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

Page 14 text:

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

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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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A SO SC OF THE ROAD 13 ( )r the flung snow-drift of the plains Freezes the life Flood in the veins ()f the unfit, for they That take the fortune of the road Shall know the force of hunger’s goad. They learn to write in hardship’s code The lives they fling away. There was one once, a pal I had. And with what clasp this siren mad Held him! He was a Harvard grad Who’d thrown life for a loss; He had a fighter’s jaw and lips. A hero's thews like corded whips From shoulder span to tapering hips. Lord! What a man he was! I hit like those fleeting storms that rise Across the changing vernal skies, Murned in the blue depths of his eyes. The world-old restlessness. And when life smiled—Alas! How rare! He'd sing me songs that told how fair The poet’s soul was bound somewhere Leneath the hobo’s dress. And many a lazy Summer day. Stretched on some meadow lawn we’d lay, While he regaled the hours away With tales his fancy drew; He’d conjure from his fertile brain Songs of the forest and the plain, And where, adown the Southern main. The Summer isles are blue; And ever would his poetry steal Lack to some fanciful Ideal, An Island kingdom—and Cecile. The lady of his dreams. “Cecile,’’ says he. “the days are drear.