The Wit and Humor of America, Volume VI

The remainder of the passage from the ritual was lost to Amidon by reason of the fact that Stevens had placed one foot against the Deacon's stomach and hurled that august officer violently to the floor.

"Let every test of life be applied," said the Sovereign Pontiff. "Perchance some higher will than ours decrees his preservation. Take the body hence for a time; if possible, restore him to life, and we will consider his fate."

The recess which followed was clearly necessary to afford an opportunity for the calming of the risibilities of the Martyrs. The stage, too, had to be reset. Amidon's ethnological studies had not equaled his reading in belles-lettres, and he was unable to see the deep significance of these rites from an historical standpoint, and that here was a survival of those orgies to which our painted and skin-clad ancestors devoted themselves in spasms of religious frenzy, gazed at by the cave-bear and the mammoth. The uninstructed Amidon regarded them as inconceivable horse-play. While thus he mused, Stevens, who was still hoodwinked and being greatly belectured on the virtue of Faith and the duty of Obedience, reëntered on his ordeal.

He was now informed by the officer at the other end of the room that every man must ascend into the Mountains of Temptation and be tested, before he could be pronounced fit for companionship with Martyrs. Therefore, a weary climb heavenward was before him, and a great trial of his fidelity. On his patience, daring and fortitude depended all his future in the Order. He was marched to a ladder and bidden to ascend.

"I," said the Deacon Militant, "upon this companion stair will accompany you."

But there was no other ladder and the Deacon Militant had to stand upon a chair.

Up the ladder labored Stevens, but, though he climbed manfully, he remained less than a foot above the floor. The ladder went down like a treadmill, as Stevens climbed—it was an endless ladder rolled down on Stevens' side and up on the other. The Deacon Militant, from his perch on the chair, encouraged Stevens to climb faster so as not to be outstripped. With labored breath and straining muscles he climbed, the Martyrs rolling on the floor in merriment all the more violent because silent. Amidon himself laughed to see this strenuous climb, so strikingly like human endeavor, which puts the climber out of breath, and raises him not a whit—except in temperature. At the end of perhaps five minutes, when Stevens might well have believed himself a hundred feet above the roof, he had achieved a dizzy height of perhaps six feet, on the summit of a stage-property mountain, where he stood beside the Deacon Militant, his view of the surrounding plain cut off by papier-mâché clouds, and facing a foul fiend, to whom the Deacon Militant confided that here was a candidate to be tested and qualified. Whereupon the foul fiend remarked "Ha, ha!" and bade them bind him to the Plutonian Thunderbolt and hurl him down to the nether world. The thunderbolt was a sort of toboggan on rollers, for which there was a slide running down presumably to the nether world, above mentioned.

The hoodwink was removed, and Stevens looked about him, treading warily, like one on the top of a tower; the great height of the mountain made him giddy. Obediently he lay face downward on the thunderbolt, and yielded up his wrists and ankles to fastenings provided for them.

"They're not going to lower him with those cords, are they?"

It was a stage-whisper from the darkness which spake thus.

"Oh, I guess it's safe enough!" said another, in the same sort of agitated whisper.

"Safe!" was the reply. "I tell you, it's sure to break! Some one stop 'em—"

To the heart of the martyred Stevens these words struck panic. But as he opened his mouth to protest, the catastrophe occurred. There was a snap, and the toboggan shot downward. Bound as he was, the victim could see below him a brick wall right across the path of his descent. He was helpless to move; it was useless to cry out. For all that, as he felt in imagination the crushing shock of his head driven like a battering-ram against this wall, he uttered a roar such as from Achilles might have roused armed nations to battle. And even as he did so, his head touched the wall, there was a crash, and Stevens lay safe on a mattress after his ten-foot slide, surrounded by fragments of red-and-white paper which had lately been a wall. He was pale and agitated, and generally done for; but tremendously relieved when he had assured himself of the integrity of his cranium. This he did by repeatedly feeling of his head, and looking at his fingers for sanguinary results. As Amidon looked at him, he repented of what he had done to this thoroughly maltreated fellow man. After the Catacombs scene, which was supposed to be impressive, and some more of the "secret" work, everybody crowded about Stevens, now invested with the collar and "jewel" of Martyrhood, and laughed, and congratulated him as on some great achievement, while he looked half-pleased and half-bored. Amidon, with the rest, greeted him, and told him that after his vacation was over, he hoped to see him back at the office.

"That was a fine exemplification of the principles of the Order," said Alvord as they went home.

"What was?" said Amidon.

"Hiring old Stevens back," answered Alvord. "You've got to live your principles, or they don't amount to much."

"Suppose some fellow should get into a lodge," asked Amidon, "who had never been initiated?"

"Well," said Alvord, "there isn't much chance of that. I shouldn't dare to say. You can't tell what the fellows would do when such sacred things were profaned, you know. You couldn't tell what they might do!"

THE WILD BOARDER[9 - From "Mixed Beasts," by Kenyon Cox. Copyright 1904, by Fox, Duffield & Co.]

BY KENYON COX

His figure's not noted for grace;
You may not much care for his face;
But a twenty-yard dash,
When he hears the word "hash,"
He can take at a wonderful pace.

DE GRADUAL COMMENCE

BY WALLACE BRUCE AMSBARY

Oui, Oui, M'sieu, I'm mos' happee,
My ches' wid proud expan',
I feel de bes' I evere feel,
An' over all dis lan'
Dere's none set op so moch as me;
You'll know w'en I am say
My leddle daughter Madeline
Is gradual to-day.

She is de ver' mos' smartes' gairl
Dat I am evere know,
I'm fin' dis out, de teacher, he
Is tol' me dat is so;
She is so smart dat she say t'ings
I am no understan',
She is know more dan any one
Dat leeve on ol' Ste. Anne.

De Gradual Commence is hol'
Down at de gr'ad beeg hall,
W'ere plaintee peopl' can gat seat
For dem to see it all.
De School Board wid dere president,
Dey sit opon front row,
Dey look so stiff an' dignify,
For w'at I am not know.

De classe dat mak' de "gradual"
Dey're on de stage, you see,
In semi-cirque dat face de peop',
Some scare as dey can be;
Den wan of dem dey all mak' spe'k,
Affer de nodder's t'roo,
Dis tak' dem 'bout t'ree hour an' half
De hull t'ing for to do.

Ma Madeline she is all feex op,
Mos' beautiful to see,
In nice w'ite drass, my wife he buy
Overe to Kankakee.
An' when she rise to mak' de spe'k
How smart she look on face,
Dey all expec' somet'ing dey hear,
Dere's hush fall on de place.

She tell us how to mak' de leeve,
How raise beeg familee;
She tell it all so smood an' plain
Dat you can't help but see;
An' how she learn her all of dat