Nay, that's mere superstition. Rocks are rent
And excavations made by argument.
Explosives all have had their day and season;
The modern engineer relies on reason.
He'll talk a tunnel through a mountain's flank
And by fair speech cave down the tallest bank.
(_The earth trembles, a deep subterranean explosion is heard
and a section of the bank as big as El Capitan starts away and
plunges thunderously into the cut. A part of it strikes De
Young's dumpcart abaft the axletree and flings him, hurtling,
skyward, a thing of legs and arms, to descend on the distant
mountains, where it is cold. Fitch and Pickering pull themselves
out of the débris and stand ungraveling their eyes and
noses._)