I will now leave the manager, and discuss him who controls the workmen of the mine, who is therefore called the foreman, although some call him the watchman. It is he who distributes the work among the labourers, and sees diligently that each faithfully and usefully performs his duties. He also discharges workmen on account of incompetence, or negligence, and supplies others in their places if the two Jurors and manager give their consent. He must be skilful in working wood, that he may timber shafts, place posts, and make underground structures capable of supporting an undermined mountain, lest the rocks from the hangingwall of the veins, not being supported, become detached from the mass of the mountain and overwhelm the workmen with destruction. He must be able to make and lay out the drains in the tunnels, into which the water from the veins, stringers, and seams in the rocks may collect, that it may be properly guided and can flow away. Further, he must be able to recognize veins and stringers, so as to sink shafts to the best advantage, and must be able to discern one kind of material which is mined from another, or to train his subordinates that they may separate the materials correctly. He must also be well acquainted with all methods of washing, so as to teach the washers how the metalliferous earth or sand is washed. He supplies the miners with iron tools when they are about to start to work in the mines, and apportions a certain weight of oil for their lamps, and trains them to dig to the best advantage, and sees that they work faithfully. When their shift is finished, he takes back the oil which has been left. On account of his numerous and important duties and labours, only one mine is entrusted to one foreman, nay, rather sometimes two or three foremen are set over one mine.
Since I have mentioned the shifts, I will briefly explain how these are carried on. The twenty-four hours of a day and night are divided into three shifts, and each shift consists of seven hours. The three remaining hours are intermediate between the shifts, and form an interval during which the workmen enter and leave the mines. The first shift begins at the fourth hour in the morning and lasts till the eleventh hour; the second begins at the twelfth and is finished at the seventh; these two are day shifts in the morning and afternoon. The third is the night shift, and commences at the eighth hour in the evening and finishes at the third in the morning. The Bergmeister does not allow this third shift to be imposed upon the workmen unless necessity demands it. In that case, whether they draw water from the shafts or mine the ore, they keep their vigil by the night lamps, and to prevent themselves falling asleep from the late hours or from fatigue, they lighten their long and arduous labours by singing, which is neither wholly untrained nor unpleasing. In some places one miner is not allowed to undertake two shifts in succession, because it often happens that he either falls asleep in the mine, overcome by exhaustion from too much labour, or arrives too late for his shift, or leaves sooner than he ought. Elsewhere he is allowed to do so, because he cannot subsist on the pay of one shift, especially if provisions grow dearer. The Bergmeister does not, however, forbid an extraordinary shift when he concedes only one ordinary shift.
