Rite Of Examination (Part 4)
The end of the Examination draws nigh, and judgement is at hand – if not this day, then in the days ahead as the Examiners scrutinise each glyph, each rune, each chicken-scratched excrescence from a heat-oppressed brain.
Praetor: The hour lacks but five minutes of the sun. When I command you to cease and desist from writing, you shall lay down the stylus, the pen, the instruments of gravure and ensignament. (Pauses.) Cease! The time has come, when the judgement is imminent upon the quick and the slow.
Candidates lay down their implements and bind their scripts together according to the specified form of examination.
Praetor: The lictors will collect all scripts in order of your secret number, the number that is engraved upon your heart and upon your desk. For the last shall be first and the first shall be last.
Lictors collect scripts, passing along each column to which they have been assigned.
Lictor Invigilis: Return to me all paper that is used and yet not expended as part of the rite. Know that such is waste and folly, to be crumpled and then to be burned. For all flesh is as dust and the glory of man is as the accumulation of dust.
Candidates submit the used paper which is not part of their bound submission; it is crumpled into balls for disposal. The lictors count all the scripts, to ensure that all Candidates have been fairly represented in the trial. When all scripts are accounted for, the lictor maioris informs the praetor that this is so.
Praetor: Inasmuch as you have come to trial in this testing of your mind, body, and desperate desire for success, you are now released. Go in peace, speak to no one as you have been told, and may your mind be clear in time for the trials ahead.
Candidates are dismissed from the Great Hall. Peace reigns again. For now.
Praetor: The hour lacks but five minutes of the sun. When I command you to cease and desist from writing, you shall lay down the stylus, the pen, the instruments of gravure and ensignament. (Pauses.) Cease! The time has come, when the judgement is imminent upon the quick and the slow.
Candidates lay down their implements and bind their scripts together according to the specified form of examination.
Praetor: The lictors will collect all scripts in order of your secret number, the number that is engraved upon your heart and upon your desk. For the last shall be first and the first shall be last.
Lictors collect scripts, passing along each column to which they have been assigned.
Lictor Invigilis: Return to me all paper that is used and yet not expended as part of the rite. Know that such is waste and folly, to be crumpled and then to be burned. For all flesh is as dust and the glory of man is as the accumulation of dust.
Candidates submit the used paper which is not part of their bound submission; it is crumpled into balls for disposal. The lictors count all the scripts, to ensure that all Candidates have been fairly represented in the trial. When all scripts are accounted for, the lictor maioris informs the praetor that this is so.
Praetor: Inasmuch as you have come to trial in this testing of your mind, body, and desperate desire for success, you are now released. Go in peace, speak to no one as you have been told, and may your mind be clear in time for the trials ahead.
Candidates are dismissed from the Great Hall. Peace reigns again. For now.
Labels: Examinations, Ritual
etched with acid at 2:59:00 pm
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home