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." [Illustration: 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.