Rollin Ridge
Placerville, California
Spring and Summer 1850
I
could no longer feel my legs after riding so long. When we arrived in Placerville, wide-eyed, we took in the town’s sinful sights and human smells. Near a hay yard, a large white oak stood with branches strong enough to hang guilty and innocent alike. Underneath, a hunched man sawed away on his bow and fiddle. He played a dandy tune, as fast as his fingers could hold down the strings. Pale bow hair gathered around his bent wrist like willow branches. Then his music halted while he examined the instrument’s curved wire, a snapped and broken string.
Aeneas said, “He’s playing ‘Arkansas Traveler’. Well, he was. Guess we’ll blend right in.”
We tied our horses to a hitching post in front of the El Dorado Saloon and Hotel at Quartz and Main. Filthy prospectors packed into wagons like roosters in a coop too small. Their faces were similar, flat and frowned with no shine to their skin. Bodies smelled of campfire smoke, salt, dirt, and rust. Miners rode in wagons, holding collapsible canvas tent sticks, sitting on top of overturned iron cooking pots and wooden sluice boxes. Picks darted across the main street, slung over men’s shoulders, with handles peeking through their grips. Their travel stirred the dust, burning our eyes, making it challenging to see four feet in front of us. Yet, through the haze, we smelled their tainted anticipation, a clammy thrill emanating from gripping drooping canvas bags held closely to their sides. Their gray bodies meshed into a lengthy line at the bank, each praying gold prices remained high.
Wacooli pulled his hat lower to hide his face. He looked back toward the quiet fiddler under the hanging tree. He said, “Hope no one concerns themselves with me being dark. I need a bath something awful.”
I offered what consolation I could. “California is a free state. Look around. Everyone is brown in mining towns.”
Wacooli’s concern for his appearance continued. “Maybe,” he said, and changing the subject, estimated our expenses. “It’ll cost us, but we need new clothes.”
Aeneas’ next remark remained muted under his bandana, keeping dust hanging in the air from his throat. “It won’t be a warm bath, that’s for sure. Saw an advertisement in Salt Lake for a mining town named Bath. I wonder how far it is. Bet they got hot water there.” He looked over his shoulder back in the direction we came.
I put our priorities in order. “Let’s find a couple of beds first. Then, we’ll find the trading post and buy three clean shirts. After, we’ll find the barber.”
“I don’t want no haircut, Rollin. Mama would never let me grow it long. It’s past the ugly stage.”
“How would you know? You haven’t looked at yourself in a month.” Wacooli stepped back and evaluated Aeneas from top to bottom. “Can’t rightly say I agree.”
“I’m the prettiest child; Mama said so.”
Wacooli and I spoke in unison. “Believe what you like.”
Aeneas pouted, speaking under his breath. “I’m the funniest too.”
Wacooli and I walked a few paces onto the road before Aeneas caught up. Then, finally, he asked, with all sincerity, “Rollin, why do we need a barber?”
Wacooli laughed over his shoulder at Aeneas’ ignorance of the many benefits of a proper barbershop. He said, “Did Mama Sarah say you were the smartest? If so, it was the only time she ever lied.” Wacooli’s sarcasm was inevitable, correcting Aeneas’ misconceptions about how a barber earned his living.
I hadn’t laughed so hard in miles. It felt good to think of Mama without seeing so much sadness on her face and renewing the anger I hadn’t found time to unpack. I told Wacooli, “I hope she said you were the brightest. There’s no doubt in my mind.”
Wacooli’s tone turned serious. “Mama Sarah doesn’t show no favorites. Let me tell you, I wouldn’t mind if I needed further arithmetic lessons to add up all the gold we find.”
He turned his attention to Aeneas, who eyed the El Dorado Saloon’s upper balcony. Scantily clad women leaned over railings, weighed heavier by breasts blossoming from their corsets. Aromas of cheap perfume wafted below, mixed with the alcohol pumping through their sweat to sour the scent. Aeneas couldn’t have cared less about the smell. He removed his hat to show off his overly long, reddish locks. Like Clarinda, he had Mama’s hair.
Aeneas said, “Who’s thinking about arithmetic?”
Wacooli said, “Carry the one, Aeneas.”
I laughed too loud. Aeneas didn’t hear Wacooli’s remark, distracted by his voice shouting compliments toward the female employees of the El Dorado Saloon. In English, the hotel’s name meant “The Golden”. I hoped its name predicted our good fortune.
I struck my gawking brother’s chest, still transfixed by the beauty above him. “Say nothing to them, Aeneas. We can’t afford it.”
To Wacooli, I said, “I’m getting two rooms for two days.” I tried a further bargain. “I’ll sleep beside Aeneas tomorrow, if you will tonight.” It took Wacooli two tries to gather enough spit in his hand to shake and bind our deal.
Aeneas said, “Rollin, you and Wacooli go in. I’ll guard the horses. My view is finer than frog hair.”
I looked up, following Anee’s gaze. “If she leans out any further, you’ll have to catch that frog with your measly arms.”
“I’ll catch her. The one with the big—”
Wacooli interrupted him, “What would Mama say?”
There were no quips left to deter my brother from smiling an ear-to-ear grin. I had little desire to do so. With only the two of us for company, I couldn’t blame him for staring at more female skin than he was accustomed to seeing, even with sisters.
Drinkers and gamblers crowded the saloon’s interior this afternoon. Sunlight beat in the windows and heated the curtains, releasing last night’s cigar smoke. Round tables covered men’s boots, stretched like overlong draperies across the scarred floor. Various shades of brown darkened the room, the same hue as the half-full glasses on their tables. Mismatched kerosene globes cast pale colors along the paneled walls with no determinable scheme.
I crossed to the attendant and asked for two available rooms. Wacooli leaned his back against the counter, surveying the clientele with his hat in his hand.
“We normally don’t allow his kind here. Stirs up the southern guests.”
Wacooli looked at me and said, “See? Tree stands in the middle of town for a reason.”
I pulled one of our last silver dollars from my pocket and held it in the light from the attendant’s lamp. I turned it in my fingers. The hotel clerk’s eyes followed my gesture.
“If we aren’t allowed, it’ll rest easy back in my dark pocket.”
The attendant passed through a muslin curtain to speak to his superior. When he returned, he jotted down our names in the hotel’s guest book. Guess silver was more important to this establishment than any other hue.
“Want clean sheets?” the clerk asked.
Wacooli turned his chest toward the clerk but kept his feet facing the door. “How much more is it?”
“Quarter a room.”
Wacooli answered the man. “Worth it.”
I dropped the coins in the man’s upturned palm and asked, “How far is the closest barber?”
“Depends. You want the cheap barber or the expensive?”
We both replied, “Cheap.”
The clerk’s eyes didn’t leave his registry book. He said, “Might need to ride a stretch to Sacramento. Mike Murphy’s contraption only costs two bits, and it’s mighty cold, but at least you won’t have to wash in someone else’s dirty water.”
“Thank you kindly. And the postmaster?”
The clerk attempted to step behind the curtain. His voice mumbled. “Man named Thomas Nugent, down Main Street a stretch.”
Wacooli turned and said, “One more, the closest trading post? My brothers and I need a fresh start.”
When Wacooli said “brothers,” the man turned around, with eyes darting from Wacooli to me, trying to reason out our relations. We’d become accustomed to such looks. Our blended family was none of his business.
He answered only after he gave up, unable to make sense of our fraternity. “Only one brick store in town, owned by Colonel Bee and his brother.”
I thanked the man. “Appreciate it.”
We wove through the day drinkers and prostitutes to meet Aeneas, still gawking upwards. Wacooli dragged him down the street to our first stop, the brick store. Inside were stacks of gold pans, sluice boxes with metal grates on the bottom, horse tack, and liniment canisters of all designs and colors along the back wall. An older gentleman reached for one with a pole, raising gartered arms with shirtsleeves rolled to his elbows. After dropping it to his hand, he charged the customer two bits for snake oil in a can.
He turned to greet us before seeing us. “Hello, gents.” Guess he didn’t care what color we were if we toted coins to exchange.
I said, “We need some fresh shirts, maybe pants too, depending on the expense.”
Colonel Bee asked, “Where do you plan to wear them?”
Aeneas said, “Gold mining, sir. Durable, not fancy.”
“Weather out here stays the same unless it’s the rainy season, but that won’t hit us for months. Days are warm; nights bring a chill. Flannel is cheaper and will serve through both conditions.”
He led us to stacks of shirts in every size and color. Wacooli and I also bought gray trousers—Aeneas said his skins could hold out another month. When we stepped out of the store into the sunlight, Aeneas complained, “Bet even the small won’t fit me. Collar’s ugly.”
