Oroville Union High School - Nugget Yearbook (Oroville, CA)

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amply repaid by having known each other—for any and all the suffering they may have had in this old world of ours. Some few years ago 1 became seriously ill and. under the advice of my physician, took a sea voyage to the Mediterranean. Landing in Italy and staying for awhile, I was fortunate enough to secure a little cottage on the shores of the Ligurian Sea in a little place which was evidently the winter home of a few well-to-do people, and yet was out of the beaten track. Such a pretty place it was, with an abundance of flowers and an air of peace and quietude, most gratifying to an invalid; such charming, courteous people, too. It was no wonder that I fell in love with it and wished that I might live there forever. My little house was surrounded by a garden in which flowers grew in aimless confusion, but which I came to love better than my own. My garden was separated from the garden adjoining by an old rock wall. A summer house covered with creepers had been built in the next garden and in the angle formed by the junction of the house and wall, a great tree had forced its way up, breaking down a portion of the summer house and wall. The broken portions had fallen on my side and in clambering up one day to peep into the garden. I discovered that with two cushions, one to sit on and the other to place at one’s back against a bough which grew out over the wall and into my garden, the top of the wall made a beautiful resting place. Thereafter I would come often in the afternoons to sit on the wall and watch the butterflies chase each other through patches of sunlight. There lived, too. in that other garden a tiny fountain which splashed with a tinkly murmur most pleasant and soothing to the ear—so soothing was it that it would quite often lull me to sleep. ()nc afternoon as I sat idling on top of the wall, several carriages filled with people drove up to the gate of the garden next door—the occupants, who were evidently servants, got out and came up the walk car-rying portmanteaux and trunks, which they took into tlie house and immediately all was stir and hustle— doors slamming, windows being opened and shutters caught back—together with much shouting and laughter. which greatiy disgusted me. for I felt that my privacy had been invaded, so I clambered down off the wall and went into my own house. The next morning, although there were signs of life about the house next door, yet everything was orderly and quiet and I concluded that the master and mistress had arrived. It was several days, though, before I mustered up sufficient courage to go back to my old seat upon the wall, for 1 felt that they might think that I was spying upon them, were they to see me. However. I went one afternoon and discovered that my neighbors were an old and a young lady and that they seemed to use their garden very little, so, feeling safe, in the afternoon 1 went back to my old perch. One day, some little time later. I had gone to my aerie and the tinkly little fountain had soothed me into a doze. I was awakened by the sound of voices coming towards the summer house; at first I thought to flee, but feared to do so lest I should be heard. While I was making up my mind, steps entered the summer house and I hardly dared to breathe, much less move, for fear I should be discovered. Well I knew though, when they entered that my presence would never be discovered, for what two young people, for such they were, would heed the pres- 15

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sister’s doll waving frantically in the air by one sawdust limb. “William.” said his aunt severely, “it is not polite to laugh when 1 am reading to you.” “When he was nearly seventeen years old. he was commissioned to survey vast tracts of land in Y ir-ginia ” Miss Jane emphasized every word in an effort to impress her unpromising young relative. “The suffering at Y'alley Forge was very intense during that cold, bitter winter.” she continued. Billy made a pretense behind his aunt’s back of throwing a ball and again laughed aloud, when Johnny made the same pretense. Miss Jane looked at him sternly over her glasses “Billy, you naughty boy. don’t you ever want to be a bright, learned man when you grow up?” And without waiting for an answer to this very important question, she read on carefully and deliberately : “He was chosen first President of the United States.” Billy wound his arms around his knees, resting his chin thereon, and made a horrible face at Johnny, who immediately returned the compliment. “He had no children of his own. so was called the Father of his Country.” Miss Jane closed the book with a bang, turned to the little boy at her side and asked: “W ho was this brave, good and noble man. William?” Jesus.” was the ready and solemn answer. “Why! W illiam Lincoln Saunders! I don’t believe you heard one word I read!” Billy was puzzled, for he was sure she had said. “Born in a manger.” and that surely was Jesus. “She didn’t say anything about a ‘log cabin.’ so ’tain’t Ab’a-ham Lincoln: and she didn’t say anything about ‘Give me liberty or give me death, so ’tain’t Patrick Henry. Gee! I wished I’d listened.” thought the naughty child. Jesus!” his aunt was saying in a horrified voice, born in Virginia and Father of our country!” Billy received his cue. “Oh! auntie. I meant George Washington.” he said sweetly. —STELLA SHARKEY. 15. “ BASIL AU REV01 R ” Myself. 1 am an old man. and now that 1 am beginning to get very tired and sleepy in the afternoon—a sure sign of advancing age—it seems to me that I should put on paper the secret 1 have cherished for so many years. It occurs to me that some of these, my neighbor’s children, who love to play in this old garden of mine and who are soon to grow up, may do as I did. in ignorance of that which is given us as a compensation for having existed at all—and I am sure that those two lovers of whose love I shall write were

