- Yg. 1927, No. 13 -

March 13th was national mourning day. What does it look like when you look at it in the magazines? So:

Berlin. Republic Square. Victory Column. Before that, fourteen Reichswehr soldiers in steel helmets; everyone carries a flag. To the right and left of them an officer with a drawn bacon knife and excessively fragile breeches. Next to it is a Reichswehr music that blows into the brass instruments. Furthermore - one does not see it; but you know it, because without it it doesn't work - without a doubt the field-gray front with stretched mutton legs, presented rifle (or doesn't it exist anymore?) and with: nose right!

Because, along the front, is our Hindenburg, as he has been walking along fronts for many years. A few weeks, days, hours later: there were no fronts left there. They were, hm. , , consumed. There were others standing there where he passed by.

Well, that's how it was with us. That's how it is with us; still today. Only he's wearing a frock coat now. The rest has not changed. Behind the soldiers is a free space where traffic is blocked. The necessary distance because of. Then comes the people, but before that there are still a few policemen. Symbolic, very symbolic: the President of the German People's State and his people - they can not come together; between them stands the military and the police.

But for those who stick there under the Victory Column, that's basically quite right. Because, just look at them, there they stand, bareheaded, in the stiff, uncomfortable Sunday dress, their hat in their hands, and shuddering with emotion, because they see Hindenburgs strolling in front of his soldiers. And the little heart knocks on them: our glorious weir! the god who made iron grow! every shot a soot and God punish England! They shudder with emotion at the historic moment, and no one thinks of those who roared outside, spitting their little lives with blood and gastric juice into the Russian forest floor, green, puffed and dead with gnawed tissues in the lime of Champagne. They only feel the moment, only the material moisture meter shows you the Moment, which is being filmed with brass band accompaniment, where they are allowed to film. And the proud consciousness: I am there! makes her happy.

Yes, you are in. And next time you will be there too. Then you would rather be elsewhere. That could be the only satisfaction for us old muskotes, but perfectly adequate if we were concerned with satisfaction: that next time not only we will be there, but also you, all of you: sextans, senior daughter, honest man and father of a family, how you stand there. Afterwards, unfortunately, we will no longer have the opportunity to see Hindenburg pacing parade companies on memorial days. It's a shame, isn't it?

1927, 13 Klux