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Everything was perfectly swell:
no prisons, no slums, no insane asylums,
no cripples, no poverty, no wars!
Oh! How happy garden of life!
Never, never, never, never,
not even in medieval times
had a garden been better tended!
All diseases were conquered,
so was old age!
Death, barring accidents was an adventure for volunteers.
The population of the U.S. was stabilized at forty million souls.
Oh! How happy garden of life!
never, never, never, never,
not even in medieval times
had a garden been better tended!
One bright morning in the Chicago Lying-in Hospital,
a man waited for his wife to give birth.
He was the only man waiting.
Not many people were born a day anymoreÖ
This room is being redecorated, redecorated
as a memorial to a man who had volunteered to die!
I'm a sardonic old man, about two hundred years old.
I look maybe thirty-five or so,
but aging had touched me that much
before the cure for aging was found.
I'm painting a mural that I donít like.
That I donít like!
All my life I need to paint only craps like that!
If you don't like my kisses honey:
Here's what I'll do! What Iíll do! Yeah!
I will go see a girl in purple,
Kiss that sad world, toodle-doo!
If you don't like my lovin'
Why should i take up all this space?
I'll get off this planet!!
Let some baby have my place!
Oh! Your mural looks so real!
Oh!
I can practically imagine I'm standing in the middle of it.
What makes you think you're not in it?
It's called "The Happy Garden of Life",
you know.
That's good of doctor Hitz.
Still lots of faces to fill in.
Must be nice to be able to make pictures that look like something.
You think I'm proud of this daub?!
You think it's my idea of what life really looks like?!
What is you're idea of how life really looks like?
That foul drop-cloth is a very good picture of it.
Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha!
You're the old duck, aren't you?
It's not a crime!
You don't like it here? Grandpa?!
It's enough to call: 2-B-R-"naught"-2-B!
It's an institution with all the sobriquets:
Automat, Birdland, Cannery, Catbox, Sheepdip, Easy-go, Good-bye-motherÖ
When I decide it's time to go, It won't be at the Sheepdip.
A! Do-it-yourselfer? Ha ha ha!
Have some consideration for people who'll come and clean after you!
The world could easily do with a lot more mess, if you ask me.
I have a lot of facial hair.
Itís normal for the gas chamber hostess.
I hope it wonít look too bad on the painting.
Iím so excited! so excited! AÖ
Is there where Iím supposed to come? Is this the place?
A lot depends on what your business was.
You're not about to have a baby, are you?
No. They told me I was supposed to pose for some picture.
My name is Leonora Duncan!
Duncan, Duncan, DuncanÖ hm-m-m-m hm-m-m-mÖ
Oh! That sure is a beautiful pictureÖ
It looks like heaven or somethingÖ
Or something. DuncanÖ yes, you are here.
See any faceless body you'd like me to stick your head on?!
GeeÖ They all look the same to meÖ
I know nothing about art.
Bodyís a body, eh?
As a master of fine art I recommend this body here.
Do you like it?
Gosh... That puts me next to doctor Hitz!
That upset's you?
NoÖ Itís such an honorÖ Such an honorÖ AÖ
YouÖ youÖ you admire him? Don't you?
Who doesn't admire doctor Hitz who was the one
that set up the very first gas chamber in Chicago?
Nothing would please me more than to put you next to him!
And sawing off a limb? Does that strike you as appropriate?
Thatís kind of what i doÖ
You mean ñ youíre making people comfortable while you kill them?
OhÖ OhÖ OhÖ
I am doctor Hitz myself: omnipotentes Zeus,
important, accomplished and full of life!
Oh! Two hundred and forty years of life! Joyful life!
Well, Missus Duncan!
Iíll tell a joke right nowÖ
Ha, ha, ha, haÖ
Wait!
What are you doing here?
Itís not where the people leave. Itís where come in!
Ha, ha, ha,ha, ha, ha, ha! Ha, ha, ha, ha, ho, ho!
Weíre going to be in the same picture, togetherÖ
Good! And, say, isnít that some picture?
I sure am honored to be in it with you.
Oh! Let me tell you ñ Iím honored to be in it with you.
