The Montgomery advertiser., 1906-08-21
noun IN IcEnox.
H,ualIx Rereased, Porter Is Frozen
 Nearly to Death.

Finally Released, Porter t1 Fr0zen Nearly to Death.
 New York Alexander Beck, bar porter of the Marlborough hotel. spent alI his spare time yesterday wherever he could find the most sunshine, and m the meantime as he went about his joints creaked and rasped like the russ ty hinge of a door.
 All that was because Beck is not yet thawed out It will be several days. he thinks, before his arteries and veins are running unAlogged by floating ice ana the darnpne& gets out of his bones and sockets. He was almost frozen to death the day before and had 1t not been for a trapped presence of mind that came to him in the last extremi-
 ty he might have been entirely frozen. His duties are many and various. He
 does his principal work shifting the
 beer kegs watching the mineraA wa ters, stirriny up the fruits and mAnag- inR the straws and other things in the refrigerator. It Is there also he keeps his lemons to save time 1t is there he sdueezes them. The Marlborough cold room Is out under the sidewalk and a narrow passage from the lavatory leads
 to It's heavy wood and Iron door two feet thick. The temperature Is kept around freezing all the time and about ten minutes is enough of 1t for Beck ordinarily. Then he goes out and exer-
 cisea.
 Beck went in there on Wednesday to squeeze the lemons and was peace fully engaged in the process when a
 darground labyrinth. Beck had left
 the massive door just on the crack,
 but the rays of the electric light he
 used did not come through. The watch
 man saw only that the door was not
 shut and, muttering something about carelessness. slammed it and threw the lock over.
 Beck was a prisoner. Unless some body came to open the door he would remain one. for kicks. shouts. screams end everything else would avail noth- ing through those thick walls. He sud- denly remembered that he had given the barkeepers above an extra supply and they would not be down to look for him for hours. He looked at an thought what would be then. He felt
 his body chilling gradually and when
 a nervous precipitation came out on his
 forehead the drops fell on the floor like marbles. He tried to dance. but there was not room, so he practiced on juggling lemons. His hands got so cold he could not tell when they touch ed him. He rolled a beer keg backward and that only made him colder. He saw some mint and when he thought of sunnfer drinks his teeth began to chatter. He felt his feet growing numb
 and after he had tried beating on the
 waIl with his fists for minute he stopped for fear he would break off
 a hand or finger.
 It seemed that about all in sight for
 him was a cold, cheerless exit, with a beer keg and bak of lemons for his
 funeral catafalque. He sat down and
 tried to weep. but the ioicles merely
 blinded him. He was giving up in de-
 spair, when he gave a shriek of delight
 He remembered that the valves of the
 air pumps attached to the beer spiEots
 of the bar were in the room. Giving
 a very good imitation of ap arctic ava
 lanche, he rolled over the casks and
 grabbed the valves. When he turned
 around finally he had shut off every
 spigot in the floor above and then he sat down to walt.
 He had not long to walt, for ten minutes later the manager came down. stairs, with harsh words on his lips for the porter who would allow the air to run out of the pumps. Not finding the pumps, he opened the vault him. self and the next minute he was car- rying Beck out into the open air. He had been in the room little more than an hour, according to estimates.
 He was at once thrown Into a tub of Ice water and by degrees melted enough to take long breath and tell what had happened. It was feared he might
 receive an attack of pneumonia, but
 physician said he had appeared to come
 through 1t all right except for the few
 traces of Ice that fingered in the hol.
 lows and cornerA