Page:Poet Lore, volume 4, 1892.djvu/464

 his bed uncovered. His youthful face, once so handsome, wore an expression unutterably painful.

“He must be buried this morning,” the parson remarked. I stepped close to the bed, and touched my friend’s hand. It was ice-cold. Tears filled my eyes. I turned away, and being unable to speak, went downstairs with the parson. The first dawn of day was already pouring in through the windows. Leaving me in the first room, the parson went to his bedroom. I lay down, dressed, upon a sofa, but could not fall asleep. About two hours later the yard was full of men. I arose, and walking about the room, awaited the funeral in feverish excitement.

After nine o’clock all soldiers that died of their wounds during the night were buried. I escorted my friend on his last journey, I saw how he was let down into the grave, and with a broken heart I returned to Prague.

Now, after many years have passed, after I have seen so many times how mercilessly Death often rages among the living, how suddenly his icy breath overtakes even vigorous persons,—now I should surely bear even my friend’s death more easily, in accordance with his wishes and views, as a welcome deliverance from the griefs and woes with which so-called Providence has so liberally overwhelmed mortals. At this time, however, I was young,—that is, in an age when the death of a beloved friend deeply affects even a person less sensitive than I was, and therefore it is no wonder that my friend’s death was a crushing blow.

At first it seemed to me impossible that he should be really dead. But when, at times, I recalled all the details, when I reminded myself of the truth that the grave never gives up its prey, when I reflected that I could never, never see my friend any more, that for me and for everybody else he was forever lost,—I felt an inexpressible bitterness. And yet, whenever I thought of him, the words of his last letter always came to my mind: “Should I get killed, don’t mourn; call our old friends together, and then think of me with cups of wine in hand.”

I held it to be my duty to fulfil even this last wish of my friend;