Cornwall, Its Mines and Miners

J. R. Leifchild

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2013
• Topic: Business
• eBook ISBN:
  9781136238772
• Subtopic: Business General
• Index: Business

Published in the year 1968, Cornwall, Its Mines and Miners is a valuable contribution to the field of Economics.

THE QUEEN’S VISIT TO A MINE.

The following is a miner’s account of the Queen’s visit to Polberro Mine, Cornwall, September, 1846:—

“I received a letter one evening from Mr. Edmonds, to say as how that Prence Albert was coming to our main the next morning. Thinks I, what can the Prence be a coming to our main for? and I cudn’t slape for the night for thinking what I shud say to the Prence, and what the Prence could say to me. Well in the morning, sure ’nuf, we saw the chay coming, and who should be in it but the Queen, so well as the Prence! There was a stone wall between, and the men went to it to’t, and was down in a minute—in less than no time, and they come on, and the Queen got out of the chay, and ran about in the wet grass like a Billy! Says she to Mr. Taylor—something, but I don’t know what—but says he to me, ‘Is it safe for the Queen to go into the main?’ ‘Safe,’ says I; ‘yes, safe as the rock of Gibralter!’ So the drams were broft footh, and some straw a throw’d into one, and some green baize after it, and the Queen skipt in like a lamb, and I do believe that I touched her! She didn’t like it tho’ when ’twas wet: but when we come on so far as we cud to the west looad, the Prence took the pick, and he thravd to like—like a man! and he got a bit a ore. This, said he, is from the west looad, so I puts en into my left pocket; and then we went to the east looad, so I puts en into my right pocket; and as they were coming out, says the Queen to Mr. Taylor, says she, ‘What’s that there blue that I do see?’ ‘Bliss ye, ma’am,’ says he, ‘that’s the light o’ day.’ One hundred and twenty miners were ready to cheer ‘em as they drove off (all red like Injians, from the red ore of the main); and we did cheer to be sure, as never was before.”

A MINE ON THE MOORS.—MUSICAL MINERS AND MINORS.

A very good way of enjoying a visit to a Cornish mine, in some mining districts, is—not to start out expressly for it, and to walk straight to it I No, just set out for a long walk on the moors, with provisions for the day, and a shilling or two in your pocket, and you will be in a right state of body and mind for whatever you may discover.

Just try to cross this wild moor here. What a savage-looking scene it is! Here now we have walked at least three miles, and have met nothing but tall blocks and “tors”* of granite. People hereabouts are accustomed to these scenes, and that poor half-starved fellow who is cutting furze or turf yonder, is as much at home by one of these tors as you would be at your own door.

What a terrible thing must a thunder-storm be here! Imagine the terrific artillery of heaven pealing over your head; the sharp sleet or rain, driving against and cutting your face; the mad winds beating you down or back; and then, fearfullest of all, the forked lightning leaping from menacing black clouds, and striking on one of these tallest blocks, and then moving with indescribable speed over the stony level; splitting, and cleaving, tearing, blasting, and blackening the oldest and mightiest masses around! Who would dare such a storm here? Who could live in it? Who would not sink in fear, if he beheld a shattered mass of granite, and a pillar of unknown antiquity, split into blasted fragments in one moment of fearful, blazing illumination? Yet I have found, in another place, a man who was once out on such a moor, and in such a scene and storm; but he declared he was afraid of the moor ever afterwards—and well he might be.

Mercifully for us there is no sign or foreboding of storm here now; though you can fancy each split pillar, if you please, to have been the result of one. But let us go on—on—on, over furze, heather, and blocks.

Still mile after mile is only a repetition of this granitic savageness. Our voices seem a profanation. Silence is the monarch here; and Desolation the subject. What solitude, what uninhabitable wastes! Surely Providence never meant man to dwell near such places, or build towns and villages within miles of them. Arabian deserts have oases, these have none.

