The San Francisco Call. Newspaper, May 30, 1897, Page 28

2 2 6 THE SAN FRANCISCO CALL, SUNDAY, MAY 30, 1897, THE FAMOUS HAUNTED CELL IN THE MARIN COUNTY ] It was late when we reached San Rs-! fael, on our way to visit Marin County’s | baunted cell. It haa been a warm day, and the air scintillated still with the heat, | and the trees languidly tried to fan them- | selves after ihe exertion of enduring. The | flowers glanced at us from between the | cracks, nodded over the fence tops and | showered their petals down rom above, | welcoming us with the perfume of their‘ warm breath. The cool evening shadows | began to creep after us, doubtfully, like naugzhty children who have stayed away 100 long. | “Going to jail” is not the pleasantest | thing on earth, even with a clear con- | cetence. 1 tried to fancy how one would | feel to be chained and led to a dungeon | along a pathway strewn with flowers, | with a load of sin upon his soul and the consciousness that the world knew of his | guilt. To endure hell in. the midst of | heaven must be no worse. | We paused on the lawn in front of the| Courthouse and viewed the prison from | without. There were a few blank, staring windows that contrasted strangely with the green, smiling lawn. There was noth- | ing unusual about it. It was like all the | rest. “Did you want the County Clerk?” asked a voice at my elbow in dulcet tones. | Turning I saw an elderly gentleman with a world of mischief in his eyes and | two dollars’ worth of expectation in his | smile. | “Noj; the Sheriff.” | He hurried away, with a disappointed | droop of his shoulders, while I, feeling a | bitterness arising in my soul against good Dame Fashion, who decreed white veils, | hastened up the steps to make my identity known. The Sheriff—I think it was that worthy gentleman, if not, the people of Marin | County have made a mistake, for he should be—took his important-leoking | keys from the drawer and led us into the bal ant to see the haunted cell and stay | there”; he spoke with a falling inflection, | eyed us and smiled cynically—the kind of | a smile that impresses you with the | owner's knowledge of the world and | human nature, and tells you plainly that | he thinks that you are a harmless lunatic playing the part of a fool. That is, a smile which is owned chiefly by politicians, although at times it is bor- rowed by newspaper editors. i “Want to be locked in, I suppose?”’ he went on, jingling his keys unpleasantly, and stiil eying us with that smile, eurving his lips. ~‘Want to wait till the ghost ap- pears, hey? Well, it’s a nice cool place to wait in. There's only one fellow down there now, locked up for vagrancy, five | s | Mentally I thanked heaven that my sen- tence was lighter—booked ons night for curiosity. Icompared the two—vagrancy and curiosity. The latter deserved the beavier punishment. “This is where we used tohang people,” said the individual with the keys, as he pushed aside the Ic 1aid strips of car- | though the spectators cheered pet and exposed the trap. fastened up above there and”—he pushea spring is right here in the wall. The con- demned man was brought up these stairs, slipped on the trap, the black eap was c¢rawn over his face, some one touched the spring and, zip—oh, I've seen lots of ‘em 1" | open the door leading downstairs—‘'the | “The rope was | quering beasts of the forest, than such de- | praved ignominy. We followed the Sheriff Gown the wooden steps and into the damp of the prison . air. He showed us the cell of Colonel Finigan and told us how he bad entered there a rich man and in ashort time had gone into the world again to go through insolvency, and he smiled mean- | HAUNTED CELL IN THE MARIN COUNTY JAIL. He spoke pleasantly, nay cheerfully, as | ingly again. thougzh it were a trifling thing to hurla human being into that mysterious condi- tion known as death, “What will his wife do?’ “She can’t do anything, now,’” he said, To bind a man and | as he turned away, “‘but she’ll come out lead him to death like a dog while the | all right. There’s no gotting away from a curse, the disgrace falls upon the innocent | woman.” —for after death there is no disgrace. Which may have been true—with ex- Civilization has not gained so much | ceptions, as in all rules — but it was after all, when people of supposed ad- vancement can nod in approval at the | fixed date of a hanging; can prowl about | door was unlocked into the further corri- and gloat over the helpless misery of the | dor and the whitewashed walls gleamed | victim and beg for permission to witness | ghastly in the half light. the last agony. Actuated by intense ha- tred or a deep-seated wron:it might be pardonable—revenge—anything is prefer- able to idle, morbid curiosity. Better, it