Manual Training High School - Prospect Yearbook (Brooklyn, NY)

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A Page From Poe Strangers always take me for a man of fifty or sixty. ln reality I have just passed my thirty-fifth birthday. My gray hair and many of the deep lines in my face were made one terrible night last winter. That night rc- occurs in haunting nightmares now- and always will. Mr. Robt. Cornelius, 295 Bleecker St., N. Y. City. Have important invention. Come in- spect personally. Please wire. John Kcllner. Such was the telegram that l re- ceived late in the morning one exceed- ingly cold Saturday towards the end of January. lt had come from Luzon, New York. The last time I had seen John Kellner was the day I called him into office to show him an invention oi' mine. The telegram brought the pic- ture before my eyes of his short, squat figure, his dark skin, his unruly black hair and his eyes dark and piercing. He always seemed to be looking for something hidden. I often thought he could pierce the very walls of death if he willed. Probably it was his invent- ing mind, making itself felt. At any rate he had invented several import- ant things for the firm, always insist- ing on showing them to me in private first. I never understood this, but humored him. As I was saying, before, I got side- tracked, John Kellner came in at my bidding this time lo see my invention. It was a small improvement that I had patented, nothing really important. I invented that, he said slowly, You stole my idea! and he drew from his pocket a model almost the duplicate of mine. He explained heat- edly that he had thought of the ap- pliance a month before and had com- pleted it the very day. In return I told him that I had applied for a patent about ten days previous. He looked at me, half-opened his mouth as if to speak and left the office. I shivered at the way he looked at me. The telegram was the first word I had had directly or indirectly from him since that day. It seemed clear to me that he had gone off to experiment in secret for it was not at all unlike him. If John called it important, I decided that his invention was worth investi- gating. Yet something told me to send an employee. Ilowever, I knew John would show it to me only so I hunted up Luzon. If found that it was over a hundred miles from the city, on the O. and W. R. R. There was a train leaving at 3 P. M. I wired John and took that train. ' It was about a quarter of eight when I reached Luzon. As I got off the train I was addressed by a thick-looking countryman who said he had come from John's. Witliout stopping to eat I went with him to his buggy. As we rode through the town I inquired about John. The fellow muttered some- thing half unintelligible about queer doings. Naturally the country people Twenty-three

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pink galley is then taken in hand by the editor. An old Prospect of the same number of pages as the pros- pective book is procured from the files, and the dummy, as this is called, is made. The editor has decided before- hand, though in a rather general man- ner, where he wants each article to go. There are two columns to a page and he cuts up the pink galley to lit these columns. Most of the time, however he has a great deal more material than he can fit into the dummy and hence he has the added trouble of deciding what to use, besides the difficulty of arranging it advantageously. The whole job is a most trying and time consuming one, well calculated to try one 's temper. Oft times there are spaces left at the end of an article which cannot be used. Hence a joke or witticism of some kind is introduced as a space filler. Of course it must be just the size required. V VVhere the old cuts, which, by the way, are the drawings prepared for use in the Prospect, are to be used, the edi- tor tits in his galley so that they will appear in the proper place. But Where new cuts are to be used, he pastes in proofs of them where they will appear to the best advantage. The advertise- ments, on the other hand, are arranged in the dummy by the advertising man- ager, usually according to the position called for in the patron's contract. And now that the dummy is made up, it is sent, along with the corrected galleys, to the printer. He makes up the page proof as indicated by the posi- tion of the articles in the pages of the dummy and sends it back to the Pros- pect. We now have a sample of how the publication will appear in print, with Twenty-two the exception that it is not bound in book form. The page proof is proof read by the editor and the teacher in charge. As soon as that operation is completed, the corrected proof is sent back to the printer, who now proceeds to print the pages and to bind them in book form. All that now remains to be done is to distribute the books by means of the circulation depart- ment to the students. Though not directly concerned in the making of the Prospect, the busi- ness staff is just as important as the literary staff, for one could not exist without the other. And because of this it is best to save an explanation of how the Prospect is managed and circulated for a future article. All that now remains for you to do, since the publication is made, is to procure one dime, buy the book and realize and appreciate the Work of the more than thirty people concerned in its production. Willian1, said the Sunday School teacher who had been giving a lesson on the baptismal covenant, Can you tell me the two things necessary to baptism? William- Yes'm, Water ' and a baby. 77 Nicoll who assists Dr. San Giovanni with the late-comers, was one day ac- costed thusly. What time shall I write on my slip? The clock on the desk says 9:07 and the clock on the wall says 9 :01'? What's the odds! replied Nieoll. You should have been here at 9 any- how. VVar is --. Sherman translate.

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would look at John as being decidedly queer with his experiments and such was what I thought. But now it strikes me that he may have meant something else. n VVe were on the outskirts of the village by now. I thought we must be nearing our destination. How long do we drive? I queried. Oh, 'bout an hour, replied my guide after I had asked him twice. Having had no supper this gave me some dismay. Besides it was a good deal colder than I had expected. It was no cheerful journey that I looked forward to. And yet it actually turned out worse than my most pessi- mistic thoughts. As we moved along a mist or fog seemed to come from nowhere, and a slight flurry of snow began to fall. The like of the fog I have never seen. I looked up and saw some stars, yet could not see the horse's head in front of me. At other times it parted before us, only to close in after a time. It would become thick, then thin, it would rise and fall. I felt that every hoof-beat was playing my funeral march, and the fog was dancing to the tune of it. Like thoughts persisted in spite of the fact that I do not believe in presentiments. Perhaps my empty stomach caused them. At length, after what seemed hours, we stopped beside a gate. I got out, and immediately the driver turned around, disappearing into the fog that had troubled me so. I stumbled along a road and found myself before an old, weather-beaten house. It had long since lost its paint, and was now the color of charred wood. I had hardly knocked before the door was opened by John. He looked Twenty-four at me wildly, grabbed my grip, and threw it into the house. I started to say something.about a bite to eat, and a cup of hot coffee, but he interrupted me gru'Tiy. The invention will work better if you don 't eat, he growled, and pulled me in the direction of a shadowy out- line that proved to be a barn. Through the fog it looked like a monstrous ogre waiting to devour me. I shivered violently, half from the cold, half at the thought my morbid brain had conjured up. The barn had at- tached to it one of those tall cylindrical structures called a silo and used for storing corn or other produce. We went up in this, clear to the top and there was a queer contraption indeed. The first thing I noticed was a huge wheel and axle. A heavy rope was wound around the wheel, and at the end attached to the four corners of what looked like a cedar chest. I bent forward to examine and as I did so, something heavy struck the back of my head. A splitting headache brought me back to consciousness. I found my- self, without an overcoat, strapped tightly in a sitting position on the chest. My arms were raised, strapped to the rope above me. Below me was a black void. I looked over at the platform and saw John gazing at me fiercly. Listen! he half shrieked. I felt the box go down a bit just then. You've been tied there since ten o'clock. The box descends an inch every five minutes making a foot an hour. It was just thirty feet from the bottom of this silo to the bottom of that chest. In other words, as it is half-past ten now, you will reach the