Читать книгу The Essays of Douglas Jerrold онлайн

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“Why, thou art drunk, merry, or mad! The churchyard and mould! I ask you where went, where is, the procession?”

“Where I tell you. I saw it pass by me, and after some windings and shiftings, I saw each brave puppet—that strutted as though the angels were looking at it—I saw it shrink, and bend, and totter, and the yellowness of age crept over it, and its eye faded, and its hair whitened, and it crawled into the earth as the fox slinks beneath his cover. The trumpets lay dumb and cankering in the soil—the rustling flags dropped tinder at the breeze—the rust-eaten sword crumbled beneath the mattock of the digger, and rank grass grows above the pomp of the last hour.”

“Why, Schatten, thou art dreaming. Blessed St Mary! thou surely didst not see the sight, else thou hadst told me a truer story of its progress.”

“Not so: trust me, I saw the revel—but I beheld it from the pinnacle of time; and I tell you again, all the men who passed me I watched into the churchyard. Their haughty eyes—their trophies, flags, and clamorous pipes—I say to you, they are dust! The shout of triumph hath died in the distance, and hic jacet is now the only tongue.”