Between
3 and 4 there was to be a setting out of some work to the men by a
sort of Dutch Auction (the usual way of setting out the work here):
some refuse ores were to be broken up and made marketable, and the
subject of competition was, for how little in the pound on the gross
produce the men would work them up. While we were here a man was
brought up who was hurt in blasting: a piece of rock had fallen on
him. At this mine besides the ladder ways, they have buckets sliding
in guides by which the men are brought up: and they are just preparing
for work another apparatus which they say is tried successfully at
another mine (Tresavean): there are two wooden rods _A_ and _B_
reaching from the top to the bottom, moved by cranks from the same
wheel, so that one goes up when the other goes down, and vice versa:
each of these rods has small stages, at such a distance that when the
rod _A_ is down and the rod _B_ is up, the first stage of _A_ is level
with the first stage of _B_: but when the rod _A_ is up and the rod
_B_ is down, the second stage of _A_ is level with the first stage of
_B_: so a man who wants to descend steps on the first stage of _A_ and
waits till it goes down: then he steps sideways on the first stage of
_B_ and waits till it goes down: then he steps sideways to the second
stage of _A_ and waits till it goes down, and so on: or if a man is
coming up he does just the same.
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