dreams I made myself. I suppose I don't mix 'em properly.
MANUFACTURER. You leave out the very essence of them. You must put in
a little sorrow, just to take away the over-sweetness. I found that
out very soon, so I took a little of the fresh dew that made pearls in
the early morning, and I sprinkled my dreams with the gift of tears.
PIERROT [_ecstatically_]. The gift of tears! How beautiful! You know,
I should rather like to try a real one. Not one of my own making.
MANUFACTURER. Well, there are plenty about, if you only look for them.
PIERROT. That is all very well, but who's going to look about for
stray dreams?
MANUFACTURER. I once made a dream that would just suit you. I slipped
it inside a baby. That was twenty years ago, and the baby is now a
full-grown woman, with great blue eyes and fair hair.
PIERROT. It's a lot of use merely telling me about her.
MANUFACTURER. I'll do more. When I shipped her to the world, I kept
the bill of lading. Here it is. You shall have it.
PIERROT. Thanks, but what's the good of it?
MANUFACTURER. Why, the holder of that is able to claim the goods; you
will notice it contains a complete description, too. I promise you,
you're in luck.
PIERROT. Has she red cheeks and a string of great beads?
MANUFACTURER. No.
PIERROT. Ah, then it is not she. Where shall I find her?
MANUFACTURER. That's for you to discover. All you have to do is to
search.
PIERROT. I'll start at once. [_He moves as if to go._]
MANUFACTURER. I shouldn't start out to-night.
PIERROT. But I want to find her soon. Somebody else may find her
before me.
MANUFACTURER. Pierrot, there was once a man who wanted to gather
mushrooms.
PIERROT [_annoyed at the commonplace_]. Mushrooms!
MANUFACTURER. Fearing people would be up before him, he started out
overnight. Morning came, and he found none, so he returned
disconsolate to his house. As he came through the garden, he found a
great mushroom had grown up in the night by his very door-step. Take
the advice of one who knows, and wait a bit.
PIERROT. If that's your advice.... But tell me this, do you think I
shall find her?
MANUFACTURER. I can't say for certain. Would you consider yourself a
fool?
PIERROT. Ah ... of course ... when you ask me a direct thing like
that, you make it ... er ... rather awkward for me. But, if I may say
so, as man to ma ... I mean as man to ... [_he hesitates_].
MANUFACTURER [_waiving the point_]. Yes, yes.
PIERROT. Well, I flatter myself that ...
MANUFACTURER. Exactly. And that's your principal danger. Whilst you
are striding along gazing at the stars, you may be treading on a
little glow-worm. Shall I give you a third verse for your song?
"Life's a woman calling,
Do not stop your ears,
Lest, when night is falling,
Darkness brings you tears."
[_THE MANUFACTURER'S kindly and impressive tone holds PIERROT as it
had held PIERRETTE some moments before. Whilst the two are looking at
each other, a little red cloak dances past the window, and PIERRETTE
enters with her marketing._]
PIERRETTE. Oh, I'm so glad you're still here.
MANUFACTURER. But I must be going now. I am a great traveler.
PIERRETTE [_standing against the door, so that he cannot pass_]. Oh,
you mustn't go yet.
MANUFACTURER. Don't make me fly out of the window. I only do that
under very unpleasant circumstances.
PIERROT [_gaily, with mock eloquence_]. Pierrette, regard our visitor.
You little knew whom you were entertaining. You see before you the
maker of the dreams that slip about the world like little fish among
the rushes of a stream. He has given me the bill of lading of his
great masterpiece, and it only remains for me to find her. [_Dropping
to the commonplace._] I wish I knew where to look.
MANUFACTURER. Before I go, I will give you this little rhyme:
"Let every woman keep a school,
For every man is born a fool."
[_He bows, and goes out quickly and silently._]
PIERRETTE [_running to the door, and looking out_]. Why, how quickly
he has gone! He's out of sight.
PIERROT. At last I am about to attain my great ideal. There will be a
grand wedding, and I shall wear my white coat with the silver braid,
and carry a tall gold-topped stick. [_Singing:_]
"If we play any longer, I fear you will get
Such a cold in the head, for the grass is so wet.
But during the night, Margareta divine,
I will hang the wet grass up to dry on the line."
Pierrette, I feel that I am about to enter into a man's inheritance, a
woman's love.
