Lincoln County leader. [volume] (Toledo, Lincoln County, Or.) 1893-1987, 1910-09-16
CHAPTER II.

and coal region as the first of an
epoch, and as the year of the great
flood. But the herald of change had
not yet blown his trumpet in Paradise
Valley; and the world of russet and
Agreen and limestone white, spreading
itself before the eyes of the boy sit
ting with his hands locked over--his
knees on the top step of the porch
fronting the Gordon homestead, was
the same world which, with due sea-
sonal variations, had been his world
from the beginning.
1t was a hot July afternoon, a full
month after the revival, and Thomas
Jefferson was at that perilous pass
where Satan is said to lurk for the
purpose of providing employment for
the idle He was wondering IL the
shade Of the hill oaks would be worth
the trouble 1t would take to reach it.
when his mother came to the open
window Of the living g-room: a small.
fair, well-preserved woman. this moth
er of the boy of 12,- with light brown
hair graying a little at the temples,
and eyes remindful of vigils, of fervent
beseeching, of mighty wrestlings
against principalities and powers and
the rulers of the darkness Of this
world.
You, Thomas Jefferson" she said,
gently, but speaking as one having au-
thority, you'd better be studying your
Sunday lesson than sitting there doing
nothing"
"Yes'm." said the boy, but he made
no move other than to hug his knees
q little closer. He wished his mother
would stop calling his Thomas Jeffer-
son." To be sure, it was his name,
or at least two thirds of it; but he
liked the Buddy" of his father, or the
: "Tom-Jeff" Of other people a vast deal
better.
Further, the thought of studying
Sunday lessons begot rebellion. At
times, as during those SOUL stirring re-
vival weeks, now seemingly receding
into a far-away past, he had moments
of yearning to be wholly sanctified.
But the miracle of transformation
which he had confidently expected as
the result of his coming through" was
still unwrought. When John Bates or
Simon Cantrell undertook to bully him,
as aforetime, there was the same In
toxicating experience of all the visible
world going blood-red before his eyes
the same sinful desire to slay them,
one or both.
He stole glance at the open window
Of the living room. His mother had
gone about her housework, and he
could hear her singing softly, as befit-
ted the still, warm day. All hymns
were beginning to have that effect, and
this one in particular always renewed
Nhn % g.
sanctity and a desire to do something
desperately wicked; the only middle
course lay in flight. Hence, the battle
being fairly on, he stole another glance
at the window sprang afoot, and ran
silently around the house and through
the peach orchard to Chamber over the
low stone wall which was the only
barrier on that side between the will
derness and the sown.
Men spoke of Paradise as "the val
ley" though it was rather a sheltered
cove with Mount Lebanon for its back
ground and a semicircular range of
oak-grown hills for its other rampant.
Splitting it endwise ran the white
streak of the pike, macadamiZed from
the hill quarry which, a full quarter
of century before the Civil War, had
furnished the stone for the Dabney
manor house; and paralleling the road
unevenly lay a ribbon of silver known
to less poetic souls than Thomas JEFF
ferson's, as Turkey Creek, but loved
best by him under it's almost forgotten
Indian name of Chiawassee.
Beyond the valley and it's inclosing
hills rose the "other mountain" blue
in the sunlight and royal purple in the
shadows-the Cumberland: source and
birthplace of the cooling west wind
that was whispering softly to the ce-
dars on high Lebanon. Thomas Jeffer-
son called the loftiest of the purple
distances Pisgah, picturing 1t as the
mountain from which Moses had look
ed over into the Promised Land. Some
time he would go and climb 1t and
feast his eyes on the sight of the Ca
naan beyond; yea, he might even go
down and possess the good land. IL so
the Lord should not hold him back as
He had held Moses.
That was high thought, quite in
keeping with the sense of overlordship
bred of the upper stillnesses. To COM
pany with 1t, the home valley straight
way began to idealize itself from the
uplifted point Of view on the mount
of vision. The Paradise fields were
delicately- outlined squares of vivid
green or golden yellow, or the warm
red brown of the upturned earth III
the fallow places. The old negro quar-
ters on the Dabney grounds, many
years gone to the ruin of disuse, were
vine grown and invisible save as n
spot Of summer verdure; and the man
or-house itself, gray, grim and forbid
ding to a small boy scurrying past 1t
in the deepening twilight, was now no
moro than great square roof with the
cheerful sunlight playing on II.
Farther down the valley. near the
place whore the white pike twisted 1T