SCENE: _Elsinore--a platform before the castle (on an improvised stage).
Inky darkness. Shade of Hamlet (solus)_.
_Shade of Hamlet_: Oh, did you see him, did you see the knave,
The spindle-shanked, low-browed, and cock-eyed
Clerk to an attorney, play at Hamlet,
Dream-souled Hamlet, wearing an eyeglass?
Oh, it was horrible.
(_Enter Shade of Laertes_.)
_Shade of Laertes_: What's the matter with Hamlet?
_S. of H._: He's not all right.
No, by the fame of Shakespeare, he's all wrong.
A certain convocation of talented amateurs
Are e'en at him.
Your amateur is your only emperor for talent;
There's not a genius in the universe
Who will essay as much.
_S. of L._: Or, who will imitate nature so abominably.
Your head is level, Ham., and I--even I,
Laertes, suffered at the hands of one
Whose fiery hair, parted in the middle
Like a cranberry pie, caused me to believe
That some of nature's journeymen had made a man,
And not made him well, he imitated nature
So abominably.
_S. of H._: Ha' the fair Ophelia!
_(Enter Shade of Ophelia_.)
_S. of O._: Yes, my lord, thine own Ophelia,
Come back to earth with heaviness o' grief
Thy madness ne'er begot, for I have seen
The efforts of a lisping, smirking maid,
As graceful as a bean-pole, and as lean.
Attempt to paint the sorrow of my heart.
Oh, I would get me to a nunnery.
_S of H._: Let me Ophelyour pulse.
Mad--quite mad; and all because
A creature whom these mortals call a Miss,
Quite properly, as her efforts are amiss,
Would fain portray thee. Soft you, now!
O fair Ophelia. Nymph in thine orisons
Be all her sins remembered.
Why let the stricken deer go weep,
The untrained amateur play?
All those that watch must surely weep.
So wise men stay away.
(_Flickering blue lights and curtain_.)
The Abused Gallant.
Two lovely maidens (woe is me!)
Play tennis with my heart;
And each is wondrous fair to see,
And each is wondrous smart.
In learning, money, beauty, birth,
None can surpass them--none.
But each receives my "court" with mirth,
And tells the other one.
My "court"! The term is fitly used--
A tennis court, you see.
And I know well I am abused,
By the "racket" they give me.
Maud strikes my heart a brutal blow,
And Mabel cries out, "Fault!"
And back and forth I undergo
A feminine assault.
Maud asks my age. Alas! I hear
Sweet Mabel say, "The goose
Is very nearly forty, dear."
Maud answers, "Oh, 'the deuce'!"
And so my poor heart with their wit
Is volleyed oft and oft,
Till Mabel cries, while holding it,
"This heart is far too soft."
And firing it into the net,
She says, with girlish vim,
"Although he isn't in our 'set,'
We're making 'game' of him."
And making game they are, I swear
By all the saints above,
With all the terms of tennis there
Save but the sweetest, "love."
After the Ball.
A last word in the vestibule,
A touch of taper fingers,
A scent of roses, sweet and cool,
When she has gone still lingers.
He pauses at the carriage door
To sigh a bit and ponder
He thinks the matter o'er and o'er,
And all his senses wander.
With mantle thrown aside in haste,
Her heart a bit uncertain,
And neither time nor love to waste,
She watches through the curtain.
And she has played him well, he knows
Nor has he dared to stop her.
She wonders when he will propose;
He wonders how he'll drop her.
Vanity Fair.
Oh, whence, oh, where
Is Vanity Fair?
I want to be seen with the somebodies there.
I've money and beauty and college-bred brains;
Though my 'scutcheon's not spotless, who'll mind a few stains?
To caper I wish in the chorus of style,
And wed an aristocrat after a while
So please tell me truly, and please tell me fair,
Just how many miles it's from Madison Square.
It's here, it's there,
Is Vanity Fair.
It's not like a labyrinth, not like a lair.
It's North and it's South, and it's East and it's West;
You can see it, oh, anywhere, quite at its best.
Dame Fashion is queen, Ready Money is king,
You can join it, provided you don't know a thing.
It's miles over here, and it's miles over there;
And it's not seven inches from Madison Square.
For the Long Voyage.
"Were I a captain bold," I said,
And gently clasped her hand,
"Wouldst sail with me, by fancy led,
To every foreign strand?
"Wouldst help me furl my silver sail,
And be my trusty crew?
Wouldst stand by in the midnight gale,
My pilot tried and true?"
"Well, no," she answered, blushing red,
"Such heavy work I hate.
But,"--listen what the maiden said,--
"I would be your first mate."
This is the end.
The printing was
done by John Wilson
& Son, Cambridge
for
Fredrick A. Stokes
Company
New York
MDCCCICVIII