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A Connecticut Yankee In King Arthur's Court Mark Twain

Restoration Of The Fountain


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We had a solemn stage-wait, now, for about twenty minutes -- a thing I had counted on for effect; it is always good to let your audience have a chance to work up its expectancy. At length, out of the silence a noble Latin chant -- men's voices -- broke and swelled up and rolled away into the night, a majestic tide of melody. I had put that up, too, and it was one of the best effects I ever invented. When it was finished I stood up on the platform and extended my hands abroad, for two minutes, with my face uplifted -- that always produces a dead hush -- and then slowly pronounced this ghastly word with a kind of awfulness which caused hundreds to tremble, and many women to faint:

    "Constantinopolitanischerdudelsackspfeifen-
    machersgesellschafft!"

Just as I was moaning out the closing hunks of that word, I touched off one of my electric connections and all that murky world of people stood revealed in a hideous blue glare! It was immense -- that effect! Lots of people shrieked, women curled up and quit in every direction, foundlings collapsed by platoons. The abbot and the monks crossed themselves nimbly and their lips fluttered with agitated prayers. Merlin held his grip, but he was astonished clear down to his corns; he had never seen anything to begin with that, before. Now was the time to pile in the effects. I lifted my hands and groaned out this word -- as it were in agony:

    "Nihilistendynamittheaterkaestchensspreng-
    ungsattentaetsversuchungen!"

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-- and turned on the red fire! You should have heard that Atlantic of people moan and howl when that crimson hell joined the blue! After sixty seconds I shouted:

    "Transvaaltruppentropentransporttrampelthier-
    treibertrauungsthraenentragoedie!"

-- and lit up the green fire! After waiting only forty seconds this time, I spread my arms abroad and thundered out the devastating syllables of this word of words:

    "Mekkamuselmannenmassenmenchenmoerdermohrenmutter-
    marmormonumentenmacher!"

-- and whirled on the purple glare! There they were, all going at once, red, blue, green, purple! -- four furious volcanoes pouring vast clouds of radiant smoke aloft, and spreading a blinding rainbowed noonday to the furthest confines of that valley. In the distance one could see that fellow on the pillar standing rigid against the background of sky, his seesaw stopped for the first time in twenty years. I knew the boys were at the pump now and ready. So I said to the abbot:

"The time is come, Father. I am about to pronounce the dread name and command the spell to dissolve. You want to brace up, and take hold of something." Then I shouted to the people: "Behold, in another minute the spell will be broken, or no mortal can break it. If it break, all will know it, for you will see the sacred water gush from the chapel door!"

 
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A Connecticut Yankee In King Arthur's Court
Mark Twain

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