Wacooli couldn’t stop himself. “Don’t be a dandy like Cousin Boudi. Quit your fussing.”
We stowed our new clothes, mounted, and rode thirty minutes to the outskirts of Sacramento where miners were few. The air cleared. A river ran through the city, blue as the sky, with trees releasing a freshness I hadn’t smelled since we crossed the prairies. Here, elegant gentlemen and ladies strode through the streets with matching clothes and parasols above their heads. Fine horses led carriages down wide main streets. Four-story buildings touched the blue horizon, with chimneys like sprawled fingers. In Sacramento, my memories collided, blending a landscape such that I hadn’t seen since my studies in Massachusetts. While Aeneas and Wacooli scanned the street signs for a striped pole, I imagined Lizzie wearing a fine dress strolling these streets on my arm.
“Know why the pole has red stripes, Aeneas?” Wacooli taunted him.
“No, why?”
Wacooli grabbed his arm and surprised him. “It’s because that’s where they suck your blood with leeches.”
When we found it, Aeneas wouldn’t go inside.
Murphy said, “For three showers, that’ll be six bits, including soap and a towel.” Without pause, Wacooli handed over the money. I’d rather sit in a hot tub till the water cooled than be doused in cold water.
From behind his establishment, we approached three holes in the ground with barrels inside. First, we shucked our filthy clothes, flopping them in a pile. Then, naked, with lines creased on our arms and necks from skin exposed to the elements, we closed the makeshift drapes. Inside was a lofted, teeter-tottered, red kerosene can with holes in the bottom. At our feet were two slick wooden pedals.
Aeneas yelled beside me, “How do you make it work?”
Wacooli yelped. Then he shouted, “Shift your weight, Aeneas, one pedal to another.” Soon, our yawls joined his.
Soaped up and rinsed clean, my brothers and I shivered while we dressed in new clothes smelling of bitter dyes. I buckled my belt, tying Kell’s knife to my thigh. I’d used the blade as often as hunger beckoned but kept my promise to Mama that it would never kill another man. Yet, with the familiar arrowhead under my thumb, so returned my urge to slice Ross’ throat.
We rode back to Placerville, and after an expensive meal of pot roast and vegetables, none of us could keep our eyes open. We retired to our rooms for a night’s sleep. I had one more task before finding sleep’s oblivion.
My Darlin’ Lizzie,
Today, we arrived in Placerville, California, although those native to this region call it Hangtown. Wacooli assumed the reason. We arrived worse for wear. Our heads looked like mops used to scrub floors from time immemorial. Combs were useless, impossible to draw downward. If we had ridden into Fayetteville, astride our bony mounts, we would have caused such hilarity among the townspeople. Small boys would follow us, hooting and taunting. You might have to gaze at my ragged countenance for a time to recognize your husband, wooly with a beard and hair to my shoulders, ribs and hip bones protruding under fraying clothes.1 Aeneas, Wacooli, and I could only laugh at ourselves and aim to recover our health with a shower (in the coldest water west of Salt Lake), fresh shirts, and a meal of anything other than salt pork and dried beef. We plan to sleep for days, God willing. Writing to you will be my last task to this perpetual day.
Packers passed us on the road (names the miners are called), whose appearance was so exhilarating that I leaned back in my saddle and nearly killed myself with laughter. We’ve passed many a poor ragged devil who began the journey with meager attire under the expectation of becoming wealthy in California. He passed us riding a gaunt old steer, fully able to run a race with a snail, drubbing the poor old beast at every step to “get along”. I confess my mirth was such that gods and men envied me. Poor humanity! To what miserable passes will it put itself in for money?2 I, too, am guilty of the crime.
Aeneas, Wacooli, and I plan to set up mining operations here. However, from our brief time in this region, we’ve learned that thousands dig at every little hole for six miles up and down the creek. From what little energy I’ve spent scouting, the terrain appears challenging, with so much unforgiving work just to figure out whether a place has enough gold to balance the labor it takes to mine it. We shall find out soon enough.
For many to have traveled here (on a steer, no less), there must be an immense amount of gold in the hills. But the few miners we’ve talked to say it is hard to find in large quantities. There is no certainty of discovering it, with no more luck than playing a hand of cards. They cover expenses with what they find, which isn’t much. But we’ve suffered enough to try our hand.
When we arrived today, we heard a fiddler playing ‘Arkansas Traveler’. After he broke a string, he couldn’t finish the tune. Since then, all I can hum is the unheard end. I hope it isn’t an omen for our fortune, or lack thereof, as we head to the rivers and mountains.
