles to
the chambers or places where men were digging out the coal.

The door near which Dick sat was called a trap, and Dick was called a
"trapper." His business was to open the trap when the little wagons
loaded with coal came by; pushed, or put, by boys who are therefore
called "putters." They bring the coal from the place where the hewers
are at work to the main line, where it is hoisted up on the rolleys, or
wagons, to be carried to the foot of the shaft. Dick was eleven years
old, but he was small of his age, and he did not know much. How should
he? He had passed twelve hours of every six days in the week, for three
years of his short life, under ground, in total darkness. He had two
candles, but one lasted him only while he passed from the shaft to his
trap, and the other to go back again. He had begun to trap at seven
years old, and went on for two years, and then the good Lord Shaftesbury
got a law made that no little boys under ten years of age should work in
mines; and so he got a year above ground. During that time he went to a
school, but he did not learn much, as it was a very poor one.

When he was ten years old, he had to go into the mine again; he had now
been there every day for a year. He had heard talk of ghosts and
spirits; and some of the bigger boys had told him that there was a great
black creature, big enough to fill up all the passage, and that he had
carried off a good many of the little chaps, once upon a time, no one
knew where, only they had never come back again. Poor little Dick
thought that he too might be carried away some day.

Often while he sat there, all alone in the dark, he trembled from head
to foot, as he heard strange sounds, cries and groans it seemed. Was it
the spirits of the boys carried off, or was it the monster coming to
take him away? He dared not run away, he dared not even move. He had
been there nine hours, with a short time for meals, when his