Thereafter came one of the most moving scenes in the drama.
Several dark-clad women appeared carrying a black pall supported on
sticks, which they set in front of the bodies of the leaders so that
it stood out, an irregular pointed black shape against the white
columns behind. But for this melancholy monument the stage was now
empty. Thick clouds of black smoke arose from braziers on either side
and obscured the steps and the platform. Through the smoke came the
distant sound of Chopin's _Marche Funebre_, and as the air became
clearer white figures could be dimly seen moving around the black pall
in a solemn dance of mourning. Behind them the columns shone ghostly
and unreal against the glimmering mauve rays of an uncertain and
watery dawn.
The second part of the pageant opened in July 1914. Once again the
rulers were feasting and the workers at toil, but the scene was
enlivened by the presence of the leaders of the Second International,
a group of decrepit professorial old men, who waddled in in solemn
procession carrying tomes full of international learning. They sat in
a row between the rulers and the people, deep in study, spectacles on
nose. The call to war was the signal for a dramatic appeal from the
workers to these leaders, who refused to accept the Red Flag, but
weakly received patriotic flags from their respective governments.
Jaures, elevated to be the symbol of protest, towered above the
people, crying in a loud voice, but fell back immediately as the
assassin's shot rang out.
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