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Joaquin Miller

In Memoriam

By Howard V. Sutherland

Still as the hills, among the hills he slumbers,
Watch'd by the stars whose messages he read;
Though he is gone, his memory is with us,

. Spirit with God-the Poet is not dead.
Death takes the clay, that from it things of beauty-
Blossom and tree and multi-color'd grass-
Hint to our sense through oft-repeated symbols
Life cannot end, though every phase must pass.
He is but changed, relieved from mortal burden;
He was a friend, yet never ask'd for guerdon-
Grant we him love!

Think of his songs! Remember his endeavor!
Judge but his best, and think how still he lies
With all earth's solemn weight upon his bosom,
The passion quench'd that lit his sapphire eyes.
He was a man who sang to us, yet labor'd;

He was a man who loved, and who had heard Songs in the dawn that made him sure of heaven; Throughout his life he spoke no coward's word. Others have worn the purple, far from royal; This was a king, because his heart was loyalGive him the crown!

He was the last of all the elder singers;

He was the first to chant our Western shore So that the world, the sluggish world, should listen, Thrill'd to its heart, to heed us evermore. Trees, hoary trees, he knew ye and he worship'd; Seas, singing seas, he knew and understood. Oh, he was steep'd in all our Westland's beauty, Knew its delights from orange-lands to Hood. Others may come and tell to us the story: He was the first: be his the praise, the gloryHis be the fame!

Singing he pass'd the wondrous wide world over,
Finding it fair; and now, though still he lies,
Somehow it seems we see an added splendor

Laid on the hills, the fields, the blessed skies. There, 'mid the stars, where seraphim are chanting, There where he hears the music of the spheres, Gather'd all songs are, when the light falls slanting, Hinting of glory. Let us dry our tears.

When a man passes, having done his duty,
He shall be clothed in other forms of beauty-
Nothing is lost.

Toll not a bell, nor stand above him mourning.
He was for God, and fearing God, for men;
He has but gone to where we, too, must follow,

There to be woven in the woof again..
He was for Light; he dwells where awful splendors
Cleanse of their stain the resurrected souls.

He was for Love; he is where Love transcendent

Laves the white shores between creation's Poles. Kneel once, and pray; then leave him with his roses : He was for Christ, and now with Christ reposes

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T

HE FIRST THING to do is to learn that this longnamed city in Central Mexico, Guanajuato, is simply Wah-na-wah-to, and no more. It is far easier to learn how to pronounce the name of this mountain city than it is to figure out all the twists and turns of its bewildering streets. The name itself is an old Tarascan Indian name signifying "Hill of the Frogs." The streets partake of this frog-like nature, hopping gleefully in a zigzag course that soon brings the visitor around a whole block and back to the place that he started from five minutes before. When airship lines get in operation in

Guanajuato they will be used exclusively to rise from the gorge in which the city is built up to the mountain heights crowned with embowered villas. But until that distant day arrives, the best one can do is to set out with a full lunch basket and let the streets wiggle their worst. This would have been a splendid town for the Pied Piper of Hamelin. He could have so confused the thousand children at his nimble heels that two blocks from home they would have been perfectly befuddled, thinking that they were in a strange and distant country.

But Hamelin town is far remote from Guanajuato of the hills. The

cleaned, and have his back well scratched as a reward of merit. In early days the peons took these tailings from the mines, shaped them into adobe bricks and built rude huts of them. But of later years, when newer processes made it possible to extract a higher percentage of the ores, these humble adobe huts, with their walls of hidden silver, have been torn down and the bricks ground to dust to extract the metal.

High up on the mountain side overlooking this rich gorge stands the stately church of San Cayetano, a treasured temple of riches built for the exaltation of God. This church was planned and financed by one of the old Bonanza Kings, Conde de Real. He was the proprietor of the famous Valenciana mine that has had few worldsuperiors as a wealth producer. The count always had plenty of silver to jin

[graphic]

A type of the box-like houses lining the streets gle in his pockets, and be

of Guanajuato.

sea-mists sweep over Hamelin town; the fleecy mountain clouds hover caressingly over Guanajuato. A person might travel for a lifetime up and down the main line of the railroad through Silao without ever dreaming that back here in the mountains is an old mining town whose silver ribs patient miners have been picking at for over three hundred years. It may be something of a surprise to learn. that these mines have produced in that period silver enough to supply every man, woman and child in the United States with ten shining dollars. Some of the gulch mud is so rich in silver that it would pay a poor peon to train his pet pig to wallow in this mire, then wiggle home to be scraped and

sides, he had three old coffee urns in the

back

yard full of this shining metal, so it was no trick at all for him to build and decorate this superb temple. It was dedicated in 1788, the year before Washington became president. Later it was found that this massive structure stood on the site of the richest mineral deposit in the whole region. Fabulous sums were offered the Conde de Real for the privilege of working this bonanza, but he shook his gray head-the church was in the way. "Ah, but we will remove the church, stone by stone, pillar by pillar, and rebuild it eighty yards from here, without a penny of expense to you," said the exploiting mining company.

"No, I said," thundered the old count. "Where the church has been

THE BOY I HIRED IN MEXICO.

built, there it shall stand until it crumbles away."

Back in 1554, when the muleteers on their way to Zacatecas passed through the Guanajuato Hills, their camp fires roasted silver buttons out of the ground. Thus this wonderful mining region was discovered. Development soon followed-not a paper development with a high-sounding prospectus and an army of white-collared clerks. It was a development that stood for something. It made Guanajuato of the hills a name that attracted the famous Humboldt when he visited Mexico a century ago. He found here two mines producing annually 4,400,000 ounces of silver, or more than one-eighth of the entire American output. For four years the Valenciana mine yielded ore that averaged quite a bit over 100 ounces to the ton.

Of course, with such richness coming freely from the fabulous mines, there were many occasions when these bonanza kings scattered money with a free hand. In fact, the Viceroy Azanza passed a bando in 1800, forbidding godfathers to fling a handful of coins into the street at the time of a christening. Many a time time some proud old millionaire has paved the streets for several squares with silver ingots just to add to the splendor of a christening. Does the church need. a new altar railing? The don would be pleased to provide silver for it to

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the weight of twenty tons. Does the A Mexican senorita of the better class

convent need more extensive gardens? Don Manuel will gladly donate to them the $25,000 he won last night at the gaming tables, or deed the nuns a piece of property that lies nearby.

But if this city is famous for its mines and its money-bags, it should be held as infamous for the system by which much of this ore has been extracted. Picture to yourself an old silver hacienda, a castle-like structure, a fortress within whose protecting walls one could laugh and cry aloud:

"Hang out our banner on the outward wall.

at the water filter.

Our castle's strength shall laugh a siege to scorn!"

Picture to yourself a broad, flat patio within these high walls. Watch the powdered rock coming to the patio from the crusher in the mill. Notice how the peons mix up a huge mud pie of silver and vitriol and mercury. Queer stuff this, and mighty sloppy. Follow the plodding mules as, with blindfolded eyes, they tramp patiently round and round, hour after hour, in this splattering, squashy,

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