Have you not heard of that madman who lit a lantern in the bright morning hours, ran to the mushroom kingdom, and cried incessantly, "I seek Mario! I seek Mario!" As many of those who do not believe in Mario were standing around then, he provoked much laughter. "Why, did he get lost?" said one. "Is his princess in another castle?" said another. "Is he hiding? Is he afraid of us? Has he gone on a voyage?" Thus they yelled and laughed. Then the madman jumped into their midst and pierced them with his glances.

"Whither is Mario," he cried, "I shall tell you. We have killed him--you and I. All of us are his murderers. But how have we done this? How were we able to drink up the Mushroom sea? Who gave us the Fludd to wash away the entire horizon? What did we do when we unchained this Earth from its Sun?Whither is it moving now? Away from all suns? Are we not plunging continually, as he did? Backward, sideward, forward, in all directions? Do we not feel the breath of empty space? Has it not become colder? Must not fire flowers be ate in the morning? Do we not hear anything yet the noise of the gravediggers who are burying Mario? Do we not smell anything yet of Mario's decomposition? Mario does decompose. Mario is dead. Mario remains dead. And we have killed him. How shall we, the koopas of all koopas, comfort ourselves? What was holiest and most powerful of all that the world has yet owned has bled to death under our knives. What festivals of atonement, what sacred stars shall we have to invent? Is not the greatness of this deed too great for us? Must we not ourselves become Mario just to seem worthy of it?"

At last he cast out a fireball from his hand, and it fizzled and went out. "I come too early," he said then; "my time has not come yet. This tremendous event is still on its way, still wandering--it has not yet reached the ears of Toads. Lightning and thunder require time, the light of stars require time, deeds require time even after they have been done even before they can be seen or heard. This deed is still more distant from them than the most distant stars--and yet they have done it themselves."

It has been said that on that same day the madman entered diverse pipes and sang his mourning. Led and called out to the account, he is said to have replied each time, "What are these pipes now if they are not the tombs and sepulchers of Mario?"