California Sketches, New Series

by O. P. Fitzgerald

"I see our way out of these troubles, wife," he said one night, as they sat hand in hand in the bedchamber, where the children were lying asleep. "We will all die together! This has been revealed to me as the solution of all our difficulties. Yes, we will enter the beautiful spirit-world together! This is freedom! It is only getting out of prison. Bright spirits beckon and call us. I am ready."

There was a gleam of madness in his eyes, and, as he took a pistol from a bureau-drawer, an answering gleam flashed forth from the eyes of the wife, as she said:

"Yes, love, we will all go together. I too am ready."

The sleeping children were breathing sweetly, unmindful of the horror that the devil was hatching.

"The children first, then you, and then me," he said, his eye kindling with increasing excitement.

He penciled a short note addressed to one of his old friends, asking him to attend to the burial of the bodies, then they kissed each of the sleeping children, and then—but let the curtain fall on the scene that followed. The seven were found next day lying dead, a bullet through the brain of each, the murderer, by the side of the wife, still holding the weapon of death in his hand, its muzzle against his right temple.

Other pictures of real life and death crowd upon, my mind, among them noble forms and faces that were near and dear to me; but again I hear the appealing voices. The page before me is wet with tears—I cannot see to write.

Father Fisher.

He came to California in 1855. The Pacific Conference was in session at Sacramento. It was announced that the new preacher from Texas would preach at night. The boat was detained in some way, and he just had time to reach the church, where a large and expectant congregation were in waiting. Below medium height, plainly dressed, and with a sort of peculiar shuffling movement as he went down the aisle, he attracted no special notice except for the profoundly reverential manner that never left him anywhere. But the moment he faced his audience and spoke, it was evident to them that a man of mark stood before them. They were magnetized at once, and every eye was fixed upon the strong yet benignant face, the capacious blue eyes, the ample forehead, and massive head, bald on top, with silver locks on either side. His tones in reading the Scripture and the hymns were unspeakably solemn and very musical. The blazing fervor of the prayer that followed was absolutely startling to some of the preachers, who had cooled down under the depressing influence of the moral atmosphere of the country. It almost seemed as if we could hear the rush of the pentecostal wind, and see the tongues of flame. The very house seemed to be rocking on its foundations. By the time the prayer had ended, all were in a glow, and ready for the sermon. The text I do not now call to mind, but the impression made by the sermon remains. I had seen and heard preachers who glowed in the pulpit—this man burned. His words poured forth in a molten flood, his face shone like a furnace heated from within, his large blue eyes flashed with the lightning of impassioned sentiment, and anon swam in pathetic appeal that no heart could resist. Body, brain, and spirit, all seemed to feel the mighty afflatus. His very frame seemed to expand, and the little man who had gone into the pulpit with shuffling step and downcast eyes was transfigured before us. When, with radiant face, upturned eyes, an upward sweep of his arm, and trumpet-voice, he shouted, "Hallelujah to God!" the tide of emotion broke over all barriers, the people rose to their feet, and the church reechoed with their responsive hallelujahs. The new preacher from Texas that night gave some Californians a new idea of evangelical eloquence, and took his place as a burning and a shining light among the ministers of God on the Pacific Coast.

"He is the man we want for San Francisco!" exclaimed the impulsive B. T. Crouch, who had kindled into a generous enthusiasm under that marvelous discourse.