But, hark, there is a Sound! Yes, a curious, unaccountable sound too, somewhere on our right. Let us turn this way. Hollo! here is a rough tramroad—a real rough tramroad over the moor here! Why, there must be spirits here who travel by railway, for nothing of human kind or art is here. Let us follow it. And now that strange sound is increasing upon us,—a noise compounded of clattering and creaking and cranking, and crushing and rushing, and clashing and dipping! What on this earth can it be, and where? Ha! this sudden turn has indeed shown us an unexpected sight. Here is the “grass-work” of a great Copper Mine—all revealed at one turn and glance. Look, look! what a marvellous sight, and what increasingly marvellous sounds. Enormous wheels are slowly and solemnly revolving. High up in the air there are skeleton platforms, and iron chains clanking painfully over iron pulleys. There is a lofty engine chimney, and near it you catch a glimpse of huge machinery, and hear puffs and pulls, and gaspings and groanings, and all corresponding to the alternate movements of big beams of wood starting up into the air and sinking down in dead heaviness. Then here we are at the foot of descending and discoloured streams, evidently polluted by metallic admixture. And somewhere near us flows an unseen but not unheard brook, probably bent on a similar errand, and brought from a similar source for similar work. Now let us rest awhile here. What a congregation of women and children, all engaged in this surface-mining work! And how happy and healthy they look compared with children in coal pits and colliery work! There they sit, “spalling, jigging,” “huddling and trunking,” and doing all manner of mining mysteries, and delighting in them too. Hark! well, I declare, the whole set are positively singing a hymn, and singing it in parts too! Listen! I never heard it before. Did you? It seems to be a hymn composed for them. Listen again!

O Lord! we mining children raise

A grateful song to Thee;

Thou wilt accept the feeblest praise

From all that bend the knee.

Here on this broad and rocky moor

We utter all our hearts,

And all our supplications pour

In simple, tuneful parts.

’Twas Thou didst rear these mighty stones

Ten thousand years ago;

And even then thy chosen ones

Didst love, and name, and know!

And Thou didst send our Saviour here,

By whom we’re reconciled;

He came to dry the mourner’s tear,

And save the duteous child.

O give us grace to do thy will,

Whate’er that will may be,

To labour daily, praising still,

Loving and serving Thee!

Give us each day our daily bread,

And from temptation keep;

At night preserve us in our bed,

And send refreshing sleep.

Then will we tread the savage moor

At morn with thankful hearts,

And all the day thy love adore

And praise in tuneful parts.

How well the girls take their parts! Farewell ye young vocalists, ye miners and minors!

Again we are on the moor—the mid-moor—amidst tors and pillars rising up tall as the ruins of Grecian temples. How like the remains of some gigantic, primeval Tadmor of the desert! How like the work of an upheaving and shattering earthquake! Nothing is moving now—nothing but the bright filmy clouds above us. What a contrast between sky and earth! Above, all light, luminous, fleecy, airy, and mobile; below, all heavy, dark, scarred, split, and yet sternly motionless. Miles upon miles of motionless masses! Not a single particle of those ten thousand tors in movement. All still, stiff, and silent, as when Druids may have offered sacrifices somewhere in their midst, and as when aboriginal Britons fought with spear and shield, and danced half-naked or clad in beasts’ skins. O ye mighty tors! speak, tell us what you have seen! What a hymn you could sing!

THE MOOR BY MOONLIGHT.

Yes, what a hymn you could sing at MOONLIGHT! And how thoroughly have I been led away by a moonlight dream that you were singing such a hymn! Standing in the midst of you, in the deep shadow of a tall tor—watching the silvery moonbeams shooting down from heaven, and softly lighting on the large whale-like back of a prostrate pillar—I have felt the charm of the hour, and the charm of the moor, and watched with an eagerness akin to fear, the wondrous metamorphoses the gentle moon has made of you. All your rough, jagged edges, and protruding bosses, and thundersplit needles, were softened down into a dim and undefined smoothness, excepting where the bright, quivering light fell full on the face of one of your loftier companions, and made the deep-scarred features of the giant play with a momentary smile of tenderness.

