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The familiar "Roll, Jordan, Roll," sung at a funeral and accompanied by heart breaking wails of grief that dictate a slowly beating rhythm is a dirge that expresses mankind's helplessness in the face of death; sung by plowmen who patiently follow their mules up and down the long cotton rows on a hot summer afternoon, it is stamped on their own resignation; at Christmas watch-night meetings which celebrate the birthnight of Jesus, who was born in a manger, poor like themselves in material things, rich like themselves in close kinship to the Creator of the Universe, the old song is shouted triumphantly, for little Jesus contrived the plan by which souls of men whose bodies die can cross Jordan's dark stream safely and reach an eternal home where all is ease and peace. When the tied of life fills the breast of the earth in the spring and the cool sap of plants flows out in leaves and blossoms, the warm red blood in men's veins is quickened and "Roll, Jordan, Roll expresses exultant joy in the fresh surge of life which proves that death dissolves old forms in order to nourish new ones (131).

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