Jake's breathing and his efforts to release himself from the heavy canvas covering him could be heard above the din and confusion. Palmer was here, there, everywhere, assuring the audience that a slight accident had befallen the mechanical part of the panorama. "Just remain seated, we'll give you a good show." He forgot himself and called it a show after all his orders to us not to speak the word "show." The strong arms of Bedford Tom, and Jake soon righted the panorama. Mrs. Palmer played the organ, and right there is where one of my songs would come in right. I sung for Jake and Tom last night and Jake declared: "The people in Bedford would like one of dem nigger songs better dan Palmer's hull tarn pictur show. De hull tam ting is a fraudt; no such a man as Bunjun was ever in Bedford yail. I and Tom knows every man dot's been in dot yail and dey don't put 'em in yail fur what he sedt." Jake's mixed up; he imagines Palmer refers to Bedford, Pa.
The panorama worked along smoothly until Pliable and Christian, (I and Jake), fell into the Slough of Despond. You know, in the book, Pliable and Christian are traveling together; they fall in the Slough of Despond; Pliable struggles and gets out. Christian, owing to the burden he carries on his back, flounders about and is fast sinking when Help appears and asks: "What doest thou there?" Jake answered: "Noting." Palmer hissed: "Roll over! Roll over! Hold your head under the canvas; duck, you son of a gun, duck!" Palmer answered with the speech Jake was supposed to deliver, as Jake rolled over and over: "Sir, I was bid by a man named Evangelist, who directed me to yonder gate that I might escape the wrath to come and as I was going thither I fell in here." Then I come as Help; I say: "Why did you not look for the steps?" Jake is supposed to say: "Fear followed me so hard that I fled the next way and fell in." Then as Help, I lean far over, hold out my hand and say: "Give me thine hand that I may draw thee upon hard ground that thou might go thy way." Instead of Jake following the business as rehearsed, he arose, took the burden off his back, walked out the opposite side, back towards the City of Destruction.
The audience, or some of them, tittered, others laughed outright. Palmer was prompting Jake: "Get into the pond! Complete the scene!" The more Palmer prompted, the more confused Jake appeared. "Get your burden, it's not time to drop it; get your burden." Jake, smiling, walked over the miry, muddy slough he was supposed to have struggled in a moment before, and took up the burden. Instead of putting it on his back he carried it under his arm, nodded at Palmer, as much as to say: "I'm ready for anything further, go on." Worldly Wise Man here appears before Christian and speaks to him: "How now good fellow; whither away after this burdened manner?" Christian answers: "A burdened manner indeed as ever, I think, poor creature had. And whereas you ask me whither away, I am going to yonder wicket gate, for there, as I am informed, I shall be put in a way to be rid of my heavy burden." Then Worldly Wise advises Christian: "Wilt thou hearken to me if I give thee counsel?" Christian answers: "If it be good I will, for I stand in need of good counsel." Worldly Wise then answers: "I would advise thee that thou, with all speed, get thyself rid of thy burden, for thou will never be settled in thy mind until then." Palmer answered with Christian's speech: "That is which I seek for, even to be rid of this heavy burden, but get it off myself I cannot, nor is there any man in our country who can take it off my shoulders."
Jake As Christian
Jake, smiling more pleasantly than ever, answered, "I kin." Suiting the action to the word, he flung his burden into the Slough of Despond. The pond was a thin piece of canvas painted to represent the quagmire. The burden made a sound as of the house falling down. Jake wiped the perspiration from his face and, spitting a mouthful of tobacco juice to one side, he gazed on the audience and smiled. It was too much for even the staid old church members. The laughter was so great that Palmer pulled the curtain and announced an organ recital.
Christian's burden was replaced on Jake's back, he was admonished to pay closest attention to Palmer's promptings. Jake continued the pilgrimage. In the next scene Jake, representing Christian on his journey from the City of Destruction to the Celestial City, must pass through the Dark Valley of Shadows. When Jake, instead of keeping to the right and following the straight and narrow path, boldly walked into the mouth of the burning pit, out of which Palmer was sending sparks and smoke. Palmer again pulled the curtain on the scene. Jake sat on a stage stump. Smoke was still coming from the pot of damp straw. Tears filled Jake's eyes, tears caused by the smoke. Palmer rushed back and forth, declaring Jake had made a farce of the most beautiful and inspiring scene in the entire exhibition. I was substituted for Jake. I knew every speech; I had learned them all and it went good to the last.
The second book is even more impressive and instructive than the first. You should read it. As the young ladies walk in at the Beautiful Gate of the city, Pilgrim is seen through a gauze; one by one the sheets of gauze are pulled down until Christian fades away like a vision. It held the audience dumb; they never witnessed anything like it; neither did I. Palmer wouldn't let me speak the words; he said they must be delivered with great dramatic effect. The words are: "I see myself now at the end of my journey, my toilsome days are ended. I have formerly lived by hearsay and faith, but I now go where I shall live by sight." But glorious it was to see how the open regions were filled with horses and chariots, with trumpeters and pipers, with singers and players upon stringed instruments, to welcome the pilgrims as they went up and followed one another in at the gates of the Beautiful City. Here the young ladies, with lighted lamps, passed in. As Pilgrim disappeared, Palmer, with great effect, ended the scene with the eloquent words: "Now, while he was thus in discourse, his countenance changed; his strong man bowed under him and, after he had said: 'Take me, for I come unto thee,' he ceased to be seen of them."
Alfred Griffith Hatfield.