The quarries, 'or caves,' as they
call them there, are so many openings, high up in the hills, on
either side of these passes, where they blast and excavate for
marble: which may turn out good or bad: may make a man's fortune
very quickly, or ruin him by the great expense of working what is
worth nothing. Some of these caves were opened by the ancient
Romans, and remain as they left them to this hour. Many others are
being worked at this moment; others are to be begun to-morrow, next
week, next month; others are unbought, unthought of; and marble
enough for more ages than have passed since the place was resorted
to, lies hidden everywhere: patiently awaiting its time of
discovery.
As you toil and clamber up one of these steep gorges (having left
your pony soddening his girths in water, a mile or two lower down)
you hear, every now and then, echoing among the hills, in a low
tone, more silent than the previous silence, a melancholy warning
bugle,--a signal to the miners to withdraw. Then, there is a
thundering, and echoing from hill to hill, and perhaps a splashing
up of great fragments of rock into the air; and on you toil again
until some other bugle sounds, in a new direction, and you stop
directly, lest you should come within the range of the new
explosion.
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