Pallbearer
Ain’t it true! Just think of him.
First Pallbearer
Yes; nobody woulda picked him out.
Second Pallbearer
Nor my brother John, neither.
Third Pallbearer
Well, what must be must be.
Fourth Pallbearer
Yes; it don’t do no good to kick. When a man’s time comes he’s got to go.
Fifth Pallbearer
We’re lucky if it ain’t us.
Sixth Pallbearer
So I always say. We ought to be thankful.
First Pallbearer
That’s the way I always feel about it.
Second Pallbearer
It wouldn’t do him no good, no matter what we done.
Third Pallbearer
We’re here to-day and gone to-morrow.
Fourth Pallbearer
But it’s hard all the same.
Fifth Pallbearer
It’s hard on her.
Sixth Pallbearer
Yes, it is. Why should he go?
First Pallbearer
It’s a question nobody ain’t ever answered.
Second Pallbearer
Nor never won’t.
Third Pallbearer
You’re right there. I talked to a preacher about it once, and even he couldn’t give no answer to it.
Fourth Pallbearer
The more you think about it the less you can make it out.
Fifth Pallbearer
When I seen him last Wednesday he had no more ideer of it than what you had.
Sixth Pallbearer
Well, if I had my choice, that’s the way I would always want to die.
First Pallbearer
Yes; that’s what I say. I am with you there.
Second Pallbearer
Yes; you’re right, both of you. It don’t do no good to lay sick for months, with doctors’ bills eatin’ you up, and then have to go anyhow.
Third Pallbearer
No; when a thing has to be done, the best thing to do is to get it done and over with.
Fourth Pallbearer
That’s just what I said to my wife when I heerd.
Fifth Pallbearer
But nobody hardly thought that he woulda been the next.
Sixth Pallbearer
No; but that’s one of them things you can’t tell.
First Pallbearer
You never know who’ll be the next.
Second Pallbearer
It’s lucky you don’t.
Third Pallbearer
I guess you’re right.
Fourth Pallbearer
That’s what my grandfather used to say: you never know what is coming.
Fifth Pallbearer
Yes; that’s the way it goes.
Sixth Pallbearer
First one, and then somebody else.
First Pallbearer
Who it’ll be you can’t say.
Second Pallbearer
I always say the same: we’re here to-day——
Third Pallbearer
(Cutting in jealousy and humorously.) And to-morrow we ain’t here.
(A subdued and sinister snicker. It is followed by sudden silence. There is a shuffling of feet in the front room, and whispers. Necks are craned. The pallbearers straighten their backs, hitch their coat collars and pull on their black gloves. The clergyman has arrived. From above comes the sound of weeping.)
II.—FROM THE PROGRAMME OF A CONCERT II.—From The Programme of a Concert
"Ruhm und Ewigkeit" (Fame and Eternity), a symphonic poem in B flat minor, Opus 48, by Johann Sigismund Timotheus Albert Wolfgang Kraus (1872- ).
Kraus, like his eminent compatriot, Dr. Richard Strauss, has gone to Friedrich Nietzsche, the laureate of the modern German tone-art, for his inspiration in this gigantic work. His text is to be found in Nietzsche’s Ecce Homo, which was not published until after the poet’s death, but the composition really belongs to Also sprach Zarathustra, as a glance will show:
I
Wie lange sitzest du schon auf deinem Missgeschick? Gieb Acht! Du brütest mir noch ein Ei, ein Basilisken-Ei, aus deinem langen Jammer aus.
II
Was schleicht Zarathustra entlang dem Berge?—
III
Misstrauisch, geschwürig, düster, ein langer Lauerer— aber plötzlich, ein Blitz, hell, furchtbar, ein Schlag gen Himmel aus dem Abgrund: —dem Berge selber schüttelt sich das Eingeweide. …
IV
Wo
