She kissed him on the forehead to soften the coming negative, and said: "To tell you the truth, dear uncle, I have promised to go down a coal mine.

See! I'm dressed accordingly." "Go down a coal mine!" said the Colonel, contemptuously.

"What fool put that idea in your head ?" Fitzroy strutted forward like a bantam-cock.

"I did, sir.

Coal is a very interesting product." "Ay, to a cook." "To every English g-gentleman." "I disown that imputation for one." "Of being an English g-gentleman ?" There was a general titter at this sly hit.
"No, sir," said the Colonel, angrily--"of taking an interest in coal." "Well, but," said Percy, with a few slight hesitations, "not to t-take an interest in c-coal is not to take an interest in the n-nation, for this n-nation is g-great, not by its p-powerful fleet, nor its little b-b-bit of an army--" A snort from the Colonel.
"-- nor its raw m-militia, but by its m-m-manufactures; these depend on machines that are driven by steam-power, and the steam-engines are coal-fed, and were made in coal-fed furnaces; our machines do the work of five hundred million hands, and you see coal keeps them going.