Without women like you, this wonderful world weíve got
wouldnít be possible at all.
Halloo? MhmÖ Ehe. HmmmmÖ
Guess what was just born?
I canít.
Triplets!!!
Triplets?! How niceÖ
-Theyíre triplets, triplets! Theyíre triplets! -How nice! Triplets! Triplets! Triplets!
Do the parents have three volunteers?
The law says that no newborn child can survive unless
the parents of the child can find someone who will volunteer to die.
Triplets, if they are all to live ñ call for three volunteers.
Do the parents have three volunteers?
Last i heard they had one.
I donít think theyíll make it. Nobody makes three appointments with us.
Nothing but singles going through a dayÖ
And whatís the name?
Wehling. Edward Wehling Junior is the name of the happy father-to-be!
Present.
Oh, Mr. Wehling, I didnít see youÖ
The invisible man.
They just phoned me that your triplets have been born.
They are all fine, and so is the mother.
Iím on my way to see them now.
Hooray.
You donít sound very happy!
What man in my shoes wouldnít be happy?
All I have to do is to pick up
which of the triplets is going to live and thenÖ
deliver my maternal grandfather to the Birdland, and come with a receiptÖ
You donít believe in population control, Mr. Wehling?
I think itís perfectly keen.
Would you like to go back to the good old days,
when population of the earth was twenty billion ñ
about to become forty billion,
-then eighty billion, -Forty billion!
- then one hundred and sixty billion? - Eighty, hundred, A!
Do you know what a drupelet is, Mr. Wehling?!
Nope.
A drupelet Mr. Wehling is one of the little knobs,
one of the little pulpy grains of a blackberry.
Without the population control
human beings would now be packed on the surface of this planet
like drupelets on the blackberry!
Think of it!
In the year 2000 before scientists stepped in and laid down the new law,
there wasnít even enough drinking waterÖ
and nothing to eat but sea-weed.
And still people insisted on their right to reproduce like jackrabbits
and their right, if possible, to live forever!
I want those kids.
I want all three of them.
Of course you do, thatís only human.
I donít want my grandfather to die, either.
Nobody is really happyÖ
about taking a close relative to the Catbox.
I wish people wouldnít call it that!
What?
I wish people wouldnít call it ìCatboxî and things like that.
Things like that.
-I wish people wouldnít. Oh! they call it ìcat-boxî! AÖ -Like ìCatbox, like ìBirdlandî. Things like that!
Like Catbox.
- You should have said: (It gives people the wrong impression.) -Impression!
Ethical Suicide Studios!
This child of yours,
whichever one you decide to keep,
he or she is going to live on a happy,
roomy, and clean, rich planet
thanks to the population control! Population control! Control!
Thereís room for one ñ a great big one!
Itís only death.
Thereís a room for two! A room for two.
And the room for three!
The painter sat on the top of his stepladder,
looking reflectively on the sorry scene, he pondered
the mournful puzzle of lifeÖ
demanding to be born
and, once born, demanding to be fruitful.
Oh life, oh life, oh lifeÖ
All the answers he could think of were grim,
even grimmer than a Catbox, Birdland and an Easy-go.
He thought of war, he thought of plague, he thought of starvationÖ
Thatís grim. Thatís all so grimÖ
He knew, he would never paint again
and let his paint brush fall to the drop-cloth below.
Iíll never paint again!
And then he decided!
I have about enough of life in the ìHappy Garden of Lifeî too!
He came down and took Wehlingís pistol, intending to shoot himself!
I canít do it! I donít have the nerve!
And then he saw a telephone boothÖ
He dialed a number:
2 ñ B ñ R ñ ìnaughtî ñ 2 ñ BÖ
Federal Bureau of TerminationÖ
How could I get an appointment?
We could probably fit you in late this afternoon, sir.
All right. Fit me in, if you please, my name isÖ
Thank you sir! Your city thanks you,
Your country thanks you, Your planet thanks you,
But the deepest thanks of all Is from future generations!
La la la la la la la la laÖ
Iíll get off this planet,
let some baby take my place!
Oh! Not again!!! What a messy business here!
Does anyone use a phone anymore
in this ìHappy Garden of Lifeî?!