It struck me that it might 'ave branched off from the main body and that there 's a bigger vein over there some'eres.

We 'll just 'ave to make a try for it.

It's our only chance." "And if we fail to find it there ?" "We 'll put a couple of 'oles in the foot wall and see what we strike.
And then--" "Yes-- ?" "If it ain't there--we 're whipped!" It was the first time that Harry had said the word seriously.
Fairchild pretended not to hear.

Instead, he picked up a drill, looked at its point, then started toward the small forge which they had erected just at the foot of the little raise leading to the stope.
There Harry joined him; together they heated the long pieces of steel and pounded their biting faces to the sharpness necessary to drilling in the hard rock of the hanging wall, tempering them in the bucket of water near by, working silently, slowly,--hampered by the weight of defeat.

They were being whipped; they felt it in every atom of their beings.