ere and there, unable to find the way
out.

"Griffin took charge. It was his hand that led every man to the ladder.
Nine men crawled up.

"As the minutes passed, the anxiety at the head of the shaft grew
intense. No more workers came. Fourteen men had gone down; only nine had
returned. There were then five men still unaccounted for. First one rope
was dropped without result, then another. This time some groping
hand--it proved to be Griffin's--encountered the rope, and found a
sufferer. He tied the rope around his comrade and the man was hoisted
up. Four times this was done, but the fourth was a huge, powerful
Irishman, called Howard. When he was pulled up, entirely unconscious, he
stuck fast in the hole and could not be pulled out.

"By an exertion of self-control and endurance, that no one ever has been
able to understand, Griffin climbed that ladder into the top where the
gases were at their foulest. Though all his comrades had been too far
gone for several minutes to move, even to help themselves, he succeeded
in pushing and pulling Howard's unconscious body until it passed through
the hole.

"A hand was stretched down to reach Griffin and bring him to life and
safety, when the overwrought system gave way. He loosed his handhold on
the ladder and fell.

"A groan went up from those above. It was a thirty-foot fall. Had the
rescuer, the hero, been killed? Scarcely could a man fall in such a way
in an air shaft and live.

"There was no need to ask for volunteers. Two men, one of those who had
been in the caisson all day and was one of the first rescued, and
another, who had not gone down at all, leaped for the ladder. The
doctor caught the first by the shoulder and thrust him aside. The other
descended a few feet and then came up again, to fall unconscious at the
edge of the shaft. Another sprang forward, and yet another, clamoring
for leave to go down.

"Just at that moment there was a faint tug at the rope, the first rope,
which had been left hanging down in the pit. Hardly expecting anything,
one of the men started to haul it in.

"'Come here, boys,' he cried; 'Griffin's on!'

"With their hearts in their mouths, the men hauled in, and the limp and
apparently lifeless body of the foreman came to the surface. How he had
ever managed to fasten the rope around him was a mystery. His hands,
with the flesh rubbed from them to the bone, showed that when he had
lost hold on the ladder he had still retained prese