San Antonio light. [volume] (San Antonio, Tex.) 1911-1993, 1925-10-06
Listen, World!
Their Marks
By Elsie Robinson

The Mission of San Juan Bautista
of rose and gray tiles says sleepily
beneath the tall California sky. With
in the 10 arches of its corridor the
shadows flow in bars of heliotrops
across the russell tiles, as though the
ghost of old wine lay spilled.
The blossoms of the locust trees
wither in a pale foam undcrfoot. The
fragrance of the locust trees clings
to the cracked adobe walls and drifts
in a sweet odor into the deep set
windows with the small, flawed panee
of glass.
The little birds take dust baths in
the earth beneath the cactus plants.
They nest inside the shaggy cypress
trees and sit in chattering chorus
around the rim-of the ancient bell.
The Mission of San Juan Bautista
is green in the moonlight. Not green
as grass or as trees are green, but
green like clouded onyx, with shadows
blue as lapis lazuli. The sky seems
lower and has lost its chilliness. 1t
has become a web of ashy violet in
which the bubble of the moon is
| caught.
The expresses are dark and still
| against the cleaning dobe walls. The
earth and walls, the warm night air
simmer with the drifting filaments of
light. Only the expresses loom black.
Against the central one tall white
cross is placed-a slender radiant line
against the shadow.
The Mission of San Juan Bautista
is very old. In 1907 the wandering
padres started it upon rise of land,
beneath which spread wide meadows
where they could grow grapes and
grain and pears for brandy. For IL
years the Indians dug and nodded the
dobe for the bricks with which they
built, then baked it in the lazy sum-
mer suns. For Is years the homesick
Spanish priests watched the walls rise
and small rooms grow across the
desert space.
So the slow wonder of that working
grew. A thing of beauty out of dobe
mud. A Christian vision built by saw
age hands. Ax-hewn beams, bowls
scooped from solid stone for baptisms,
doors to hold Roman vestments carved
with the red Indian Zine of life.n
| L
it was done-the dim, rough-raftered
church, with it's tagged floor and
blade-arked benches-the church
where padres preached with gun in
hand against hostile uprising-the cor.
ridor that spread its length along the
plaza, where cheering mobs watched
bulls and bears fight to the death
And now today they have all passed
away, the praying priests and savaget
who labored at their will. But tbs
Mission is left, white In the sun
green In the moonlight, a treasure be.
yond price for those who rule the
land.
Yes, the mission stays. And every
day throughout the year Mr.. and Mrs
Ed Jones, of PIG Main Street, Kansas
City, or Newark, or Sacramento, oil
San Antonio. with Mary or Ellen ani
Dave and Joe. and the frying pan and
the sleeping bag, all drive up in tbs
flivver to have look.
They have look.
But do they see the lovely line Of
rosy tiles against the vaulting sky
Or do they see the shadows like spill.
cd wine or how the expresses frame
that slender cross?
No. they do not see these things.
THEY ONLY SEE A LOT OF
SWELL WHITE WALL WHERE
THEY CAN WRITE THEIE
NAMES.
SO they write them on that oil,
white wall, built of the blood ant
tears. the sweat and dreams and faitf
and laughter of so many men-tha
rare and costly wall whose textur,
modernS never can replace. The.
write their names thcre-Emma Hal
and Susy Price, Hitch Hikers from
Milwaukce-Jim Borden. Eddie Wal
lace, Harry King. Fresno Hicl
School. Rah! Rah /! Rah Steve Rog
; ers and Wife, of Chicago-"You know
me. Steve!"
, Wherever they can reach they writ
, their names. Thousands of name
smearing the old white walls or carve
, deep into the adobe. Wherever the
D can squat they throw their trash
j There's an empty tobacco can at tn
foot of the white cross. little of pic
mic plates and egg shells on the wor
red flags, wad of gum beside tn
door where dim gold letters still pre-
claim
"HIC DOMCS DEL EST PORT.
COELI." This is the house of Go
and the portal of heaven"
With these few words the Latin
;, sealed their work and left their mari
NOW WE, \ VANDAL-LIKl
TRIBE, LEAVE OURS!
Copyright, 1925, King Feature Syn, In