THE ST. GOTHARD TUNNEL?--?I DESCRIBE IT FOR HARPER’S MAGAZINE?--?ITS COST?--?A GREAT SCARE IN THE TUNNEL.

October, 1878.?--?The great tunnel through the St. Gothard Alps is reaching completion. Nothing like it was ever accomplished before in the world. It happens that Mr. Hellwag, the chief engineer of the stupendous undertaking, is a personal friend, and he gave me every facility for visiting it. His courtesy and hints have helped me in preparing my article for Harper’s (October) Magazine. Hellwag is already famous as the builder of the tunnels for the Brenner pass. He is also the inventor of the Auger, or Spiral tunnel system, by which railway trains reach high elevations up tunnel slopes, winding around and up the inside of mountains. He gave me letters and permits to go everywhere, and, so far as I know, I am the first American to have been inside the tunnel.

The undertaking of this tunnel is something vast. It takes the surplus cash of three governments to build it, Italy, Germany and Switzerland.

The line reaches from Lake Luzern in Switzerland to Lake Maggiore in Italy, one hundred and eight miles. One hundred and twenty thousand feet of this is tunneled through mountains of granite. The longest tunnel in the series is 48,936 feet. Few of the smaller tunnels are less than 7,000 feet long.

It was thought one hundred and eighty-seven million francs would pay for it, but two hundred and eighty-nine millions are now required. It is the usual blundering in figures that comes with most public enterprises. This particular blundering has bankrupted thousands of innocent people who have bought shares. The extra money is now raised, however, and the awful barrier of granite peaks and fields of snow and ice, between Italy and Switzerland, is to be overcome by skill of man.

There was no road over the Gothard for five hundred years, and not until a century ago was a vehicle of any kind ever seen up there. Even now, the wagon road is one of great peril, as I have myself experienced, a whole sledge load of us once barely missing being overwhelmed by an avalanche that fell a hundred feet ahead of us. There were granite boulders in that slide of snow, big as our horses, and the thing fell without a warning, and with a crash that was stupendous. Many lives have been lost in this pass; half the year, even now, it is abandoned entirely to the winds that howl among its mountains of desolation.

The tunnel was not quite finished when I was there. The boring machines inside are worked by compressed air, furnished by enormous air compressors outside. These also force air in for ventilation. They compress air also for the peculiar locomotives that are moved by air, not steam.

My guide and I got on the front platform of one of these air engines, and were shot into the tunnel for miles through a black cloud of smoke and gas that I thought would kill me, or cause me to fall off the engine. It was Cimmerian darkness. The engineer said: “You shall now see a glimpse of the bowels of hell.” I saw nothing for miles, and then suddenly we came to the weird lights, the big air machines boring into the granite walls, and the half-naked workmen. It was a gruesome picture in there, with the yellow lights, the racket of the machines, and the occasional explosion of dynamite. The water in places burst from the rocks in streams as big as my arm, and with force enough to knock the workmen from their feet. At one spot, the torrent broke through fine crevices, at the rate of four thousand gallons a minute. A special canal was made under the railroad tracks, to carry this river of water out of the tunnel.

I was greatly impressed, not only by the scene inside, but to think that at that moment avalanches were falling five thousand feet above our heads, storms were raging among the cold peaks up there, and a rapid mountain river was rushing right along over us. It seemed a perilous place. Indeed, it was often feared that some mighty torrent might be struck suddenly, some day, and destroy every life in the tunnel.

Far in, where the compressed air left the pipes, the ventilation seemed better, but it would kill most men to stay in there at all for any length of time. It is well known that the health of these unfortunate workmen is being ruined. An early death stares every one of them in the face.

Something is always threatening to happen, and my conductor relates an incident that shows how easily alarm sets in. He was one day walking along in the half darkness, inspecting something near the mouth of the tunnel, when he heard far behind him what sounded like the tramping of a herd of buffalo, or the bursting of a torrent. Suddenly, he saw quick moving lights and heard human voices. Whatever it could be, exploding gas, demons, or torrent, it was rushing towards him like an avalanche. He jumped into a niche at the side of the tunnel, to save his life. Then he heard the cry, “The mine, the mine! run for your life!” He, too, then ran till he broke down and saw the terrible army of half-naked, begrimed men, with the coal lamps on their heads, rush by him in terror. A jutting rock had saved his life, but the herd of men, still screaming “gas,” “the mine,” “run, run!” tumbled over each other and tramped each other down, till the mouth of the tunnel was reached. When my informant picked himself up, and went down to the company’s offices, he found the whole crowd gesticulating and talking loudly. There had been no “explosion”?--?no “mine”?--?no “gas.” It was simply a strike. The leaders had adopted this plan to scare everybody out of the tunnel.

The next day, and the next, the strikers refused to either work or disperse. They were trying “the dog in the manger” system of the United States strikers, neither working nor letting work. A regiment of militia was sent there, and, unlike American militia, did their duty. A very few musket volleys, and the poor, deluded strikers went away, though a good many staid there in their blood.