PIERRETTE. I wish you every happiness.
PIERROT [_singing teasingly:_]
"We shall meet in our dreams, that's a thing understood;
You dream of the river, I'll dream of the wood.
I am visiting you, if the river it be;
If we meet in the wood, you are visiting me."
PIERRETTE. We must make lots of money, so that you can give her all
she wants. I'll dance and dance until I fall, and the people will
exclaim, "Why, she has danced herself to death."
PIERROT. You're right. We must pull the show together. I'll do that
article for the paper at once. [_He takes paper, ink, etc., from the
dresser, and, seating himself at the table, commences to write._]
"There has lately come to this town a company of strolling players,
who give a show that is at once musical and droll. The audience is
enthralled by Pierrot's magnificent singing and dancing, and ... er
... very much entertained by Pierrette's homely dancing. Pierrette is
a charming comedienne of twenty, with ..." what color hair?
PIERRETTE. Fair, quite fair.
PIERROT. Funny how one can see a person every day and not know the
color of their hair. "Fair hair and ..." eyes?
PIERRETTE. Blue, Pierrot.
PIERROT. "Fair hair and blue eyes." Fair! Blue! Oh, of course it's
nonsense, though.
PIERRETTE. What's nonsense?
PIERROT. Something I was thinking. Most girls have fair hair and blue
eyes.
PIERRETTE. Yes, Pierrot, we can't all be ideals.
PIERROT. How musical your voice sounds! I can't make it out. Oh, but,
of course, it is all nonsense! [_He takes the bill of lading from his
pocket and reads it._]
PIERRETTE. What's nonsense?... Pierrot, won't you tell me?
PIERROT. Pierrette, stand in the light.
PIERRETTE. Is anything the matter?
PIERROT. I almost believe that nothing matters. [_Reading and glancing
at her._] "Eyes that say 'I love you'; arms that say 'I want you';
lips that say 'Why don't you?'" Pierrette, is it possible! I've never
noticed before how beautiful you are. You don't seem a bit the same. I
believe you have lost your real face, and have carved another out of a
rose.
PIERRETTE. Oh, Pierrot, what is it?
PIERROT. Love! I've found it at last. Don't you understand it all?
"I am a fool
Who has learned wisdom in your school."
To think that I've seen you every day, and never dreamed ... dreamed!
Yes, ah yes, it's one of his beautiful dreams. That is why my heart
seems full of the early morning.
PIERRETTE. Ah, Pierrot!
PIERROT. Oh, how my shoulders tingle! I want to soar up, up. Don't you
want to fly up to the roof of heaven and sing among the stars?
PIERRETTE. I have been sitting on the moon ever so long, waiting for
my lover. Pierrot, let me try on your smile. Give it to me in a kiss.
[_With their hands outstretched behind them, they lean towards each
other, till their lips meet in a long kiss._]
PIERRETTE [_throwing back her head with a deep sigh of happiness._]
Oh, I am so happy. This might be the end of all things.
PIERROT. Pierrette, let us sit by the fire and put our feet on the
fender, and live happily ever after. [_They have moved slowly to the
settle. As they sit there, PIERROT sings softly:_]
"Baby, don't wait for the moon,
The stairs of the sky are so steep;
And mellow and musical June
Is waiting to kiss you to sleep."
[_The lamp on the hood of the chimney-piece has burned down, leaving
only the red glow from the fire upon their faces, as the curtain
whispers down to hide them._]
GETTYSBURG[31]
_A WOOD-SHED COMMENTARY_
By PERCY MACKAYE
[Footnote 31: Copyright, 1912, 1921, by Percy MacKaye. All
rights reserved.
SPECIAL NOTICE
This play in its printed form is designed for the reading
public only. All dramatic rights in it are fully protected by
copyright, in the United States, Great Britain, and all
countries subscribing to the Berne Convention. NO PUBLIC OR
PRIVATE PERFORMANCE--PROFESSIONAL OR AMATEUR--MAY BE GIVEN
WITHOUT THE WRITTEN PERMISSION OF THE AUTHOR AND THE PAYMENT
OF ROYALTY. As the courts have also ruled that the PUBLIC
READING of a play, for pay or where tickets are sold,
constitutes a "PERFORMANCE," no such reading may be given
except under conditions above stated.
