Polytechnic High School - Caerulea Yearbook (Long Beach, CA)

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I V ' IlllIIIIIIIIlIIIlIIIllIIIlllllllllllllllllIlIlIIIIIlllllllllllIHIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIlIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIlllllllllllllllllllliig consulshipg that in the future I can help prevent war by being a factor in the peaceful arbitration of our problems, to keep other fathers' hearts from breaking. I'm proud of my son, though. The newspapers were full of his heroism. He died at the head of his comrades, cheering them on to victory. fMac has sunk dejectedly into the depths of his chairj Allison: Come, come, Gardiner, I hate to interrupt your postmortem, but we've got to be traveling. Mac: frousing himself, You're going to Buenos Aires? Is there room for another in your car? Gardiner: To be sure. Yourself? Mac: No-my pard here is going that way.-fGood byes are said. Gardiner extends his hand, and Mac grips it firmly in both of his-They are gone. Mac huddles over the flickering flames. Dejected, sobbing, he cries outj-Dear old Dad-it would kill him, he must never know. A DREAM SHIP Hazel Valby Far out upon the combing seas I saw A dream ship, a fairy galleon. I stood upon a windfswept hill and longed To sail with it to the world's end, but, no- My task's unfinished. Oh ship, will you come again? MY BOOK HAVE never seen him, but I think he must be PREVIEWER rather a gouty old gentleman with huge, forbid' ding, heavy, darkfrirnmed spectacles, and a bristly little whiskbroom of a mustache. And I think the pet word in his swear' ing vocabulary is humph! This is conjecture, but there are things about him that I know: for instance, that he has a very cynical disposition, and that he is fond of appending explanatory footnotes to the books we read. I say we be' cause I am sure that either our literary tastes are very similiar, his and mine, or he has read and reviewed all the books there are, for I find his tracks in nearly every library book I read. I met him first in George Meredith's The Egoistf' In this particf ular copy he had painstakingly inserted a t in the word wherever he

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7 28 CAERULEA 25 IIIIIIIlllllIIIIIIlIIIIIIIIIIlllllllllllllIlIllllIlllIllIIIlllIKllllIIlllIllllIIIlllllIIIIIIIIIIllIIIIIlIIIIIllIlllIllIIIlIIIIIIIIIIlIIIIIIIIIIllllIIIIIIIIIIIIlIIlllIIllIlIllllHIIllIIIIIIIIIIIIIlIIIIIIIllllllIIIllIlllllllllllllllllllllllll had deserted her in her hour of need. So I changed my name and came here, not to forget, for that could never be, but merely to live out my life. If there is any mercy, any commiseration in heaven, it will not be long now. fThe fire has burned low. Both men are silent and gaze fixedly into the dying embers. Neither is aware of the sounds outside until there comes a rap at the door.j Cook jumps to his feet and opens it. Two middlefaged men, blue and numb from the cold, enterj Allison: Whew! Coldest night in years. Saw your light, so brought my comrade here, who's pretty much petered out by this cold, to see if we couldn't warm him up some. Mac: frousing himself from his lethargyj Of course we can. Glad to see you. It's not often that we see anybody out here. Allison: That's pretty decent -of you. We've driven for hours. Guess we took the wrong road there in the mountains somewhere. We were in such a hurry to get back to Buenos Aires tonight. fMac replenishes the fire and makes the coffee while Cook eagerly questions the visitorsj Cook: Mac, here, and I are starved for news of the world. I'Iaven't seen a soul for six months. Who was elected President? Last I heard La Follette was going over big. Allison: Yes? Well, Cal won by a huge majority, which shows that most Americans don't go in for radicalism. Cook: Radicalism? Why man, La Follette is not radical, he's prof gressive. But we can argue later. I'Iow's foreign relations? Allison: Pretty much settled down. Gardiner: Qwho has revived with the warmthj Lord knows, they ought to be after the last war killing off a fourth of our civilization. Allison: Yes, my friend here, Mr. Gardiner- fMac jumps to his feet, his face pale as death, Cook: What's the matter, Mac? Mac: Ch nothing, that confounded coyote out there startled me. fbut he scans his visitor's face intently, oblivious of Allison's wordsj Allison: Mr. Gardiner, who is our Consul to South America, is very bitter toward war. It took his only son. During this speech an expression of joyous recognition lights up Mac's thin face. He leans forward to grasp Gardiner's hand but is stopped by his words. Gardiner: Yes, it robbed me of the grandest boy that ever lived. At the irst call to arms he left, eager to sacifice his life for Old Glory. Oh the lonesome years since then! It's in his memory that I entered the

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30 CAERULEA '25 lllllIIIIIIIIIIIIHIIIIIlllllllllllllllllllIIIIIIIHIIVIIIV lllllllllllllllllllllll IIIIIlllllllllllllIllllllllllI llllllllllll II IlllllllllllllllIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIllllIIllIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIH found it. Whether he believed it to be a typographical error, or a technical misapprehension -of Meredith's, I do not know, but Sir Willoughby be' came, to my old friend, and probably to many others after him, an egotist instead of an egoist. He gives me reason to believe that he is either married or unmarried, for he has called attention to these words in a volume of Bacon's essays: Wife and children are impediments to great enterprises, and The or' dinary cause of a single life is liberty. These words he has underlined most emphatically. In the first paragraph of a translation of the Qdyssey he has inserted a marginal note to the effect that the interpretation is very poor, and he confidentially urges the reader to resort to the original Greek. A certain collection of short stories he has subjected to a very characf teristic transcription, labelling those stories which pass his censorship and likewise those that have failed to meet with his approval. These he has condemned summarily as illogical , sentimental , or exaggerated Markheim, in particular, he explains, is altogether improbable both in development and climax. I am inclined to believe that, besides being cynical, he is almost ag' gressively conservative. In the preface to Androcles and the Lion by Bernard Shaw, in which the author challenges some of the principles of Christianity, there is a very acid margin note by my ,old friend, in which he raps Mr. Shaw severely and advises the literary pilgrim that no good can come of reading such radical propaganda, indeed, so sure is he of its unwholesome effect, that he states he has never permitted himself to read it. I was reading the other day Emerson's essay on Manners , but I found no traces of him there. Leave us the word American-. Leave us the consolation and pride which the term American, however modified, still imparts. Take away that term and though you should coin in telling phrase your highest eulogy, we would hurl it back as common slander. -Senator William E. Borah