seems, would be theden of wild animals and death in fighting, even the con- { | scarcely polite. The keys clanked unpleasantly as the We passed the cell where the vagrant lay—an oid man, broken in body and soul, with pitiful, un- certain eyes and trembling hands. He shoula have been resting in this evening, after his battle of life, in the shelter of love, hiding his scars and bear- | ing the wounds until he should sink away. instead of lying on an iron cotin a dank cell, alive and unfriended, his food the prison fare served to him in rusted tins. ““Bad luck, pardner!” He sat up and looked at us and swayed his body back ana forth in feeble assent. “Go wy from here,” he said; *’tis not for you!” Then he lay back and closed his eyes, while I looked longingly toward the outer door. Most glad would I have been to “‘go wy.” ““He was hunting for a poorhouse or besgar’s home, or a poor-farm or some- thine, and got in here,” said our gnide. “‘Poor old fellow,” said a companion. w do they get so low?” h, he’s all right, getting board and lodging free for a few days. You women are too a—sympathetic.’” There were two large cells opening into each other, and containing, respectively, two tanks or dark cells. We went into the inner one and looked about. A more uninviting place I have never seen. There was no connection with the outside save through the other cell. The walls were whitewashed, blank and glaring; an iron 1 ’// /. 'y/ Wik ot / [i75 cot, with a rougn blue blanket, sat in a corner. That was all the furnishing. “Tais is the haunted place!” he said, going toward the further tank. *In here aman hung himself. See,” he went on, *‘there’s where he tied' the rope—up there, and swung himself off, quite neatly. It's his ghost that comes back. A Chinaman hung himself in the other cell, but he don’t seem to hauntit. Guess now he’s got out of it, he prefers to stay.” “But this ghost?” “Well, there was a young woman here from somewhere. She was trying to paint the town, and we locked her in here. In the morning she swore that the ghost came out of the cell where the fellow hung himself, and crouched in the corner nearest the door. She described him, and it is not probable she had ever heard of the incident. “Then there wasa Chinaman who said he saw a ghost, and when we let him out in the morning he was nearly crazy with fright. Lots of people deciare it is no myth.” “‘And you credit the story?'’ He smiled and shook the keys a bit, THE GHOST AS IT IS SAID TO HAVE BEEN SEEN. “I have never stayed here to see,’”’ he said. “I will believe you in the morning.” Then he passed down and out of the ball. I heard his hurrying steps and the grate of the keys in the lock. Then I looked at my companions aud shuddered. I am quite sure they shuddered toc.! “Brave or not,” said one, *1 wouldn’t stay here alone for the world. What isit that makes one feel so sleepy ?”’ There was no doubt about the feeling whatever it might result from. The thought of anything intangible and inca- pable of being understood and which one cannot wrestie with is distressing. Itis not fear—it is a feeling as difficult of ex- planation as is its cause. The quickly gathering darkness played tricks with the gray light that filtered in through the one grated window. It gath- ered in the corner and formed elusive sbapes and chased that welcome intruder out into the open air, where finally with one sigh it gathered its forces and fled, leaving ali in complete darkness. We sat on the rough couch and leaned against the wall and talked. Our voices echoed strangely in the stone place as we told of weird happenings, of sudden, unex- plainable and unusual deaths. We re: counted tales of sudden madness, caused by the reappearance of thuse who had passed beyond the grave, of all the awful sights and sounds which had been told to us. We recalled stories of the dissecting- rooms, and agreed that it was really fool- ish to be superstitious. And with charm- ing consistency—to be expected, I suppose, from women—we refused to move or sleep. We spoke in lower and still lower tones, until our voices became whispers, and we breathed carefully, thankful that we could not see each other, but longing wistfully for daylight. 1 must have falien aslesp, anxious as I was to keen awake, for I started suddenly to find myself stiff with cold and some- what confused as to my location. Remem- bering suddenly, I looked in the direction of the door, which stood partially ajar, into the other cell a few feet from our sol tary window. Gradually something light assumed proportions, and two arms were stretched across the top of the door. Cold in excess, broken rest, and a fresh fund of ghost stories, are apt to make one nervous and apprehensive. I did rot move until I was positive that there was something there. Then I awoke the others. “Awake?" I asked. “Yes! what’s the matter ?” “Look at the door!” “Nothing there!’’ spoken in low whis- pers, as though in fear of disturbing some- thing. | They say that supercatural things are | oftentimes visible to but one person in a | company. I was beginning to fear that I was the unlucky individual who could see, when the artist struck a match, walked to the door, grabbed something, Le'd up to our view a man’s white flannel undershirt, then peered out the window and remarked that it would soon be day- light. | ““How did that get there?” = «Jt was there when we came In, I sa¥ ir, but forgot about it. There’s a pair of red flannel what-you-call-ems on the other cell door.” : Somewhat peculiar certainly, bat still not supernatural—quite to the contrary. Daylight came slowly so much more slowly than it had gone the night before, It made the walls look painful and did not interfere at all with the darkness that gathered in the tanks. By the early morning light our faces looked pale and haggard and the prison damp was on our hands and our {ips were parched. There was nothing to say nor to do save to quietly wait for the Shenff. We had stayed in the prison cver night, And all for nothing. We did not say nor feelit. We could not laugh with each other over the non- appearance of the ghost. There was nothing for the visions in the unholy place; but the very air we were breathing resked with the sighs and groans and misery of those who had been there before us—the playthings of circum- stance with their unbridied and unprinci. pled natures. Every stone in which the iriendless eyes had gazed had burned into it the thought that sprang from the beart. Thoughts of wasted life, of crime, accomplished and conteiuplated, of crushed hope, of great despair—oh, they lived and thrived there, these children of worse than madness, and they shrieked their little beings into our ears and made us feel their living. But this was no haunting peculiar to this cell. Itis in them all, filling them, crouchin: in wait for the next occupant, . to creep about him and instill itself inte him and possess and handle him before ho recognizes it. Then there was a step far away and the clanking of the keys and the opening of the door. ‘We met ihe Sheniff in ihe corridor. ““What did you see?” he asked, and be looked a little anxious. “IsSig haunted ?"’ “Yes.” He smiled the old cynical smile. “What did you see?’’ he asked. “Nothing."” “What did you hear?’ “Nothine.” “Well, then?” “Don’t you feel it?"’ He turned abruptly and walked away and we followed, nor did we pause or speak until the San Rafael sun was thaw- ing out the prison chill, “I didn’t think you ought to have tried it,”” the Sheriff said. “It isn’t like other things some way. It seems some way serious. Good-day,” he said. “l hope you haven’t caught cold.” It mav not truly have visible ghosts that steal in the dead of the night from their hiding-place and croucb in corners, this strange cell, but it is haunted never- theless, and you can feel it and know it, and if the visible spirit form does prowl about it has invisible companionship. MURIEL BAILY. WROTE “(LNLY WAITING.” Frances L. Mace, the Celebrated Authoress, is at Present Residing in California. Only waiting tiil the shadows Are a little longer grown; Only w tiil the glimmer Of the day’s las: beam s flown Few English-speaking hymn-lovers are | unfamiliar with “Only Waiting.” Ratber | than the expression of any one human | heart it seems the spontaneous utterance | of many beautiful lives. | But it was first felt and sung and writ- | ten by brown-haired Frances Laughton | of Maine, now white-haired Frances | Laughton Mace of California, who, five years ago, from her bed of pain and help- lessness, unable to move hand or foot, FRANCIS dictated ‘‘Gethsemane,” voicing ore pite- | ous wail: | Thou knowest, Lord, how weak my faith, How sharp the thoras upon my path. The single, self-considering plaint in all her abundant writing. Later came *Patience.” T nsked of glits the fairest and the best, Gems of the spirit that should Making my life to other lves a s . * * 1d:d not ask for patience, which 1 deemed Too poor a treasure for the life I dreamed. How couid it be upon my royal road 1 should need help to bear a weary load? - * = . 