Anyone disregarding the author's rights renders himself
liable to prosecution. PERSONS WHO DESIRE PERMISSION TO GIVE
PERFORMANCES OR PUBLIC READINGS OF THIS PLAY SHOULD
COMMUNICATE DIRECT WITH THE AUTHOR, AT HIS ADDRESS, HARVARD
CLUB, 27 WEST 44 STREET, NEW YORK CITY.]
Percy MacKaye was born in New York, March 16, 1875, the son of Steele
MacKaye, a well-known dramatist and theatrical inventor of his day.
"My own early dramatic training," writes the son, "was in the theatre
in relation with my father's work there as dramatist, actor, and
director." In another place he says: "I have not sought to conceal, or
to put aside, the grateful enthusiasm I feel, as a son and comrade of
Steele MacKaye, for those examples of untiring devotion to the theatre
and of constructive achievement in its art, by which his life has been
an inspiration to my own, to follow--however haltingly and through
different means--the trail of his large leadership." Percy MacKaye was
graduated from Harvard in 1897 and later spent a year studying at the
University of Leipzig. After travel abroad, he returned to New York in
1900 and taught there in a private school till 1904. He spent some
time in the next five years lecturing on the Drama of Democracy and
the Civic Theatre at various American universities. In 1904 he joined
the colony of artists and men of letters at Cornish, New Hampshire,
the home of Saint-Gaudens, Maxfield Parrish, Winston Churchill, and
others. Since that date Percy MacKaye has devoted himself wholly to
poetry and the drama, writing community masques, plays of various
kinds, and operas.[32] It is interesting to note that one of the
latest products of his pen, _Washington, the Man Who Made Us, A Ballad
Play_, was translated into French and presented by M. Copeau's
players, at the Theatre du Vieux Colombier, during their second season
in New York, and later acted in English by Walter Hampden, the scene
designs being made by Robert Edmond Jones. In October, 1920, he was
invited to Miami University, Oxford, Ohio, not to teach but to
continue his own creative work, quite untrammeled, filling there the
first fellowship in creative literature ever established in this
country.
[Footnote 32: A list of his works is given in the latest
_Who's Who in America_.]
_Yankee Fantasies_, a collection of five one-act plays of which
_Gettysburg_ is one, is the expression of Percy MacKaye's belief that
the American dramatist may find "north of Boston," or, in fact, in
almost any rural neighborhood, material for "quaint and lovely
interpretation of our native environment now ignored." These plays,
published in 1912, testified also to his conviction that the time had
come for the development of the one-act play in this country, not only
because this form is distinctive and capable of expressing what the
full-length play cannot, but also because a receptive audience was
already organized. He found even then that amateurs in schools,
colleges, and elsewhere were clamoring to perform one-act plays, to
see them performed, and to read them. At that date Little Theatres
were just beginning to be, but in the preface to _Yankee Fantasies_,
the author advocated the establishment of Studio Theatres, in essence
experimental, many of which have since come into existence under
different names, wherein playwrights might practice the new craft of
the one-act play as in a workshop. The one-act play may be said to
have arrived in the nine years that have elapsed since _Gettysburg_
was published.
The one-act play has shown no tendency, however, to rival the
short-story in the matter of local color. Kentucky, California, Iowa,
Louisiana, to name but a few of the favored states which have served
as rich backgrounds for many finely flavored narratives of American
life, have been neglected as sources of dramatic material. But though
Percy MacKaye may perhaps be matched with Mary Wilkins, there is no
writer who has made notable use in the one-act play of localities,
associated, for example, with the art of George W. Cable, Bret Harte,
James Lane Allen, or Hamlin Garland. One of the paths of glory for the
American dramatist lies undoubtedly in this direction.
GETTYSBURG
CHARACTERS
LINK TADBOURNE, _ox-yoke maker_.
POLLY, _his grandniece_.
