St Johns Ravenscourt School - Eagle Yearbook (Winnipeg, Manitoba Canada)

Page 78 text:

' Rotofk %dt tTfo OU Horn t7 ' Jwttp The trans-continental was heading due west, And I was the engineer. The Fireman, porter and driver blessed, Were a staff who had never known fear. If you think that this crew could great things do, Then there you have a wrong lead, For the fireman, porter and driver too Had no trust in their fellow breed. First they decided the porter was drunk. (A frightful mistake indeed!) That poor man in the soup they did dunk ’Twas truly a terrible deed. The fireman said that the driver took dope, And couldn’t handle a train. So he fixed the affair with an envelope Of heroin and cocaine. I decided the fireman must have gone mad To handle the driver so. I said I’ll do something terribly bad, And out of the window you go.” The Trans-continental was heading due west With only one man aboard. I had disposed of all the rest, And was getting a little bit bored. Patrick True love, Grade 7EW. The old store looked ghostlike in the majestical light of the rich, full moon. The overgrown lawns were edged with what once had been whitewashed stones. One door was off its hinges, windows were broken and curtains were shut. The front steps were rotten, the road had hollows, the chimney was down and the shut¬ ters were lying on the sandy soil. The whole edifice seemed to lean one way and visibly sway in the thick dampness of the growing night. The effect it produced was somewhat like that of needles running up and down the spine. The old kitchen was laden with cobwebs. A drop of water fell from the ceiling into a dried puddle on the linoleum which was cracked and contorted into rolls. The heavy iron ranges were an orange colour because of the rust. The oil lamp, in the middle of the room, hung swaying in the wind which pushed through the gaping hole where the door should have been. The stairway was covered with dust that had collected over years. In the dust were footprints of enormous size. The stairs were worn and with every step the wood creaked. In a collection of dust at the landing at the top of the stairs stood the tramp. He was dressed in an old double-breasted suit. Peek¬ ing from behind a dirty satin scarf was an old plaid shirt. His trousers hung from one suspender and fell to his shoes which were covered with greasy spots. In his breast pocket was a red and white polka-dot hand¬ kerchief. His hair was long and unkempt. His eyes were black and shifty. His nose was bulbous and the thick lips were stained brown from his fat cigar. His chin was covered with a thick black stubble. In his hand was a bottle of beer. Altogether he was repulsive. James Hutchison, Grade 7EW. M Somuuj StAoll It was a winter’s windy day, The snow was falling fast. I took a walk beside the bay, While all the cars went past. I heard the children having fun, Their voices loud and clear. They laughed and sang till day was done, And night was drawing near. The moon came out; the sky was clear. The stars they twinkled bright. I wished that I could stay right here, Until the day broke light. David Quinton, Grade 7EW. 75

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' Hojfk did FRONT ROW, Left to Right: Alvi, Hutchison, Sprague, Bowden, Cruickshank, McGill, Ross, Kernahan, Truelove, Goldring. MIDDLE ROW: Mr. Beare, Hogg, Hjartarson, Klassen, Annett, Grymonpre, Taylor, Guest, Haworth, Meredith. BACK ROW: Quinton, Bond, Clark, Christie, Jacob, Krueger, Beech, d’Agincourt, Ramsay, Bredin, Guest. Halloween, ' JtMlq by Alan Bennett This year we had a very successful Hallowe’en Party with some of the most colourful costumes we’ve ever had. Hours of discussion and work went into them before the big day arrived. On the afternoon of October 31st, the gym was filled with an assortment of witches, goblins, hippies and Generals de Gaulle much to the delight and amusement of the many visitors and staff. On our entrance, the whole school paraded round the gym and then separated into their various forms to await judgement. As their turn came, the different forms paraded before the judges, who were chosen at random by the audience, so that the winners, three from each form, could be chosen. What a difficult task they had! After the contest, we all went to the dining hall for treats and the winners received their cakes. On behalf of the school I would like to thank the teachers, the kitchen staff and the judges, not to mention the many parents who produced such colourful costumes, for making the party such a success. t7 It Sijmpkoiuf toMMi by James Hutchison This concert, sponsored by the Women’s Committee of the Symphony Orchestra, is put on annually to help cultivate interest in young people for classical music. It is attended by many classes up to fifteen years of age. Even if their ef¬ forts cause just one person to become interested, they have succeeded in their purpose. The concert is usually made up of a variety of short pieces, classical, modern and novelty. The ones best received are the novelty numbers which can have whistlers and many other distracting effects. The more modern pieces are received with almost as much interest. The classical variety, unfortunately, are the least popular. The concert opened with a classical overture by Rossini, Semiramide”. This was quite lively and contained a beautiful solo passage for the horn. This was followed by a modern composition by the Russian, Shostokovitch, called the Golden Eagle. This introduced the xylophone which held the attention of most of the audience. The most intrigu¬ ing piece was a novelty number by Leroy Anderson entitled The Waltzing Cat”. In it the symphony howled like cats much to the delight of the younger members of the audience. The last piece was the ballet music to Billy the Kid” by the contempory composer Aaron Copland and was divided into four short movements. The whole concert was a great success. Everyone, or nearly everyone, enjoyed it and it was well worth while. It could have encouraged more than one future artist to make music his, or her, career.

