University of San Francisco - USF Don Yearbook (San Francisco, CA)

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PATHS or THE PADRES 11 If the ruined mission, a temple bereft of its ceremonies, a sanctuary without spirituality, a crumbling corpse, long since separated from the religious activity that animated it, appears, even thus, beautiful to the eye, what must have been its attractiveness, its grandeur, when it was livened by the peal of the Angelus, bestirred by the thread of sandled feet, vivified by the presence of its soul—the ritual of a practiced faith ? Fair and stately in death, it must have been of a transcendent beauty in the bloom of life. 'I'he explanation of the California mission’s present loveliness is seen when we reflect that every great institution leaves its impress upon future ages. The temples of the Greeks are buried under the debris of years. The Roman forums are barely traceable in the dust of centuries but their influence still lives and they speak—even from their ruins. So it is with the California mission. It’s beneficent influence survives. It is eloquent even in its mute and silent ruin. The California mission will last forever. The padre could exclaim, with Horace. “Exegi menu-mentum acre perenniusr

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JO THU I GNAT I AS' Years of such toil and patience resulted in the establishment of a long chain of famous missions, along the “El Camino Real.” To recite the names of these missions from San Diego in the south to Sonoma in the north is to recite a most beautiful Litany of the Saints. Why do we not learn more of this wonderful period? W hile engrossed in the temporal activities of their missions, while attending to the field, the table and the flock, while leading with gentle hand “the strange, sad, melancholy savage” along the paths of labor, the California missionaries bore ever in their hearts a wonderful zeal for their higher spiritual duties. Their temporal labors were but the means by which they accomplished their nobler supernatural purpose. The feeble Indian mind could not grasp the most fundamental and primary truths: the dull edge of their intellects could not penetrate the simplest abstract problems. Their inherited slowness of comprehension convinced the wise Franciscan that, not along the path of knowledge, but along the path of honest labor and wholesome toil should the neophyte be led. Many calumnies have been uttered against the missionaries: much criticism of the mission system has been made. An unprejudiced, diligant inquiry, however, will disclose only that which was appropriate, noble and innocent, will only increase the glory of the humble padres of California. After reverting even for a moment to the mission days, after awakening memories that hover about ivied walls and lonely sanctuaries, we can not without a pang of regret turn from those warmful, interesting scenes of mission history to the cold, crumbling adobe that to-day marks in silence the old grounds and the old days. And yet all is not lost. There yet remains a beauty thriving in ruins, an enchantment surrounding whitened walls, a romance filling the California breeze. The missions are impressive still.

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12 THE 1GXATIAX A Bam} nf tb iSnab V in cent William Hallinan, A. ! ., ’19. There’s something in the camp fire’s light That’s kinda got me going to-night; I Relieve me. Bo, I’ve got it right— The fever’s coming back : (hit yonder where the grey pack reigns. The night is whispering to the plains. The night-wind’s spell is in my veins. It drives me in its track. I’m due to go; I know the sign; There's something in this blood of mine That calls me off the beaten line. Bids “Come” and go I must; It’s foundling of the South-sea’s spray, The zephyrs of the mountain way. It’s jungle depths and sea-lapped cay, It’s called the Wanderlust! A thousand times I’ve tried to shake Away the charm its memories wake, I’ve bent my very heart to break Its sinister spell, and then Out of the South would conic the call; I’d see the well-known scenes and all The old familiar haunts, and fall. Ah! what a curse it’s been! And with what strength it holds the man Who follows in its causeless van: It’s held in thrall since time began The race that don’t fit in; Xor does its mystic message seek The craven-hearted or the weak. And those who learn at last to speak Its siren tongue are men: Spill on their tracks the midnight trains