_The Place is country New Hampshire, at the present time._
_SCENE.--A woodshed, in the ell of a farm house._
_The shed is open on both sides, front and back, the apertures being
slightly arched at the top. [In bad weather, these presumably may be
closed by big double doors, which stand open now--swung back outward
beyond sight.] Thus the nearer opening is the proscenium arch of the
scene, under which the spectator looks through the shed to the
background--a grassy yard, a road with great trunks of soaring elms,
and the glimpse of a green hillside. The ceiling runs up into a gable
with large beams._
_On the right, at back, a door opens into the shed from the house
kitchen. Opposite it, a door leads from the shed into the barn. In the
foreground, against the right wall, is a work-bench. On this are
tools, a long, narrow, wooden box, and a small oil stove, with
steaming kettle upon it._
_Against the left wall, what remains of the year's wood supply is
stacked, the uneven ridges sloping to a jumble of stove-wood and
kindlings mixed with small chips on the floor, which is piled deep
with mounds of crumbling bark, chips and wood-dust._
_Not far from this mounded pile, at right center of the scene, stands
a wooden arm-chair, in which LINK TADBOURNE, in his shirt-sleeves,
sits drowsing. Silhouetted by the sunlight beyond, his sharp-drawn
profile is that of an old man, with white hair cropped close, and gray
mustache of a faded black hue at the outer edges. Between his knees
is a stout thong of wood, whittled round by the drawshave which his
sleeping hand still holds in his lap. Against the side of his chair
rests a thick wooden yoke and collar. Near him is a chopping-block._
_In the woodshed there is no sound or motion except the hum and
floating steam from the tea-kettle. Presently the old man murmurs in
his sleep, clenching his hand. Slowly the hand relaxes again. From the
door, right, comes POLLY--a sweet-faced girl of seventeen, quietly
mature for her age. She is dressed simply. In one hand, she carries a
man's wide-brimmed felt hat; over the other arm, a blue coat. These
she brings toward LINK. Seeing him asleep, she begins to tiptoe, lays
the coat and hat on the chopping-block, goes to the bench and trims
the wick of the oil-stove, under the kettle. Then she returns and
stands near LINK, surveying the shed._
_On closer scrutiny, the jumbled woodpile has evidently a certain
order in its chaos: some of the splittings have been piled in
irregular ridges; in places, the deep layer of wood-dust and chips has
been scooped, and the little mounds slope and rise like miniature
valleys and hills.[33]_
[Footnote 33: A suggestion for the appropriate arrangement of
these mounds may be found in the map of the battle-field
annexed to the volume by Capt. R. K. Beecham, entitled
_Gettysburg_, A. C. McClurg, 1911.]
_Taking up a hoe, POLLY--with careful steps--moves among the hollows,
placing and arranging sticks of kindling, scraping and smoothing the
little mounds with the hoe._
_As she does so, from far away, a bugle sounds._
LINK [_snapping his eyes wide open, sits up_].
Hello! Cat-nappin' was I, Polly?
POLLY. Just a kitten-nap, I guess.
[_Laying the hoe down, she approaches._]
The yoke done?
LINK [_giving a final whittle to the yoke-collar thong_].
Thar!
When he's ben steamed a spell, and bended snug,
I guess this feller'll sarve t' say "Gee" to--
[_Lifting the other yoke-collar from beside his chair, he holds the
whittled thong next to it, comparing the two with expert eye._]
and "Haw" to him. Beech every time, Sir; beech
or walnut. Hang me if I'd shake a whip
at birch, for ox-yokes.--Polly, are ye thar?
POLLY.
Yes, Uncle Link.
LINK. What's that I used to sing ye?
"Polly, put the kittle on,
Polly, put the kittle on,
Polly, put the kittle on--" [_Chuckling._]
We'll give this feller a dose of ox-yoke tea!
POLLY.
The kettle's boilin'.
LINK. Wall, then, steep him good.
[_POLLY takes from LINK the collar-thong, carries it to the
work-bench, shoves it into the narrow end of the box, which she then
closes tight and connects--by a piece of hose--to the spout of the
kettle. At the further end of the box, steam then emerges through a
small hole._]
POLLY.
You're feelin' smart to-day.
LINK. Smart!--Wall, if I
could git a hull man to swap legs with me,
mebbe I'd arn my keep. But this here settin'
dead an' alive, without no legs, day in,
day out, don't make an old hoss wuth his oats.
POLLY [_cheerfully_].
I guess you'll soon be walkin' round.
LINK. Not if
that doctor feller has his say: He says
I can't never go agin this side o' Jordan;
and looks like he's 'bout right.--Nine months to-morrer,
Polly, gal, sence I had that stroke.
