Pages 121 - 135 Summary

The family passes time in awkward silence. The next act is "Ourselves," and everyone wonders what they will mean. How can they possibly depict the present time? Everyone becomes impatient and increasingly anxious.

Behind the trees, Miss La Trobe sees that her performance-art type experiment has failed. She wanted to subject the audience to ten minutes of themselves, to just sitting in the audience, but she sees that they are missing the meaning. Like the cows before, nature saves this dead silence by way of a sudden downpour of rain that disappears as quickly as it arrives.

Finally the pageant resumes. A wall (in reality a painted cloth) is hung, meant to symbolize civilization, with a man on a ladder (humanity) constructing it. A great mass of swallows descends on the terrace and seems to dance to the music blaring from...