An hour after leaving Callander they reached the Dochart pit.
The most indifferent person would have been touched at the appearance this deserted spot presented.

It was like the skeleton of something that had formerly lived.

A few wretched trees bordered a plain where the ground was hidden under the black dust of the mineral fuel, but no cinders nor even fragments of coal were to be seen.

All had been carried away and consumed long ago.
They walked into the shed which covered the opening of the Yarrow shaft, whence ladders still gave access to the lower galleries of the pit.

The engineer bent over the opening.