SECTION 5.

The mule is notoriously a profane and godless creature; a blind alley of
Nature, so to speak, a mistake of which she is ashamed, and which she
does not permit to reproduce itself. The thirty mules under Hal's charge
had been brought up in an environment calculated to foster the worst
tendencies of their natures. He soon made the discovery that the "colic"
of his predecessor had been caused by a mule's hind foot in the stomach;
and he realised that he must not let his mind wander for an instant, if
he were to avoid this dangerous disease.

These mules lived their lives in the darkness of the earth's interior;
only when they fell sick were they taken up to see the sunlight and to
roll about in green pastures. There was one of them called "Dago
Charlie," who had learned to chew tobacco, and to rummage in the pockets
of the miners and their "buddies." Not knowing how to spit out the
juice, he would make himself ill, and then he would swear off from
indulgence. But the drivers and the pit-boys knew his failing, and would
tempt "Dago Charlie" until he fell from grace. Hal soon discovered this
moral tragedy, and carried the pain of it in his soul as he went about
his all-day drudgery.

He went down the shaft with the first cage, which was very early in the
morning. He fed and watered his charges, and helped to harness them.
Then, when the last four hoofs had clattered away, he cleaned out the
stalls, and mended harness, and obeyed the orders of any person older
than himself who happened to be about.