The Russellville Democrat., 1892-08-25
rHE GHOST or pARAplslo.
A spook That rakss Baths ana Orders
 Dranks.

has been explained at last.
 Many will remember that few years ago story came out of the ''busted" Southern California boom of the spook which haunted the big new hotel at Paradisio.
 Paradisio was typical of the boom's decadence White stakes marked town lots and villa tracts out where the Hone and level sands stretched far away 1.-The city, consisted of a lonely horse car on rusty track and the hotel. The hotel would have done credit to San Francisco. In Oakland 1t would have been called a caravansary. It had salI the modern improve ments, 7 except guests. It stood in that staked plain, fresh painted, tenantless, alone.
 One night J DeBarth Shorb and a party of friends, belated, camped near the hotel. They were the ones who heard the ghost, saw 1t, and staked their regulations for sobriety and veracity on the ttr1ssth tr1stslh: ,,f { !!ssssir narrative. They were so earnest in their statements that Walter Moore, John T. Gaffey, J. Downey, Hars y and Walter Maxwell went out the next night to the camping place, near the Paradisio Hotel, just to as- certain whether or not there was anything really supernatural abont the spot where they had dumped few of their dollars.
 When they returned to Los Angeles they were scared They confirmed everything Shorb and Lis friends had sail. They added de- tails and went into particulars. Other people hocked to Paradisio. The ghost never was seen or heard again. The narrators were called liars. They knocked the people down and were knocked down in turn. But they persisted with angry emphasis that they had seen the ghost.
 s'It isn't an ordinary ghost, they said, flor 1t takes baths and orders drinks. We've heard the water running in the tubs on one floor after another-and we've found the tuhs wet when we broke into the hotel. We've heard ghostly voice ordering ID all sorts of drinks through the speaking tubes. We've heard all the electric bells jingling. We've seen a palid figure appear at the windows and vanish suddenly. We searched high and low through the hotel and no one was there.
 So came about the great ghost story of Paradisio.
 The other evening Albert Ger berding, bank commissioner and president of the Bohemian Club, sat in the center of merry group spin ming very pleasant, and very i'm probable, yarns. He began on his third as follows:
 "A few years ago l was down in Southern California on business, and was forced to stay in great barn of a house-one of those modern hotels erected to boom new town. There wash [ another person in it, not a habitation anywhere near. The only sign of life was the smouldering fire of some tramps camped not far away.
 1.-The first night of my stay was one of those big, moonlit nights that seem vast and empty. think the bigness of 1t and its loneliness filled me with strange fancies. Per haps it was too long looking at the moon. But in any event l threw off all restraint 1 set the alarm bells changing all over the vacant house. I ordered rare wines through the speaking tubes from imaginary bar keepers, and roared into the ear of a suppositious chief a demand for banquet which would have strained the exchequer of an empire. I danced through the halls desha- bile, and took a bath on every floor.
 1.-The next night l started the same antics, but those internal tramps broke into the place and 1 was forced to hide in the garret. The next night 1 got out of Para disio as fast as my legs"
 "Whatf" shrieked Downey liar vey, who suddenly awakened to an interest in the conversation. "Where was thatf"
 "At Paradisio, Southern Cali fornia." <"
 "About four years agoi"
 "Yes."
 "Why, confound your sunburned soull I've been reviled, beaten, cursed and kicked up and down this broad land on your account. l was one of those 'tramps' who broke into the hotel.
 "'Hang youl You're the far famed ghost of Paradisio. "-San Francisco Examiner.