German is
preferable to death.
W. (Reflectively.) Well, I don't know--the problem is so sudden--but I
think you may be right: some kinds of death. It is more than likely that
a slow, lingering--well, now, there in Canada in the early times a couple
of centuries ago, the Indians would take a missionary and skin him, and
get some hot ashes and boiling water and one thing and another, and
by-and-by that missionary--well, yes, I can see that, by-and-by, talking
German could be a pleasant change for him.
GEO. Why, of course. Das versteht sich; but you have to always think a
thing out, or you're not satisfied. But let's not go to bothering about
thinking out this present business; we're here, we're in for it; you are
as moribund to see Annie as I am to see Margaret; you know the terms:
we've got to speak German. Now stop your mooning and get at your
Meisterschaft; we've got nothing else in the world.
W. Do you think that'll see us through?
GEO. Why it's got to. Suppose we wandered out of it and took a chance
at the language on our own responsibility, where the nation would we be!
Up a stump, that's where.
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