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BOOK IV.

then is the shape of the meers, varying in accordance with the differentkinds of veins.

Now tunnels are of two sorts, one kind having no right of property, theother kind having some limited right. For when a miner in some particularlocality is unable to open a vein on account of a great quantity of water, heruns a wide ditch, open at the top and three feet deep, starting on the slopeand running up to the place where the vein is found. Through it the waterflows off, so that the place is made dry and fit for digging. But if it is notsufficiently dried by this open ditch, or if a shaft which he has now forthe first time begun to sink is suffering from overmuch water, he goes tothe Bergmeister and asks that official to give him the right for a tunnel.Having obtained leave, he drives the tunnel, and into its drains all thewater is diverted, so that the place or shaft is made fit for digging. Ifit is not seven fathoms from the surface of the earth to the bottom of thiskind of tunnel, the owner possesses no rights except this one : namely, thatthe owners of the mines, from whose leases the owner of the tunnel extractsgold or silver, themselves pay him the sum he expends within their meer indriving the tunnel through it.

To a depth or height of three and a half fathoms above and below themouth of the tunnel, no one is allowed to begin another tunnel. The reasonfor this is that this kind of a tunnel is liable to be changed into the otherkind which has a complete right of property, when it drains the meers to adepth of seven fathoms, or to ten, according as the old custom in each placeacquires the force of law. In such case this second kind of tunnel has thefollowing right; in the first place, whatever metal the owner, or companyowning it, finds in any meer through which it is driven, all belongs to thetunnel owner within a height or depth of one and a quarter fathoms. Inthe years which are not long passed, the owner of a tunnel possessed all themetal which a miner standing at the bottom of the tunnel touched witha bar, whose handle did not exceed the customary length; but nowadaysa certain prescribed height and width is allowed to the owner of the tunnel,lest the owners of the mines be damaged, if the length of the bar belonger than usual. Further, every metal-yielding mine which is drainedand supplied with ventilation by a tunnel, is taxed in the proportion of one-ninth for the benefit of the owner of the tunnel. But if several tunnels ofthis kind are driven through one mining area which is yielding metals, andall drain it and supply it with ventilation, then of the metal which is dugout from above the bottom of each tunnel, one-ninth is given to the owner ofthat tunnel; of that which is dug out below the bottom of each tunnel,one-ninth is in each case given to the owner of the tunnel which followsnext in order below. But if the lower tunnel does not yet drain the shaft ofthat meer nor supply it with ventilation, then of the metal which is dug outbelow the bottom of the higher tunnel, one-ninth part is given to the ownerof such upper tunnel. Moreover, no one tunnel deprives another of itsright to one-ninth part, unless it be a lower one, from the bottom of whichto the bottom of the one above must not be less than seven or ten fathoms,