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accustomed to continue work in perfect darkness. These men rarely lived to reach five-and-twenty years of age.

Because of the difficulties of transportation through these narrow passages little children were employed in carrying ore from the mines in small baskets.

Gutters were cut on either side of the mine roads to carry off the natural flow of water, and bamboo or other wooden pumps and pipes were sometimes employed to clear the lower depths. A severe influx of water generally resulted in the permanent abandonment of the shaft, yet under all these disadvantages and dangers the sturdy workers frequently penetrated to a depth of 1,000 feet, and extended their operations over an area of several miles.

Milling was carried on by women and old men, who broke the ore and picked by hand. The selected ores of gold, silver, copper, or lead were put into a stone furnace and calcined with fuel. The calcined ore next was placed in a U-shaped furnace made in the ground, and melted by the bellows system. In the case of gold and silver ores a proper quantity of lead was added and argentiferous lead was formed, which was separated by smelting in another furnace. Copper was generally first roasted, and then the calcined ore put into a furnace for fusion over a charcoal fire. When the ore was melted down, the slag was removed and the molten matter cooled by the application of water, or directly subjected to desilverization by a process known as mabuki. The matter produced by the latter process was again calcined, and then removed to a hearth furnace and melted. If there was still any slag left the molten ‘matter’ was allowed to settle, and if found free from impurities, this was called ‘black copper.’

As may be imagined, the inefficiency of these methods occasioned a large proportion of waste. This débris is now frequently reclaimed and reduced at a profit.

In 1867, during the last few days of the Shogunate Government, an Englishman named Erasmus Gower introduced into the country the use of explosives in mining, and at about the same period an American named Pumpelly used an explosive in a lead mine in Hokkaido. In the first year of the Restoration (1868) Kauso Nabeshima, feudal lord of Saga, in conjunction with an Englishman named Glover, sunk the first European shaft in Sakashima.

With the new order of things the Imperial Government took over the mining business, and placed the Sado, Ikuno, Muoi, Aui, Kosaka, Kamaisha, and Okuya metal mines, as well as the Sakashima and Miike collieries, under its direct control. Foreign managers were employed, foreign systems were adopted in mining, smelting, and transportation, and at the same time