A stranger in a strange land,
Too calm to weep, too sad to smile,
I take my harp of broken strings,
A weary moment to beguile.
And tho’ no hope its promise brings,
And present joy is not for me,
Still, o’er that harp I love to bend,
And feel its broken melody
With all my shattered feelings blend.3
L
After weeks of getting our boots stuck in knee-deep mud and finding no more gold than would yield us four or five dollars each day, we moved on, conversing with fellow travelers from Springfield, Missouri. They dressed like us, smelled like us, and had the same pain-riddled expressions we’d adopted, a combination of somber and weary. But, eager for company, our bands rode beside one other through the short miles between the Cottonwood and Trinity Rivers.
One man, too hunched and infirm to consider mining a profession, said, “People say a season can yield a man fifty thousand, but I’ve never seen it. One man said he made twenty, but he could have been lying.” Despite the giant wad of tobacco under his lip and the amber spittle dripping from his mouth, I understood.
His traveling companion overlapped his partner’s mutterings. “Only one in a million digs his fortune from California rock. Where are you headed?”
I responded with the truth, despite my suspicions they intended to follow. “Farther upriver, toward Whiskey Creek, under Mount Shasta.”
“Fine gold there,” the older man responded, spitting spent tobacco in a wad on the ground, wiping his mouth free of brown spit with his gray sleeve.
I said, “I hope so. Let’s hope it isn’t so fine we can’t see it.”4
We split at the fork at Whiskey Creek, named for the only item sold there. With fewer miners than near Placerville, we hoped for more gains with fewer hands in the pot. Miners pitched tents around a communal cookfire. So, I raised ours, completing the established circle. After a supper of slapjacks and pickled pork, Aeneas and Wacooli went to test a few pans in the river, seeing what they could uncover before the moon stole the remaining daylight. I stayed behind to guard our belongings.
I wasn’t alone, though. Worn boots shrunk inside a neighboring tent, replaced by an older black man’s grin, carrying his hat full of holes. His curly beard was gray at the roots and made paler by pounding rock dust. He climbed from his tent on all fours and stood with painful groans, holding whatever ailment he suffered at bay with broad palms against his back. He walked a few paces to throw more river driftwood on the common fire, dulling the light I borrowed for writing.
When he turned, his face revealed thicker eyebrows, denser than the patch of boisterous hair receding from the crown of his head. Although few here had anything significant to smile about, the man’s cheeks lifted in a grin as if he remembered the punchline to a story but had yet to share the humorous tale. My first impression of the man was from his subdued laughter. Although, nothing struck me funny.
He wobbled, stepping on one leg, and dragging the other behind him as if it tingled from numb nerves. Then, finally, he asked, “What you writing?”
Infected by his smile, I returned his lightheartedness and answered his question. I squinted, blinded by the setting sun behind his back. “Uninspired at present. Just a letter home.”
“Don’t have a soul to write to. Name’s Spencer Hill.” He reached out his hand to shake mine.
“Rollin Ridge.” Copper and black hands shook with the new acquaintance.
He drank from a flask in his vest pocket and passed it alongside another question. “Where are you planning to send it?”
“Fayetteville, Arkansas. Writing our troubles to my wife and mother.”
“Nice to have women at home. Gives a man something to dig for. I’m from Arkansas too, near Little Rock.”
“Been there, flat as a slapjack.” More eager for conversation than retelling the same woes, I corked my pen, and rose to offer him a bit of what measly food we had. Our cast iron pan was still hot. “You hungry?”
He nodded, rolled pork into the hot cake, and ate it in two bites. Then, with his mouth still partially full, he stared at the vast mountain range in the distance. He said, “Hear tell from some Digger Indians nearby that a Sky Spirit lived on that mountain once.” He looked at the peak of Mount Shasta, covered in purple shadows from the setting sun. “Wind blew the Sky Spirit’s daughter from that peak. Swans caught her and flew her down here, with us hairy bears, who walked on two legs.” He thought the image funny and laughed, tearing his eyes away from the snow-capped mountain side. “Can you imagine?”
He returned his upward gaze. “When the Sky Spirit came down to look for his daughter, he found her in love with one of those bears and met his half-bear grandchildren. You’d think he’d be overjoyed, but nope. Mighty angry he was, so he forced the bears to walk on all fours and took away their ability to speak.”5
I blew the air from my nose and put my hand on my hip. “My father’s people believe we come from one union too. When I was a boy, Papa’s stories seemed so real, difficult to tell what was true. Hard to know where you’re going, not knowing where you’ve been.”