0 you who watch with me the years go by, “hut In from life’s sweet work and liberty, Let us hoid fast to pailence; she alone Abides when hope and happiness are g . * . . - | | { one. At 18 Frances Laughton was a dream- ing, blue-eyed girl, with firm black brows and rippling gold-brown hair. Intellect was hers by birthright; poetry by the grace of God. “Mine was a silent, dreamy childhood,” she says, “haunted by visions of impossi- ble poems; a lead pencil and scraps of pa- per scrawled over with verse, hidden away in nooks and corners.” At 7 she began to think in rhyme. Be- fore she reached 13 she had translated the Zneid and taken up bucolics. At 12 her poems began to appear in print. The first to be published was THE MARINER'S LAST WISH, In the unfathomed deep, Where far above me shall the sea birds fly, Where the siorm spirits unawakened sleep, There let me lie Not bad, for a girl of 12 When she was 18, the same age at which Bryant wrote “Tuanatopsis,” a friend told her of the answer an old man in the poor- house gave to the question, **W hat are you doing here?” He replied, *‘Only wait- ing.”” An hour iater the hymn was writ- ten word for word as it stands to-day. was published above the signature of Inez, won immediate celebrity, was copied over \! \ NN PAN % L. MACE. and over again, set to music and included in different collections of poetry and songs. Other writers claimed its authorship. The matter was finally settled by an in- vestigation set on foot by Dr. Martineau of London, England, assisted by Professor Bird, the eminent hymnologist of Lehigh University. The hymn is to be found in Mrs. Mace's volume of *‘Legends, Lyrics and Sonnets.” At 19 Frances Lauzhton married B. H. Mace, a lawyer of pronounced literary abil- ity,who has been her most unsparing critic, and to whom also her work has been the source of greatest pride. To-day he glows in speaking of Kiing. sohr, one of her most ambitious produc- léou.. It tells of Klingsohr, deathless King of Poesy. * * * He it iswho fires the brain With thoughts of noble meaning, lights the soul With splendid visions, and with voice that steals 1 he hieart away leads upward to the stars. - . . . . ** Sing thou of love, and thou of war,” he sald, “ And both of beauty as ye read it best . In Nature’s changiug face. There is no law Nor limit to your freedom. . « . » . . Oh, 5iroug heart within me grew, and strong My right hand held the sword of victory. . . . b4 Hardly feminine—that? Eight chiidren she has brought into the world;-five.she has seen, to use her own expression, born 1nto the world beyond. It | She raised her children, cared for her household, shared the reverses and suc- cesses of her husband’s career, living the while the poet’s life of isolation, best de- scribed in her own lines: In the hotse which is my own, Though no living eye can read The invisible title deed Which makes it mine alone— In the room where my heart and I In still communion sit. Tt adds nothing to her rare personality that she early won and without effort re- tained recognition. She published in Harper's Magazine and other periodicals of that class as well as for the great papers. Perhaps no woman has had more poems illustrated in Har- per’s by the best artists in the same length of time than Mrs. Mace between the years of 1870 and 1890. At the Bangor centennial in 1869 her poem was selected to be sung. Her friends like to remember that when Portland unveiled the English bust of | Longfellow, presented to the Maine His- torical Association by the Longfellow me- moria! committes, of which the Prince of Wales was chairman, Mrs. Mace was called upon for the dedicatory poem, and responded with her fine “Welcome Home to Longfellow.” Then, too, when the gentle Whittier first met Mrs. Mace he said: “‘In Bangor I know but two persons, Hannibal Ham- lin and thee. I know him for his states- manship and I know thee for thy beauti- ful poems.” Itis hard to tell of the catastrophe in this beautiful life—hard to recall that under the strain of intense and conflict- ing activities of mind, heart and body, the body, belng weakest, gave way. ‘Worn out by the care of her youngest daughter, an invalid, blue-eyed June Mace, her “‘summer child,”” of whom she writes, ““Her days had for laugh ter, not for tears,” she fell ill of pneumonia, which resulted in a stroke of paralysis. Possessed of what should have been a strong body, with a rich and trained in- tellect, present success assured and the future beaming with promise, she was forced to lay down her pen, 2s her friends believed, forever. But her indomitable mind did not yield so easily, Long before the tiniest muscle would respond to her will, her brain resumed its work. In her guiet hill cottage near Los Gatos she is regaining a measure of physical strength and freedom; above all, her pen hand 1s again obedient, and she loves to reach out toward others shut in like her- self from “life’s sweet work and liberty.” She looks upon this as the one way left her of serving the humanity she loves— this woman, whose simple act of living is a service to the world. From her broad window she gazes with far-seeing eyes bayond