Willard Middle School - Target Yearbook (Berkeley, CA)

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The Mysterious Mountain A True Story N HIS room at a little hotel in Shasta County Mr. F sat for an hour pouring over the chart which showed the location of a certain fossil bed deposit he was about tc explore. At daybreak next morning he started out with an old long-haired Indian guide, and two pack horses. After journeying for a few hours, he became concerned about the indirect route along which he was being led. He knew the right direction was due north, and he suddenly real- ized that he was travelling southwest. Hey, Quio! Mr. F called out, jumping off his horse. You ' re taking me the wrong way. But Quio rode stubbornly along. Again he called out, Stop Quio! What ' s the matter with you? From his saddle bag Mr. F took out the chart. He was studying this carefully when Quio finally came back. With one hand on the chart and the other indicating a great pine mountain, Mr. F spoke sternly, You ' ve taken me at least three miles out of the way. We should have gone close to that mountain. I not go that way. Mountain him heap bad. What do you mean by that, Quio? laughed Mr. F All mountains are good. ' Him heap bad mountain, he got devil inside. A devil inside ? Who told you that? Wait, and I tell you. Together they sat down beneath a pine, and as they filled their pipes, Quio related the following: Long, long, long time ago, the first born of my mother ' s mother, and two other girls had lovers who went on a hunt. One day girls went to medicine woman to have their fortunes told. She say they must go through cave in that mountain to a pool, bathe their foreheads, and make a wish. Pretty soon they went in, the daughter of my mother ' s mother ahead, carrying a pitch torch. They did what the medicine woman told them. The torch went out. They took hold of hands to find way back. 1 hey got lost. Bye and bye daughter of my mother ' s mother screamed loud, pulled hands of other girls. Only two girls came back, pale like a log without bark; said the devil took the other girl. But exactly where is this cave, Quio? Right near the north trail. After eating lunch Mr. F said, Come on, let ' s go into that cave and see what the devil looks like. No, no, you go. I stay here.

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Frances grabbed the paper and read it. Oh, how wonderful ! Do you think the boys wrote it? They can ' t write poetry. I know that, said Matilda, because I remember writing it for them when they had to write it for school. The sun next morning, as it looked over the top of the mountains, saw the girls sneak out of the house with shovels in their hands. The tree was easily found as it was conspicuously taller than the others around it. The girls started digging, seldom talking, as if the magic of the early summer morning had cast a spell over them. As Matilda was soon tired, they stopped, covered up the hole, and started back to the house. They did the same thing every morning for several weeks. Each day Matilda was able to dig longer. No one had discovered their ab- sence from home as they went early and came back before anyone was up. One day they came to a little box beautifully carved out of a solid piece of wood. In it was a piece of paper bearing these words : By digging, digging, digging, For the treasure which you sought, Not even stopping to think, ' Twas not of substance wrought; IT was your health. What poetry! sighed Frances. Yet how romantic! Those horrid boys, exclaimed Matilda. — MARJORIE DUNLAP. O To Night O Night, around the drowsing Phoebus gently draw thy sable cloak; Call upon thy whispering zephyrs all their magic to invoke; Summon forth your fairy starlets with their silver lanterns lit. Ask Diana, too, to help you; call the fireflies out to flit Round among the dark ' ning shadows that will soon loom from above; Let us show the slumb ' ring Phoebus all the tokens of our love. All this day hath Phoebus warmed us, clothed us in the sunshine bright. Now that he would sink to slumber, lull him to his rest, O Night! — NINA BANCROFT.

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The sound of a horse ' s hoofs could be heard as Mr. F hur- ried toward the north trail. At the entrance to the cave he took a candle and a ball of twine from the saddle bag. From the formation of the rocks in ceiling and walls, he believed the cave once to have been the bed of a river. He tied the string to a projecting stone and followed it seventy-five feet or more with the lighted candle in hand. Mr. F found the pool as Quio had described. A few feet beyond this his candle light fell upon a dark cavern which proved to be a large and dangerous shaft, fully fifte en feet deep. He tied the string to the candle which he lowered slowly into the empty hole. Bending over the sloping edge of the shaft, he saw on a small rocky ledge, six feet below him, an object. It was the torch. At the bottom of the hole he saw bones and decayed garments of the old Indian ' s aunt. Mr. F took the bones back to Quio — all except the skull which he kept to present to the University of California. He left Quio and his relatives soon after they had performed the sad duty of burying the bones of their loved one, whom they thought the devil had devoured. With the bones also was buried the superstition that the devil reigned in Mystery Mountain. Mr. F continued his journey alone to the fossil beds. — HERBERT LYSER. O To Satyrs Drink, ye Satyrs, and sing with glee, Songs of merry minstrelsy. Roll and tumble on the earth In your ecstasy of mirth. Pan his pipes is now a-sounding, Haste and be around him bounding. Fill your cups and while you ' re drinking On the grass with joy be sinking. Fill the air with song and jest And let it be your very best For in yon streamlet that is ghst ' ning, A naiad dwells whose ear is list ' mng. FLORENCE STAPLES.