It had the usual country-schoolhouse form--be-
longed to the packing-box order of architecture;
had an underpinning of stones, a moss-grown roof,
and blank window spaces, whence both glass and
sash had long departed. It was ruined, but not a ruin
--a typical Californian substitute for what are
known to guide-bookers abroad as 'monuments of
the past.' With scarcely a glance at this uninterest-
ing structure Jaralson moved on into the dripping
undergrowth beyond.
'I will show you where he held me up,' he said.
'This is the graveyard.'
Here and there among the bushes were small en-
closures containing graves, sometimes no more than
one. They were recognized as graves by the dis-
coloured stones or rotting boards at head and foot,
leaning at all angles, some prostrate; by the ruined
picket fences surrounding them; or, infrequently, by
the mound itself showing its gravel through the
fallen leaves. In many instances nothing marked
the spot where lay the vestiges of some poor mortal
--who, leaving 'a large circle of sorrowing friends,'
had been left by them in turn--except a depression
in the earth, more lasting than that in the spirits of
the mourners. The paths, if any paths had been,
were long obliterated; trees of a considerable size
had been permitted to grow up from the graves and
thrust aside with root or branch the enclosing
fences. Over all was that air of abandonment and
decay which seems nowhere so fit and significant
as in a village of the forgotten dead.
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