Yes, the proper time to see a moor dotted over with granite rocks is the moonlight. The mist conceals too much, the thunder-storm is too terrific, the bright day reveals too much; but the moonlight conceals only that which is best hidden, and shows that which is best revealed. It won’t do for a prosaic man. He would feel cold and uncomfortable, and be thinking of the warm fireside; but it will do admirably for you and me, reader, who are not satisfied to be always plodding in dingy counting-houses, whose souls are not buried in Russian hides and tallow, or in the price of wheat, or the fattening of stock, or the slaying of pigs, or the cutting up of unlucky authors—it will do for us. People make a mistake as to the proper scenes for moonlight views. You don’t want ruined abbeys and broken down castles. You want scenes and things more ancient still. A Cornish granite block is of an antiquity to which abbeys and castles are but of yesterday. The moon shone down on them long before monks and popes were dreamt of; before men came upon the scene at all! Antiquity! Ah! the greatest antiquary is the geologist. Antiquity! Do you desire to see the remains of antiquity? to trace the devourings of the tooth of Time? Come with me on to the old moor. Do you wish to have yourself transported back to the primæval scenes of this earth? Come with me by moonlight to a granite moor—any other moor will not do; I prefer this great and grand Cornish moor, because not far hence are the rich results of incalculable antiquity, in the precious mineral veins which run like silver cords of life under all the huge backbones and ribs of rock that overlie them. Barren enough the whole stricken moor certainly is; but search below, and all around its interior, and there you may find those mineral streams, solid, but shining like sunny water, that will at once banish from your thoughts all idea of barrenness.

Well, it is moonlight after a wintry day, and this is about the middle of the moor; and that is one of the highest blocks, pointing up and glittering beneath the silver flood. Let Imagination have her flight, uncage her, and sit down on the top of this smooth bank, and when you have put away the thoughts and recollections of man’s affairs from you, and have familiarized yourself to the scene around you, musing and fancying, then listen—listen to this song of that tall tor yonder:—

THE SONG OF THE GRANITIC GRANDEE.

Ho! Brother Tors! now comes the hour

When, waking from our stony death,

We feel the moving, mystic power

That stirs our life, and gives us breath!

What hast thou seen, my brother tall,

Since last we had a talk together?

Pray, didst thou feel that sudden squall

Last Monday night?—what horrid weather!

What horrid storms we’ve had of late!

I don’t believe this thousand years

I’ve had more snow upon my pate,

Or trickled down such floods of tears.

I think I’ve lost an inch of skull,

Although you know ’tis very hard,

And I in brains am rather dull;

If storms increase—I’ll lose a yard!

I’ve had some most distressing fears,

That though I am not made of clay,

Yet in a few such stormy years

My head will quite be wash’d away!

You know I do not oft complain,

But now the moon is up on high,

And not a mortal on the plain,

’Tis safe at least to heave a sigh.

Upon my word, it is not fair

To keep us here a thousand ages,

Standing bolt upright in the air

Like Nature’s Mutes, or stony Pages,

In stiff attendance on the mountains,

Who get just thrice our share of sun,

And dash the rains away in fountains,

Or quickly make them “cut and run.”

Ay, run amongst us here below,

As fast as each can other follow,

Until they manage just to flow

Into some nice, convenient hollow,

Scoop’d out in some short brother’s head,

Not quite so tall as you and I,

And when once in it, as in bed,

They sleep a month, and softly lie!

Then, amongst other grievous articles,

There’s no such thing as sociality,

Mountains are made of the same particles,

And yet deny us an equality!

Of many other things beside

I might complain, but will forbear;

It much, for instance, hurts my pride,

That cattle should rub off their hair

On right and left, not asking leave,

Nor having sense enough to see

How such rude conduct can but grieve,

And compromise our dignity!

How vile that puny Men should dare,

With hammers big, to strike and chip!—

Just bend a bit, and look down there,

And mark that blow upon my hip!

I tell ye what, the times are bad

For us, my granite friends and brothers;

Enough to make us all go mad,

When so much worse we fare than others.

You’ll all remember, I’ll engage,

When I was only just a youth—

About ten thousand years of age,

(I never utter’d an untruth;)

You all remember what I said

Before a sign of man appear’d:

We should be left as good as dead,

And are we not just what I fear’d?

What frolics once we had, I ween,

When we in earthquakes used to tumble!