picturesque Santa Clara Valley, beyond stately Mount Ham- ilton, to where she sees a great stone house beside the blue Pencbscot, where, she says, “I see again beloved faces, missed forever from my life. I cannot forget, but Ithink I shall find content in this pretty home among the hills.” WILD ROSES OF MAINE, [July, 1896.1 When the midsummer days are come My heart is fod with dreams of home. Beyond these blaz:ng hills 1 see The Fairyland ot memory. For now the wild rose blooms again In all the cherished haunts of Maine, Along tne roasite first I view The dainty flowers of seashell hue; In open piaces of the woods They beautify the solitudes. "The craggy river banks they fringe With rich festoons of rosy tinge, And over all the seaside isles This glory of the summer smiles. 0 boon diyine which Beauty gives! - Once seen and loved it al: lives, And like a pever-setting star Sheds blissful beams through years afar; 80 by Pacific’s lone y sea. ‘The Maine wild roses bloom for me! EARAH HucHEs GBAVES, - SPOKANE, Wass., May 26, 1897.—As I was lounging in the lobby of the Hotel Bpokane this morning I noticed an elderly man, with a newspaper carelessly folded on his lap. He is a typical frontiersman, miner and prospector, tall, biue-eyed, stoop shouldered, iron-gray hair and un- kempt whiskers. He was in a good humor with himself and all the world and was easily engaged in conversation. “Iam here from Montana,” he stated, as he called my attention to a paragraph in the Anaconda Standard in regard to W. A. Clark’s fabulous strike in the May Flower district. ‘I knew it was bound to leak out some time,” he added, ‘and have been sur- prised that it was kep} from the news- paper sharps so long. You will see that strike makes William Allen Clark the richest man in the world. Beside him all the millionaires of ancient and modern times are but as paupers. Clark Is the only living billionaire and the only man who ever required ten figures to represent his wealth ' This information took my breath and I was anxious to hear more. The old gen- tleman was just as desirous of imparting all the information stored away in his shaggy head. ““You see,” he continued, ‘it states that Clark purchased the May Flower claim nine months ago for $150,000, and at that time there had been no development work excepting a seven-foot hole.” Iglanced at the paper and saw the old prospector was stating the facts. “Then from a space 16 by 10 feet and only 10 feet deep the lucky owner has taken $100,000. I happen to know all about it, for I have been over every acces- sible foot of that claim.” “Do you know what happened after the figures showed the wealth of the mine?'’ Iconfessed my ignorance and curiosity. “Why, Clark shut down the work and packed off every man that had been work- ing for him, excepting myzelf, {0 his dif- ferent properties in other sections of the State—scattered them, as it were, to the four parts of the earth, and they are kept at work. When one grumbles about any- thing, seeking some excuse to quit, to. go prospecting on his own hook, his wages are raised and he is induced to remamn where he is.” ““What was the reason for such action ?” I inquired. “That’s just what I am going to tell you,” replied the old prospector, as he took a chew of tobacco. “You see, Clark has handled some pretty rich property in his day, but he had never run across anything like this, and he didn’t want auy experienced miners around. You see, the paperstates that this mineral belt extends clear from the Boulder to the Jefferson River, and so it does, a distance of nine miles, every foot of which can be traced by croppings. Clark has been filling the district with greenhorns, fresh from the Kast, who have staked out claim after claim, and wouldn’t know a piece of gold quartz from an old chunk of castiron. Every one of these claims has been bonded or sold outright to Clark. He probably owns about thirty-six squars miles of territory, the richest on the globe.” “I was a sort of assisiant foreman on the first work. I am getting too old and stiff to do anything but boss, and I knew Olark’s people way back in Ohio fifty years ago, when old Bill Allen—‘Foghorn Allen’ as they used to call him—after whom Clark was named, was the great political power in the State; and so Clark put me in charge of the May Flower work. He sent me gangs of the greenest men I ever saw handie a pick or shovel, and I was in terror every time a blast went off. We ran that tunnel the Standard tells about 100 feet below the first opening and we atruck the ledge again, just a foot or two wider, if anything perhaps a little richer. Then we went 300 feet lower on the side of the mountain and tunneled again and found the ledze intact. After the back of the