His body, whin he killed himself, was pitched into a lake on the Alps mountains.Now, listen to the job that 'tis mine to perform on the night of ivery Good Friday.The ould divil goes down in the pool and drags up Pontius, and the water is bilin' and spewin' like a wash pot.And the ould divil sets the body on top of a throne on the rocks, and thin comes me share of the job.Oh, sir, ye would pity me thin -- ye would pray for the poor Wandering Jew that niver was a Jew if ye could see the horror of the thing that I must do.'Tis I that must fetch a bowl of water and kneel down before it till it washes its hands.I declare to ye that Pontius Pilate, a man dead two hundred years, dragged up with the lake slime coverin' him and fishes wrigglin' inside of him widout eyes, and in the discomposition of the body, sits there, sir, and washes his hands in the bowl I hold for him on Good Fridays.'Twas so commanded."Clearly, the matter had progressed far beyond the scope of the _Bugle's_local column.There might have been employment here for the alienist or for those who circulate the pledge; but I had had enough of it.I got up, and repeated that I must go.
At this he seized my coat, grovelled upon my desk, and burst again into distressful weeping.Whatever it was about, I said to myself that his grief was genuine.
"Come now, Mr.Ader," I said, soothingly; "what is the matter?"The answer came brokenly through his racking sobs: