Arizona Weekly Citizen

THE RAINS DESCENDED
The Good Saint Brought It-The Priest who was "up" on Weather.
Rain and rain stories are highly apropos of the season, and a sojourner from Mexico gives an account of how they made rain in Magdalena some fifteen years ago.
It was St. Francisco, the patron saint of one of the churches there, who brought the downpour. The priest in charge of the church was well versed on meteorological indications, which, of course does not mean that this had anything to do with it, only that he gave permission for the pilgrimage of the saint when he deemed proper. "The drouth had been a long one, the vegetation was withered, the wells were going dry, the dust was intolerable, and the implorations for his intercession for rain to St. Francisco were countless. Then one day the priest consented to the pilgrimage of the saint to bring the rain. The saint was accordingly tenderly loaded on a pack animal, and started on his quest of moisture, going seven miles up the creek bed entering the town, and then seven miles back. Anxious, very anxious watchers noted the heavens. Would it rain? The sky certainly did look hazy far off in one direction, and the good people of Magdalena watched it grow into a cloud. The cloud blackened and began to spread. The distant rumble of thunder was heard from beyond it. It neared, and increased, and overspread all and then the rain came down, and the people blessed the good saint who had heard their petitions and granted them at the imminent risk of getting his own coat of paint removed by the hurrying storm.
The good Francisco had hitherto been held in high estimation, but now he was the blessed of all that part of Mexico. The people thronged to him, each dropping in his mite, according to his means, and the good priest counted over several thousand dollars which he cared for well for St. Francisco, who brought the rain and the crops and filled the wells and made the people prosperous and happy and liberal to him.