"When we got to the mine shaft, it was surrounded by women, some crying, but most of them silent. The two rescue crews had been working like fiends, and work was needed, too.
"I didn't see how I could be much use, anyway. The miners were 'way ahead of me. I haven't had enough experience underground. Just the same, as soon as Barnett saw me, he shouted,
"'Down with you, boy!' and down I had to go.
"As I passed him, I said,
"'Mr. Barnett, I don't know much about the practical end of this!'
"'I know ye don't,' he answered grimly, 'ye don't have to. But men always need a leader. Get on down!'
"As soon as the bucket rattled me to the bottom of the shaft, I fixed on my apparatus, ready to start with the rest of my team. I'd been through that mine once and the comment I'd heard at the pit mouth had told me where the trouble was, so we started off boldly.
"We went 'way in and met one of the parties coming out with a stretcher. We were near enough to make signs to them, just visible in the dull gloom of dimly burning safety lamps when, woof! down came a mass of roof. I saw it coming and dodged back, but not quite in time, for a chunk of coal caught my shoulder. It twisted me round so that I fell with my left arm stretched out, and then a big chunk rolled full on me, just above the wrist."
"Yes, quite a nasty smash,—a comminuted fracture, the doctor called it. My boys snaked that coal off and got me up in a hurry, but the party with the stretcher was cut off. That fall of the roof had choked up the passage solid. The men were already at work at it, using their pickaxes like demons. Seeing I couldn't do any good with a broken arm, I ran back for reënforcements."