This, of
course, upset all theories as to there having been a readjustment
of surface rock, dangerous sometimes, to magnetic connections.
Then again, no man understood tunnel construction better than
Henry MacFarlane, C.E., Member of the American Society of
Engineers, Fellow of the Institute of Sciences, etc., etc. Nor was
there ever an engineer more careful of his men. Indeed, it was his
boast that he had never lost a life by a premature discharge in
the twenty years of his experience. Nor did the men, those who
worked under him--those who escaped alive--come to any definite
conclusion as to the cause of the catastrophe: the night and day
gang, I mean,--those who breathed the foul air, who had felt the
chill of the clammy interior and who were therefore familiar with
the handling of explosives and the proper tamping of the charges
--a slip of the steel meaning instantaneous annihilation.
The Beast knew and could tell if he chose.
I say "The Beast," for that is what MacFarlane's tunnel was to me.
To the passer-by and to the expert, it was, of course, merely a
short cut through the steep hills flanking one end of the huge
"earth fill" which MacFarlane was constructing across the
Corklesville brook, and which, when completed would form a road-
bed for future trains; but to me it was always The Beast.
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