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A Svmd A th ' TauMiw I had been given a note for a certain Eric Muller which I was to deliver within the hour. From the mom¬ ent I heard the name, my brain conjured up a picture of what he would be like. A short middle-aged man, I had decided, with a blank expression on his face. He would have a grey beard and a mumbling voice. In fact, I would have felt a great deal happier if I had been going the other way, my mission completed. Such were my thoughts about Mr. Eric Muller. As I walked along the green avenue, I could scarcely help noticing how beautiful everything around me was. It was mid-summer and all the flowers were in full bloom. The leafy, overhanging boughs of the trees al¬ most touched their equivalents on the other side of the path. Thus it was that I walked through a dark green tunnel rather than on a path through the trees. The forest stopped abruptly, suddenly and surpris¬ ingly, and there, before my astonished eyes, was an ocean of fields, stretching away into the distance as far as the horizon. There was a shabby, little, unpainted farm house which bore such a sad and mournful ex¬ pression that one actually had compassion for it. There, in the middle of all this, was Eric Muller — at least it must have been he, for I knew that he lived alone. But how unlike the picture I had of him. Here indeed was a throw-back of earlier ages. His bearing alone told me that he was no ordinary man. He stood about six feet-three and was as straight as a pine tree. He was chopping firewood when I arrived and though his axe was by no means sharp, he sliced through the logs as though he were using a huge razor blade. As for his features he resembled an ancient Greek statue, for no one could mistake the straight nose and entirely symmetrical features that marked that old civilization. Then he noticed me. What would you like?” he in¬ quired, and from that moment on I decided that if I was anywhere near Mr. Muller I would be safe from anything. Below a bare waning bulb lay a strong figure of about thirty years of age. His pale but stern fullmoon face telling the tale of a decade of strict confinement. His dark hazelnut eyes were sad and forlorn in their solitude. The accompanying brown hair was cropped into practical nonexistence by the prison barber. The name of this destitute figure was Sam Bradly, once a proud and arrogant Halifax gangster, now only a lowly inmate of Kingston Penitentiary, sentenced to eighteen years for his misdemeanors. His lot was a sorry one, up at eight, to bed at ten. I, his attorney, pushed my way through the stale air towards my for¬ saken client. His chamber was a bleak cell in row thirty-four on the second floor. The cracked ceiling showed up very well its 1911 vintage. In one corner of the roof a leak in the overhead pipes was positioned. This tormentor had haunted Sam for the first two years. The bed dated from World War II. The only window was barred and was six feet above the concrete floor. The cell had a single cold water sink which, on cold December morn¬ ings, was covered by a single layer of ice. The heating was far from adequate and on cold January nights the icy knives of cold stabbed through the inmate’s flesh to slash his vertebrae. As it was, in mid July, the cell was like a hot oven and it baked its tenant to unbear¬ able degrees of anguish. Often when water was sorely needed it was non-existent. I marvelled how such a free-spirited creature could bear such regularity and compulsion. His strong back and sharp mind were becoming useless through idle¬ ness in an institution of this nature. Few sounds carried down the hallway, the clatter of time trays. Smells, there were many of them; the stench of the sulphur refinery, the unappetizing aroma of mass-produced meals, the rancid odour of ammonia and disinfectant. Life wasn’t always bad. At Christmas and Thanks¬ giving the joyous air was filled with the fragrance of turkey plus all the trimmings. The prison at Yuletide was filled with joy. As I closed the heavy iron door my mind was filled with his tale and the plea, Please, oh please, get me out of here!” Stuart Guest, Grade 7EW. 76