Amador ledger., 1900-02-16
A STORY OF LONG AGO|
A Strong Hint For Some
body.
A VOLCANO CORRESPONDENT RECALLS THE YARN
He Makes An Effort to Stir Volcano
ties and Wants Them to BE
Up and Doing"

Mr.. EDITOR: 1 accidentally ran
across this story in an old book, and,
as l thought it might interest some of
your Volcano readers, venture to ask
for space to publish it in your valuable
paper:
1t was long, long ago. The sun
was shining pleasantly on a beautiful
valley, in which numerous houses
were sheltered, inhabited by hap
| py people. Around the houses
grew magnificent trees bearing fruits
of peculiar golden tint. These fruits
| were not only beautiful to look upon,
but delicious to eat and very iourish-
ing, and had such qualities that almost
every one that had ever eaten of them
either could not or would not eat any
other. So these fruits were the main |
stay of the happy valley people. Many
travellers passed through the valley, |
and, allured by the golden fruit,
bought trees for their own use and re-
mained among the people.
'As the years passed by it came to
happen that the lower limbs of the |
| fruit any longer, so that the people
could not reach them from the ground
any more, and as few young trees
grew up and as the fruits brought to
the ground by shaking the trees by
the hand or by the wind were worth
| less, the only way for the people to OBJ
tain their favOrite fruits was by climb
ing the trees. Now this was a most
difficult task. All the lower limbs were
gone and the bark of the trees was
very slippery and extremely hard.
| With great pains you had to cut holes
in the bark for Yoar feet to have
hold, in order to reach the higher
branches on which the fruit was still
abundant. So not many succeeded in
the task, but great numbers fell down
and broke arms and legs and some were
even killed in the attempt. But they
had to have the fruit, and it then be-
came necessary to use ladders. Now
the conditions were such that these
ladders had to be made very strong
and very long, and the special material
from which they were constructed was
costly and difficult to obtain, so but
few people could afford to build them;
so few men undertook to furnish
ladders for the use of all the
/ PCOplC. L uO OWHcIS vi JU6S6
charged high price for their use 1t
became customary not to collect the
charges until the person using the lad
der descended to the bottom again. In
many cases the people fell off the lad
ders and got killed, so that nothing
could be collected from them for the
use of the ladders, others having
gained the upper branches jumped to
the ground on the opposite side and so
avoided payment. And while the lad
ders were very easy to ascend it some
times took years for the descent, so it
often took very long ladders to reach
the highest branches on which some of
the choicest fruit was suspended.
| 'NOw there lived man in the
town on a corner in a big house, where
the travellers used to rest after the
fatigues of their journey. Said he to
the people: oh, ye fools! why pay We
for the use of the ladders? | will help
you to build one that you may gather
the fruit without cost The people
listened eagerly to this talk and began
to gather material for the construction
of the ladder. This, as has already
been said, was difficult to obtain. So
some commenced to tear down their
houses or those belonging to other peo-
| pie, that they might bring to the man
on the corner the wherewith to build
ladder for them. A ladder was built,
but it did not reach very high and had
soon to be removed. So in their frenzy
to obtain the material the people con-
| tinued to destroy their own houses as
well as those of other people; they
even destroyed part of the big house on
the corner that they might build the
| free ladder. The man on the corner
assisted them in gathering the fruits,
and in doing so laid by good share for
his own use, though he was never
known to eat much himself
''The sun now shone down on a pitt
full sight. The once happy town was
fast going to pieces. The travellers did
not visit it any more, as the roof was
torn off the big corner house and could
afford them no more shelter. So
gradually the town went to ruin. And
when some of the people asked the |
man on the corner to lend them spade |
and pick to plant some more of the
young fruit trees, he refused to assist
them, but sat laughing in the corner of
his house that had not yet gone to
pieces on top of the sacks of fruit he
had gathered with the aid of the lad
der, of which the ruined houses of the
people had furnished the material. "
Such is the story. 1t is said that
history repeats itself. Is it possible |
that anybody can show me the parallel
to this story at the present time?
With thanks for the hospitality of
your estimable paper, l am, Mr.. Editor,
yours truly, REUBEN WINTER.