“Bet that mountain knows. Been here longer than any man. What it must have seen.” Spencer shook his head, then caught my eye to clarify such wonder. “What it’s yet to see. Can you imagine how far a Sky Spirit, or a man, could see, standing so high?” Spencer Hill reached into his pocket and offered me a bit of his tobacco stash.
He held the rolled tobacco between his lips and squinted one eye to keep the smoke from making him tear. Then he sat on the ground. He used both hands to take off each of his boots and return their captured pebbles to the earth. Afterward, he replaced the boots over filthy socks. I couldn’t judge him, with mine just as wretched.
I said, “Man could see time and change. All those things he works through, but rarely recognizes until they’ve passed. He’d have perspective.”
He chuckled and flicked ash. “You sound more poet than miner. Bet a man could take a deep breath up there, and then, he’d be free.”
An eagle appeared, gliding above the peak. Spencer saw it, too, and pointed his finger to follow its broad-winged flight.
I said, “If a bird can find enough air, a man could too.”
Spencer said, “Wasn’t enough air for me in Arkansas. Bound to wheatfields and man, earning nothing from the harvest but another day’s work. That’s why I’m here. Digging gold to buy a plow and tack and turn dirt on a claim I own in this here free state of California.”6
I said, “I had that once. A wife and daughter, growing corn and wheat near Springfield. Family close. Couldn’t see what was in front, gripping too tightly to what was behind. Gave up my chance to choose my life.”
I’d seen slaves working in the deeper mines downriver but knew freed blacks and immigrants sought some version of an American dream under Shasta’s rocky face. Spencer sought opportunity, like the rest of us here, but his ambitions weren’t lofty like mine. He sought only a plow and a horse, a roof over his head. When I had those and more, I wasn’t as grateful as I should’ve been. Now, I’d lost what mattered, searching for an abundance I’d yet to find. It was the want that drove a man insane. Didn’t matter for what: wealth, justice, respect.
I told Spencer, “My father and grandfather fought for my people’s right to be free—to grow corn from a piece of earth they knew as well as the back of their hand. A place to ride across untouched pastures and chase the sun. Ride across the wilderness without being shot in the back. Where a son could bury his father and not feel the ground tremble from white men riding West with a new treaty in tow.”
“You hiding?” He looked at me with a raised eyebrow but dropped it when I didn’t answer. I couldn’t, not without accepting failure by speaking it aloud.
Spencer said, “Back in Arkansas, the man who owned me, name of Tucker, clutched his heart sitting on his horse, fell, and crushed his wheat. Neither the wheat nor the man stood back up. He had no living wife, no family I’d ever seen. After he died, I flew like that eagle there. Free to remember how I’d changed. Old enough to recognize the time I’d lost.”7
The eagle disappeared behind Shasta’s rock moments before Wacooli and Aeneas returned from the river. Ascending the hill, they dumped the remaining swell from their pans against their pant legs, dotting them with oblong water spots. When my brothers approached, Aeneas tilted his hat toward Spencer and me.
Aeneas said, “Night, Rollin. Had enough today.” My exhausted baby brother entered his tent. Shortly after, Aeneas threw out his dusty boots. One landed on the bottom, ready to put back on in the morning. The other lay on its side, too tired to remain standing.
Wacooli took a damp handkerchief from his pocket and wiped his face. “All we found was some dust. Maybe ten cents’ worth. We can’t keep this up. We’ll starve before we find a run that turns a profit.”
I looked up at him, holding my knees. “We owe it to ourselves to try. If we don’t find a streak, suppose we could stand the boredom of city life? Go back to Sacramento. Find work?”
He nodded his head, confirming his thoughts echoed mine.
I introduced him to my new friend, Spencer Hill, and they shook hands. Listening to them exchange pleasantries, I wondered what Wacooli’s fate might have been if Peter had not found him. Would whites have forced him into slavery?
Wacooli said, “Rollin?”
“Huh?”
“Let’s give this plot a month. Then we’ll decide. I’m beaten up tonight.”
Spencer said, “Guess I’ll turn in too.” He gestured toward the unfinished scribble beside me. “Finish that letter. Safe bet those women are impatient to hear from you three.”
