The Rose of Tuolumne
Chapter One
A girl peculiarly nicknamed rose is in her bedroom. She just got back from some party. It's late at night and she is getting ready to sleep. Her father, Mr. McClosky enters her room and asks her if she could get dressed to entertain one of his guests, a young poet. The girl's name is Jenny. She accepts and tells him that she misses having a woman in her life, someone like mother. He assures her that she doesn't need one and leaves the room. He finds his guest outside angry. Mr. McClosky tells him that his daughter will come out soon. The poet called Ridgeway tells him that he already knows what he's trying to do. When Jenny comes out he is captivated by her, Rose. They talk all night and she offers to walk with him when he is about to go home. When they reach the area near the woods they suddenly become overcome with passion and kiss. There is a sound on the road, footsteps and the couple parts. Jenny goes back home. She is overcome with this new feeling and can't think of anything else. Soon, the sun rises and Jenny spots a man outside of her home. She goes out to find out it is Ridgeway, he is wounded beneath his shoulder. She asks what happened and he answers that her kiss did this and faints. Jenny grabs him and carries him into the house resembling a goddess. When she puts him down on the sofa she is struck by feeling of guilt. Her father simply comments that Jenny had fetched him.
Chapter Two
Ridgeway is recovering and soon leaves the house. Mr. McClosky leaves to visit Jenny's future husband John Ashe. He tells him about Jenny's mother; she is not dead as he told Jenny, but is alive and moving from one place to another. He tells John that he needs to break off with his daughter and he agrees. He comes home and finds Jenny with a man called Henry, Jenny's courter. Ridgeway comes to the house and the two men have jealousy fits. Jenny tells them to break it off and leaves. Henry is waiting for Jenny outside in the moonlight. She comes out in a sleeping dress stained in blood and accuses Henry of attacking Ridgeway. He wounds her and escapes. The wound is not fatal and Jenny is recovering. Henry is imprisoned. Soon, Jenny recovered and decided to take a walk with Ridgeway to the same spot where they kissed. The passion is no longer there and the couple admits it. They go back home.
Analysis
Ridgeway is not a man from the city so the people are quick to judge what happened to him. Jenny also has a weird motherly affection towards him that maybe stem from her not having a mother, it also explains the lack of affection the two have at the end.
A Passage in the Life of Mr. Jack Oakhurst
It is a story about a young broker named Jack Oakhurst who falls in love with a married invalid woman. He gives her husband the money needed for her recovery. She recovers and is a new woman and he is madly in love with her. She likes him as well and convinces his husband to invite him to live with them as a gratitude for what Oakhurst has done for them-things have turned and the couple is rich now and Jack poor. The woman and Jack are in a relationship and no one in the town is aware as Mrs. Decker has a good reputation. Jack has a jealousy fit when a man named Hamilton comments on their relationship and kills him later that night. Hamilton gives him some letters before he dies that are supposedly from Mrs. Decker's lover. Jack Oakhurst goes to Mrs. Decker's house later and threatens to kill her, she persuades him not to and he leaves. Mr. Decker comes home and Mrs. Decker hugs him and they continue living happily. After two weeks Jack is seen playing cards in his rooms in Sacramento.
Analysis
It is a story about turns of fate and a man being judged for his different appearance and different way of living and carrying himself. It is a story about a man doing something stupid for love which proves to be useless later.
Wan Lee, the Pagan
The narrator recalls an event of being called to the warehouse of one of his Chinese friends, a gentleman named Hop Sing. The narrator refers to him as a pagan because of his religious beliefs. Hop Sing has prepared a show for a few of his guests. It is a show by a magician named Wang. In his last act Wang asks for a handkerchief and the narrator offers him one. Beneath the handkerchief Wang makes a Chinese baby appear. The baby is born there and the guests are his godfathers. Years later narrator receives a letter from Hop Sing asking him to foster his godchild, the young baby from the performance who was named Wan Lee. Wan Lee is spending time as the narrator's assistant before he gets accepted to some Chinese school and gets adopted by a widow with a daughter. Wan Lee becomes fond of the daughter and she seems to be transforming him and teaching him about Christianity. There is a persecution and killing of foreigners in San Francisco. Hop Sing invites the narrator to his warehouse again. He shows him Wan Lee dead. He was stoned to death on the street by Christian boys his age. On his chest there is a figure of their pagan god crushed to pieces by one of the stones.
Analysis
It is a sad story about an intelligent boy who might have had a bright future if it weren't for the sheer hatred for his race that shut his young life down.
How Old Man Plunkett Went Home
It is a story about a man who keeps saying that he will go home but never does. He makes up a story to his acquaintances at the bar about finally going home and seeing his wife and daughter. He hands his daughter's photo to one of the men called Henry York. Henry falls in love with the girl on the photo. One day his lies are uncovered and the men attack him about lying. York falls into his defence saying that he did go, he has seen him. York takes the old man Plunkett home and there asks him if the girl on the photo is his daughter. Plunkett says that it's a photo of an actress and makes Henry York disappointed. One day old man Plunkett receives a letter from York telling him about the location where he can finally meet his wife and daughter. Plunkett has mixed feelings of hope and fear. When he arrives at the location Plunkett shouts that the two women aren't his blood, that his daughter is beautiful. Plunkett falls to the ground and dies which makes him finally go to his real home.
