"Stay, Jo! What now?"
"It's time for me to go to that there berryin ground, sir," he returns with a wild look.
"Lie down, and tell me. What burying ground, Jo?"
"Where they laid him as wos wery good to me, wery good to me indeed, he wos. It's time fur me to go down to that there berryin ground, sir, and ask to be put along with him. I wants to go there and be berried. He used fur to say to me, 'I am as poor as you to-day, Jo,' he ses. I wants to tell him that I am as poor as him now and have come there to be laid along with him."
"By and by, Jo. By and by."
"Ah! P'raps they wouldn't do it if I wos to go myself. But will you promise to have me took there, sir, and laid along with him?"
"I will, indeed."
"Thankee, sir. Thankee, sir. They'll have to get the key of the gate afore they can take me in, for it's allus locked. And there's a step there, as I used for to clean with my broom. It's turned wery dark, sir. Is there any light a-comin?"
"It is coming fast, Jo."
Fast. The cart is shaken all to pieces, and the rugged road is very near its end.
"Jo, my poor fellow!"
"I hear you, sir, in the dark, but I'm a-gropin—a-gropin—let me catch hold of your hand."
"Jo, can you say what I say?"
"I'll say anythink as you say, sir, for I knows it's good."
Our Father."
"Our Father! Yes, that's wery good, sir."
"Which art in heaven."
"Art in heaven—is the light a-comin, sir?"
"It is close at hand. Hallowed be thy name!"
"Hallowed be—thy—"
The light is come upon the dark benighted way. Dead!
Dead, your Majesty. Dead, my lords and gentlemen. Dead, right reverends and wrong reverends of every order. Dead, men and women, born with heavenly compassion in your hearts. And dying thus around us every day.
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