“Thank you kindly, freeman Spencer, for the tobacco—and perspective. Best of luck to you.”
“To you as well, Cherokee Rollin.”
L
In the many dawns that followed, I took great pains for numbness. Lit the candle mount on my hat with clay-stained hands. Followed my lantern underground, tracing lingering sulfur air singed from blasts of dynamite. I followed the stench willingly, hand braced against embedded veins of iron ore. Work too brutal for shale so brittle.
With pickaxe supine, I heaved the miner’s tool in relentless rhythm against ribs of bedrock. Amidst such brainless work, my memory sparked in flashes against the limestone and gneiss.
Tragedy struck.
I woke again that dawn, heard the banging of the door, the clank of the broken lock, the scuffle of men’s feet across the wooden floor. Overlapping cries, some in anger, some with fear. Papa’s “Wait.” Mama’s “No.” And in drops like the sweat down my back, the warriors steadily spit their threats. “Treaty,” they said. “Traitor,” they said. “Trail,” they said. “Tears.”
Man against nature, in tedious monotony, I rose, hands sliding to grip, overlapping, and thwack. Axe teetering at the fulcrum point then, the collapse. First, a chink, then, the fall of sharp severs that buried my boots. Rocks rang as I bellowed, “Let him go. Leave him be.” No one heard me then; no one heard me now.
I threw my axe underfoot and grabbed the drill rod and hammer. Shadows and sunlight. Men against man, the war party carried him outside. Mama’s hands held me behind her. Mask and kerchief kept her from him.
Beat and turn. Arms pound and burn. They stabbed. Twenty-seven. Twenty-eight. The arrowhead on the bowie knife. Twenty-nine. They stole his breath, walked single file across his body. Mama in blood-soaked white. Papa raised himself to speak. Air escaped. No words.
This man warred against his thoughts. My mind couldn’t separate Papa’s visage in life after seeing him pale with death. His blood oozed through a winding sheet and fell, drop by drop on the floor. By his side sat my mother, with hands clasped in speechless agony. Bending over him was his own afflicted mother, with her long, white hair flung loose over her shoulders and bosom, crying to the Great Spirit to sustain her.8 I lost time to such futility. With buckets in tow, I surfaced, tracing limestone serpentine toward the sun, sonless.
At the time, we scarcely knew our loss.9 The same day Papa died, Grandfather was ambushed, shot in the back. Uncle Elias’ head was beaten in by lying men.
After so many voiced condolences and unvoiced threats, Mother sent me away. And my life sped behind never-ending coach windows, taking me to my grandparents’ house, the Northrups in Massachusetts, to study Latin and Greek in Great Barrington’s classrooms. Years later, another coach returned me, much slower, to Arkansas, to Washbourne’s lawbooks, to Lizzie and her mountain lion. Canoe rides. Our wedding. Holding Alice. Erecting cabin walls. Planting corn, wheat. Killing Kell. Papa’s letter. Mama. I hacked through it all. But more rock lay ahead, despite all my efforts to touch the golden reprieve on the other side.
Inside my mind, their faces remained, not the books I’d read or the places I’d lived. Papa’s letter said he wished to live for his own sake, his wife and children’s sake, and for the sake of his race. He’d said the sacrifice of his life was the consequence of his choices; he had already put his life in danger and contingently given it up. Must I learn the same lesson, realize the same, and die searching for repose and refuge? My pan was still light, even after sifting endless piles of rock for specks shining under the muted earth.
I wanted to fly like an eagle on top of Mount Shasta and glide above the world. Maybe there, I would find the truth, held out of reach of mortal’s hand. From the ground, all I’d uncovered was that reason remained as elusive as unfound riches, despite all it cost me to look. Gold mining was not why I was born. My purpose remained insurmountable, like Mount Shasta—my birthright: the Ridge legacy.
Like a tall, wise father, Mount Shasta recited what had already passed. With a child’s ears, I heard the mountain’s sublime consolation. With the remaining firelight, I uncorked my pen and transcribed the Father’s voice.
And well I ween, in after years, how
In the middle of his furrowed track, the plowman
In some sultry hour, will pause and wiping
From his brow, the dusty sweat, with reverence
Gaze upon that hoary peak. The herdsman
Oft will rein his charger in the plain and drink
Into his inmost soul the calm sublimity;
And little children, playing on the green, shall
Cease their sport, and, turning to that mountain
Old shall of their mother ask: “Who made it?”
And she shall answer — “GOD!”10