On the Gate by Rudyard Kipling — Read

A Tale of '16

If the Order Above be but the reflection of the Order Below (as that Ancient affirms, who had some knowledge of the Order) it is not outside the Order of Things that there should have been confusion also in the Department of Death. The world's steadily falling death-rate, the rising proportion of scientifically prolonged fatal illnesses, which allowed months of warning to all concerned, had weakened initiative throughout the Necrological Departments. When the War came, these were as unprepared as civilised mankind; and, like mankind, they improvised and recriminated in the face of Heaven.