But now we stand unmoved, unseen,

Left to be worn by storms, and ...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Half Title Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Contents
• Cornwall: A Cornish Van, and Journey Thereby
• The Van Continued, Upset and Arrival
• The Town of Looe
• The Pilchard Fishery of Cornwall
• To Fowey: Fowey and Harbour
• St. Austell, and the Eastern Mining District
• Carclaze Tin Mine
• Marazion and St. Michael's Mount: Scenery and History
• Penzance
• Huel Wherry, A Mine Under the Sea
• The Tin Mines of St. Just and St Ives
• Cape Cornwall: Night Thoughts and the Ocean
• Botallack Mine—Under the Sea. Descent and Description
• Other Submarine Mines
• The Blind Miner of Botallack
• The Land's End
• The Logan or Rocking Stone, its Fall and Restoration
• Origin of Rocking Stones
• Cornish Moor and Coast Scenery
• Redruth—View from Carn Brea
• The Mining District of Gwennap
• The Camborne and Illogan Mining District
• Geology of Cornwall: Granite, Clay-Slate, China Clay
• Granite Veins in Clay-Slates, Elvans, &c
• Mineral Deposits
• Natural State of Metallic Ores
• The Mineral Veins or Lodes in Cornwall
• I.—The Particular Character of the Lodes
• II.—Relation of Lodes to Containing Rocks
• III.—Size and Breadth of Lodes
• IV.—Dip and Direction of Lodes
• V.—Cross-Courses, or Cross-Veins.—Their Character and Composition
• VI.—Intersections of Lodes
• VII.—Miscellaneous Observations Relating to Productiveness
• Temperature of Rocks and Veins
• Original Formation of Mineral Veins
• Design and Benevolence in the Arrangement and Relative Quantities of Metallic Ores
• Mining Discovery.—The Divining Rod
• Management and Working of a Mine
• Opening and Working upon the Vein
• System of Labour; Tribute and Tutwork
• Development and Extension of the Mine
• Timbering the Mines
• Descent and Ascent of the Mines: Man Machines
• A Mine on the Moors.—Musical Miners and Minors
• The Moor by Moonlight
• The Song of the Granitic Grandee
• Numbers Employed in and about Cornish Mines
• Analysis of a Great Mining Establishment: The Consolidated Mines
• Analysis of the Fowey Consolidated Copper Mines
• Water and Drainage of Mines
• The Steam-Engine at Cornish Mines. “Duty,” Details, Chief Engines
• Greatest Depths of Mines
• Tin and Tin Mining in Cornwall.—History and Stannary Laws
• Foreign Tin Mines
• Tin Ores, Lodes, Stream-Works, &c
• Dressing Tin Ores—Various Processes
• Tin Cleaning.—Oxland's Process
• Smelting of Tin: Produce of British Tin
• Applications of Tin in the Manufactures and Arts
• Copper—Varieties of Ores, Mines, and History
• The Parys Copper Mine
• Localities of Copper—Foreign Mines in Sweden, Germany, Australia, United States
• Dressing Copper Ores
• Sales and Produce of Copper Ores in Cornwall; Tables
• Reduction and Smelting of Copper Ores
• Uses and Manufactures of Copper
• Lead and Miscellaneous Metals in Cornwall
• Mining as a Pecuniary Speculation
• Risk, Returns, and Changes
• The Devon Great Consols Mines
• The United Mines
• Great Wheal Vor Tin Mine
• Tresavean Copper Mine
• Dolcoath Copper Mine
• Old Crinnis Copper Mine
• The Marazion Mines
• Hints to Speculators and Investors in Mines
• A Speculative Adventure in Mining, by Way of Example
• Cornish Men and Manners
• The Old Cornish Language, and its Remains
• The Ancient Cornish Drama
• Miners in and about the Mine, and at Home
• The Young Persons Employed in and Around Mines
• Colliers and Cornish Miners Contrasted
• Physical Condition of Cornish Miners and Lead Miners
• Mental Condition
• Going Home after Work
• Miners at Sea
• Heroism in a Mine
• Mining Schools and Education
• Examples of Intelligence amongst Miners
• An Artist from the Miners
• Sunday and Religion amongst the Cornish Miners