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encc of an old man. even though they knew it. Through the gap in the roof I saw them enter and. except that he was tall, so tall that he had to stoop to clear the doorway, and she just tall enough to pass beneath the lintel. I could not see plainly what they were like, for the sunlight, striking from behind me through the tear in the roof, threw a little patch of light in the center of the summer house, leaving the doorway and side in shadow. In front of him. and against his left breast he carried his right hand and in it lay hers, and in this wise, bending over and talking very earnestly, they entered. As they did so. he released her and stepped to the center of the house, to stand right in the patch of sunlight, thus leaving her again in the shadow. Here he waited for his answer. What a man he was. tall, as I have said, and broad of shoulder; dark, with black wavy hair and black eyes and a well modeled head; the lines of his chin and mouth bespeaking firmness and decision. He was a man to fill the eye of any maid; moreover, he was a man’s man, one whom men would follow; one would know that nature meant him for a leader. Presently she spoke, and it became evident, as she did so. that he had been urging his suit, for in a voice soft, low, and yet wonderously clear, she told him that she could not choose for herself, that she was bound to her people, that should she abdicate to become his bride, leaving her cousin, a weakling, to fill her place, the nation would be torn by civil war. and left open to acts of aggression by her stronger neighbors—that even now, her people torn and wearied by the conflicts of preceding years, looked for her to cement by marriage, an alliance with the house of Romanoff which would insure peace within her borders and a cessation of the attacks of her neighbors. Silently and sadly he listened as she spoke and as she stopped he lifted up his head, and throwing out his arms, he burst into a plea for her happiness and his. If she left her people, he would give her his. and had she not as much right to her own happiness as any one of her subjects? Forty thousand wild mountain blades he could give her and were they not enough against her enemies on the plains below? lie would take her to his mountain fastnesses where no Romanoff. nor two or three of them, would ever dare to come. Queen of himself and of his people she should he. of a nation old as the hill? themselves, who called no man master, but who would be privileged, indeed, to call her mistress. Swiftly he spoke, reminding her that when as a little lad he had come down out of the hills with his father in the old King’s time, they had played together in the Palace (harden and she had laughingly promised to marry him when they grew up and how they had gone to his father and the old King and told them, and how they smiled, one to the other, and said. “It may be?” True, that was before she became the reigning Princess, but had he not. while yet a lad. been at the bedside of the dying King, and did not the old man put his hand on his head and say. “Re good to Del-pliia. boy”. All his life he had waited for her and now lie claimed her. they were man and woman now and they owed to themselves something more than they owed to their people—throwing wide his arms, he called her to him. once, twice, and swiftly, as he called, she came, and as she passed into the patch of sunlight 1 caught a vision of wondrous beauty, blue eyes, well lashed, outrivaling the Mediterranean in their depth and color, a perfect mouth, half open, with a tiny dimple at one corner struggling in its desire to both laugh 16