Analysis
It is a story about a man so caught up in his lies that he can't even make out the truth anymore. He keeps promising that he will go home but knows that he never will. When after so many years he finally sees his daughter and wife the reality of how they changed is unbearable to him.
The Fool of Five Forks
The Fool is a man named Cyrus Hawkins who works at a gold mine at Five Forks. He isn't very bright and often complains about his health to other workers so they make fun of him. He has a mistress who the men call a Hag. The Fool keeps sending her letter and she just sends them back and their relation keeps going in that circle. The Fool gets involved with some politicians as an adviser. He gets an offer to sell his land where he lives but he refuses. The reason is because he is getting ready to build there. He built a large house but never spent time there. Because the house was left unoccupied the locals started calling it the Fool's Asylum. Years later one of the local woman, a teacher called Milly, decides to visit the supposed haunted house. On her way back she meets Hawkins the Fool and he escorts her back. Miss Milly breaks her leg and Hawkins becomes her frequent visitor at the hospital which leads to rumours about the two. One day there is an accident at the mine and one of the men became trapped. His wife Annie runs to Hawkins and begs him to save her husband. Annie is the Hag and Hawkins didn't know she was married. Hawkins saves her husband but becomes trapped instead. He is trapped under the house he built and dies there, but the men are not able to move his body because if they do the entire house will fall. Before he dies Hawkins tells Annie to live in the house with her husband because it was built for her.
Analysis
It is a story about a Fool. The man Cyrus Hawkins is a definition of the Fool in every sense of the word. He even dies as a fool.
Baby Sylvester
The narrator visits a cabin of one of his friends, a man named Sylvester. When he asked the miners what he could do in that solitude they said that he will play with Sylvester's baby. Confused the narrator enters the cabin and falls asleep. When he wakes up he finds a little bear, a cub in the cabin-it has a collar with his name: Baby. Narrator spends a wonderful day playing with the bear and then returns home. After a few months he receives a letter from Sylvester about Baby: He can no longer take care of it so he sends him the bear to look after. The bear arrives that night. The next morning the narrator decides to take the bear to one of his cabins. He prepares invitations for neighbours to come see the bear. When they do arrive the bear is missing. He finds him eating syrup. The next day Baby escaped and narrator never saw him again except, some time later when he sees a malnourished show bear on the street. He calls it by the name Baby and at first it doesn't react but when the narrator turns around he sees it looking at him and thrusting a paw to the glass.
Analysis
It is a story about a man unusually bonding with a wild animal. Beautiful at first glance that bond proves to be more harmful to the animal than the man.
An Episode of Fiddletown
It is a story about a beautiful poet from a place called Fiddletown. Her beauty sparks many rumours about her relationships but eventually she marries a man called Mr. Tretherick. He is abusive and cruel towards her and they have an episode where they get separated. Mrs. Tretherick upon returning to their home finds a little girl there-her name is Carry. She is a daughter of Mr. Tretherick's ex wife. Mrs. Tretherick becomes fond of the girl and leaves the house together with her. Years have passed since her sudden departure. A Chinese servant from the house pays her a visit and gives her some money because she isn't fairing well. Mrs Tretherick receives news that her husband died. She marries a Colonel Starbottle. On their honeymoon Carry gets taken by her real mother which crushes the poet-now Mrs. Starbottle. Many years have passed and we get a look at Carry's life at school. She is about to turn eighteen. When she got taken years before Mrs. Starbottle made a deal with Carry's real mother that she will pay for her education and whatever is necessary under the condition that when the girl turns eighteen she will be able to choose her guardian from then on. Carry chooses Mrs. Starbottle and they spend Mrs. Starbottle's remaining days together.
Analysis
It is a story about motherhood. It questions what makes a real mother. This story goes to show that it is more than blood bond. The poet devotes her life to this young girl despite not being the one who gave birth to her. On the other hand there is coldness between Carry and her birth mother.
A Jersey Centenarian
A centenarian is a person who lives above hundred years. The narrator recalls going to visit one of New Jersey Centenarians and ask her about George Washington but she keeps mixing up the story with one of the men from his time called Perkins. The narrator comically describes her jaw dropping but she keeps talking and when one of her young daughters of eighty-five puts it back in place her talk becomes confusing. The woman talks to the narrator about her family, recalls stories on the go, but there is very little talk about George Washington so he leaves not knowing much more than he did when he came.
Analysis
It is a concluding story. The reason for it to be the final story might be because the old lady talks about history from her own perception, personal experience so the narrator leaves not knowing what is true and what not. The old lady is a representation of history in general.
