TRUE HEROISM.

Patea Mail, Volume 1, Issue 18, 12 June 1875, Page 3

TRUE HEROISM.

The “St, Louis Globe ” says :—The fire broke out about mid-day, and when first discovered the main shaft in the mine was a blaze, with thirly-two men and boys at work beyond and beneath the flames, nearly forty feet below the level of the earth, in a few minutes the whole population of the place rushed to the scone, and a thousand or more men, women, and children—the relatives, friends, and neighbours of the entombed miners—wore gathered at the mouth of the burning shaft, stupefied with fear and anguish. All the wells in the town had run nearly dry weeks before, and scarcely enough water could be secured to subdue the heat above ground, much less to arrest the conflagration inside the mine. Thus matters stood for two awful hours, when a railroad engine arrived with a full tank, which was hurriedly emptied into the shaft, and a great shout of hope went up from the people. At this juncture a man emerged like a spectre from the blaze and smoke, and fell, in a swoon at the very edge of the shaft. An hour later, two more men cried up through the flames for help, and a ladder was lowered to them on which they made their way to the top, and were dragged forth alive, but burned and blackened beyond recognition. Three were now saved, but twenty-nine others were still below, and the Arc was not yet under control. The terrified crowd stood aghast for a few minutes, and then suddenly a panic of despair seemed to seize them, the stilled moans of the women and children breaking out afresh, and the men drawing back from the nunc with blanched and averted faces. The supreme moment of the emergency had come, and the one man to meet it was there. His name was William Marks, and he stopped to the front with the promptness and the modesty of a true hero. “ Fasten a rope around me, and let me down into the shaft,” said lie. The proposition was appalling, but down ho went into the horrible cavern, without another word, and reaching the bottom, freed himself for his search in the entries diverging from the main shaft. At almost the first step into the stifling darkness lie stumbled upon the inanimate form of one of the miners in a coal ear, which he pushed to tlie entrance, secured the rope around the body, called to those above to hoist away, and in a moment the man was sate. Further search soon revealed the whereabouts of the remaining twentyeight, and slowly but surely Marks piloted them to the mouth of the mine and delivered them one by one—many insensible, but all alive—out of the jaws of death into the hands of their wives and children. Then, when the last one had been rescued, he came himself to the surface, scorched and blinded and nearly suffocated, and stood there silently among the cheering towns-pooplo, the master - of the situation. Thus the peril was surmounted without any sacrifice of life, but tire heroism was there all the same. The rescue of the helpless miners, and the escape of ttic man who gave death scorn to save them, spoiled the perfection of a tragedy ; but the destruction of all concerned could not have added to the radiance which belongs to the unselfish bravery of William Marks. He was a common working man.