ridge here and there for the 1500 feet of the claim, and everywhere | the ledge showed up between two walls of | granite as perfect as molten lead poured into a mold, and you see those greenies really wondered when we would strike pay dirt! I tell you it was laughable. Somehow, I disreraember how, a particu- lar friend of mine, Sam Adams, located | on an adjoining claim early in the game, GRAY. HAIR A but Clark, after we had scratched along the 1500 feet, coolly planked down $100,000 and took the claim. I lost my job shortly after and am now on my way East with Adame. Ireckon he and I can get along on $50,000 apiece, but it is a mere drop in the bucket to what that mountain of ore is worth.” Here my friend took another chew as he proceeded. . “Now it is simply a matter of mathe- matics, and I figured it out on the cars coming down and have it all in my heaa. The problem kept buzzing in my head to the rhythm of the car wheels like Mark Twain’s idiotic ‘Blue trip slip for a 10-cent fare, punch in the presence of the passengaire,” and I can ro!l it off at my tongue’s end. From a hole 16 by 10 by 10—that's 1600 cubic feet—comes $100,000, or $6250 per cubic feet, and two claims giving a united ledge 3000 feet long, 400 feet deep—and no telling how much deeper—and 16 feet wide gives 19,200,000 cubic feet at $62 50 per cubic foot in round numbers agzregates $1,200,000,000, and that is some idea of the immediate wealth of William Allen Clark. The gold is there and it won’t take two years to get it out. You see, just the rock removed in our tunneling and scratching, entirely ontside of the main ledge, netted $500,000. “I have been studying the matter over, that we were set to work scratching along | “« HE was TaLL AnD - BLUE-EYED. WITA IRON DNKEMPT WHISKE and when I go East I am going to lay the subject before Congress. I think the Government ought to confiscate the prop- erty, give Clark a pension of a few mil- lions annually and pay off the National debt. Yousee—" But my mind bad been stunned by the enormous facts and fi ures so glibly nar- rated by my loquacious acquaintance, and I was moving toward the bar, and as he joined me he repeated a quotation from Bret Harte— This is my story, sir: a trifle, indeed, I assure you. Much more, perchance, might be said; but I hold him of all men most I ghtly Who swerves from the truth in his tale. thank you Well, since you are pressing, Perhaps 1 don’t careif Ido; you may give me the same, Jim—no sugar, And as the old man moved slowly back to his seat I inquired of “‘Jim"* who he was. ©Oh, I don’t know,’' he replied, *as I am comparatively a stranger here, but he issome fellow with a half dozen aliases, more or less. Ihave been introduced to him this morning once as Rider Haggard and once as some foreign nobleman, No, | ‘THE RICHEST MAN IN ALL AMERICA. cious that such was the case and his re- quests for a settlement grew more and more pressing. Finally young Raphael, in desperation, resorted to the following device: He carefully painted upon a table-top in his room a number of gold coins and, placing the table in a certain light that gave a startling effect, he packed his few belongings and summoned his host. “There,” he exclaimed, with a lordly wave of his hand toward the table, “is | enough to settle my bill and more. Now kindly show the way to the door.”* The innkeeper, with many smiles and | bows, ushered Lis guest out, and then | hastened back to gather up his gold. His rage and consternation when he discov- ered the fraud knew no bounds, untii a wealthy Englieh traveler, recognizing the value of the art put in the work. glaaly paid him £50 for the table.—Harper's Round Table. Tall persons live longer than short ones, and those born in the spring have sounder constitutions than those born at any other season. Baron Mun — Mun — Munchausen, I b ! i i i i I { ND | [ i | { | 1\ liave, was the name.” | But |PG botel clerk was an old-timer, l-nd smiled as he said: ‘“Been having a social chat with old Jack Winters, have you? He is a great one. Knows every time prospector who is a pensioner on the bounty of every pioneer in Montana, Idaho and Washingzton. He can draw the long bow with the best of them, ana like the hero of 49 is entitied to ‘never m meal nor to pay a cent.’”’ Derr pE Worr. Raphael’s Joke. Raphael, the great Italian painter, Whose celebrated Biblical pictures are worth fabulous sums of money, was not a rich man when young and encountered some of the vicissitudes of life like many another genius. Once when traveling he put up at an inn and remained there, un- able to get away through lack of funds to settle hisbill. The landlord grew suspi- mine-owner in the Northwest; @n. old- | Y HECALLED MY SATTENTION TO A NEWS PAPER {PARAGRAPH “" »