Alaska sentinel., 1905-06-01
NO SURRENDER
Mans Indomitable Courage in the Face
 of Stupendous Dangers.

5lan'e ln0Om1taDIe AOuraSc HI thc hGs
 of Stupendous Dangers.
 Mans unwillingnes to yield to cir. cumstances is one of his most impress Sive characteristics. Sometimes it seems to be mere stubbornness, un. reasoning and purblind. Far more often, however, it is admirable in a high degree, betokening the supremacy ,f mind over matter and the primacy of man among created things. Over many things man triumphs. over many others he may never hope to triumph. The elemental forces of na- ture are beyond his control. Before such a catastrophe as that which oc- cured in the Windward Isles. for ex- ample, man, with all the knowledge of the schools and all the resources of twentieth century civilization. IS as helpless as the cattle of the fields and the worms of the dust. One witness of the destruction of St. Pierre says the people perished like flies. The de scription Is accurate, and it's sugges- ton Is true one. The flies of an hour, the gnats that dance in a sum- lner sunbeam, are not more helpless than man in the face of such con- yulsion of nature, says the New York Tribune.
 Yet man remains defiant and indom- itable. Pompeii was and Herculaneum WAS; yet Naples is, and it neseues fearlessly at the foot of their still --.,a.. on5 ,,a1ooin1 dastroyar To- day the horror-stricken world says of ST. Pierre that 1t was, but 1t is no more. Yet tomorrow men will found q new city at the base of that same Bald mountain which has done this awful deed. A striking instance of neighboring island of St Vincent, which has suffered less only than Martinique. Its great sulphur noun tain erupted ninety years ago with ap' palling violence and devastation Forthwith some said the island should be abandoned, and the British govern ment actually began to make plans for the entire removal of the people and the distribution of them among other islands less menaced by volcanic action. But soon the idea was given up, and the people remained, some 10000 of them, clinging resolutely to some 132 square miles of beautiful and fertile but ominously unstable land. To-day the revival and execution of those plans are suggested, even urged. But doubtless this, too, will pass, and for all the throes of La Soufriere the people of St Yincent-those who are left of them-will remain where they are There will be no surrender.
 It is the same trait that causes the Finn and the Icelander to cling to their semi-arctic homes rather than to seek more genial and more fertile re- gions, and the Switzer and Highlander to prefer their rugged rocks and cliffs to the soft, smooth lowland plains. IL is the same spirit that nerves man to endure pain and trouble, to repress the groan and tear, and to meet with a smile the darkest frowns of disap- pointment and misfortune. Columbus bidding his muinous crew Sail on.' and Panssy burning hls house 10 keep his furnace raging, and Gordon serene ly awaiting his martyrdom at Khar- toum were similar types of the uncon- uuerable man who knows not how to frame the word surrender" There are those who would desert St Yin. cent and Martinique. who would aban- don all efforts to reach the North Pole, who would yield, defeated at the first touch of elemental rage. They also would have had Columbus turn back in midvoyage and every great inventor stop work in despair at fail- ure of his first or his fftieth e1perl- ment. Controlled by faint hearts. the world would know no progress. Those who lead mankind forward and up- ward are those whose watchword, even in hopless sacrifice, is No sur rpn1erw