POLLY [_pointing to the ox-yoke_].
You're fitter sittin' than most folks standin'.
LINK [_briskly_]. Oh, they can't
keep my two hands from makin' ox-yokes. That's
my second natur' sence I was a boy.
[_Again in the distance a bugle sounds. LINK starts._]
What's that?
POLLY. Why, that's the army veterans
down to the graveyard. This is Decoration
mornin': you ain't forgot?
LINK. So 'tis, so 'tis.
Roger, your young man--ha! [_Chuckling._] He come and axed me
was I agoin' to the cemetery.
"Me? Don't I look it?" says I. Ha! "Don't I look it?"
POLLY
He meant--to decorate the graves.
LINK. O' course;
but I must take my little laugh. I told him
I guessed I wa'n't persent'ble anyhow,
my mustache and my boots wa'n't blacked this mornin'.
I don't jest like t' talk about my legs.--
Be you a-goin' to take your young school folks,
Polly?
POLLY.
Dear no! I told my boys and girls
to march up this way with the band. I said
I'd be a-stayin' home and learnin' how
to keep school in the woodpile here with you.
LINK [_looking up at her proudly_].
Schoolma'am at seventeen! Some smart, I tell ye!
POLLY [_caressing him_].
School-master, you, past seventy; that's smarter!
I tell 'em I learn from you, so's I can teach
my young folks what the study-books leave out.
LINK.
Sure ye don't want to jine the celebratin'?
POLLY.
No _Sir_! We're goin' to celebrate right here,
and you're to teach me to keep school some more.
[_She holds ready for him the blue coat and hat._]
LINK [_looking up_].
What's thar?
POLLY. Your teachin' rig.
[_She helps him on with it._]
LINK. The old blue coat!--
My, but I'd like to see the boys: [_Gazing at the hat._] the Grand
Old Army Boys! [_Dreamily._] Yes, we was boys: jest boys!
Polly, you tell your young folks, when they study
the books, that we was nothin' else but boys
jest fallin' in love, with best gals left t' home--
the same as you; and when the shot was singin',
we pulled their pictur's out, and prayed to them
'most more 'n the Allmighty.
[_LINK looks up suddenly--a strange light in his face. Again, to a far
strain of music, the bugle sounds._]
Thar she blows
Agin!
POLLY.
They're marchin' to the graves with flowers.
LINK.
My Godfrey! 't ain't so much thinkin' o' flowers
and the young folks, their faces, and the blue
line of old fellers marchin'--it's the music!
that old brass voice a-callin'! Seems as though,
legs or no legs, I'd have to up and foller
to God-knows-whar, and holler--holler back
to guns roarin' in the dark. No; durn it, no!
I jest can't stan' the music.
POLLY [_goes to the work-bench, where the box is steaming_].
Uncle Link,
you want that I should steam this longer?
LINK [_absently_].
Oh,
A kittleful, a kittleful.
POLLY [_coming over to him_].
Now, then,
I'm ready for school.--I hope I've drawed the map
all right.
LINK.
Map? Oh, the map!
[_Surveying the woodpile reminiscently, he nods._]
Yes, thar she be:
old Gettysburg!
POLLY.
I know the places--most.
LINK.
So, _do_ ye? Good, now: whar's your marker?
POLLY [_taking up the hoe_].
Here.
LINK.
Willoughby Run: whar's that?
POLLY [_points with the hoe toward the left of the woodpile_].
That's farthest over
next the barn door.
LINK. My, how we fit the Johnnies
thar, the fust mornin'! Jest behind them willers,
acrost the Run, that's whar we captur'd Archer.
My, my!
POLLY. Over there--that's Seminary Ridge.
[_She points to different heights and depressions, as LINK nods his
approval._]
Peach Orchard, Devil's Den, Round Top, the Wheatfield--
LINK.
Lord, Lord, the Wheatfield!
POLLY [_continuing_].
Cemetery Hill,
Little Round Top, Death Valley, and this here
is Cemetery Ridge.
LINK [_pointing to the little flag_].
And colors flyin'!
We _kep_ 'em flyin' thar, too, all three days,
from start to finish.
POLLY. Have I learned 'em right?
LINK.
_A_ number One, chick! Wait a mite: Culp's Hill:
I don't jest spy Culp's Hill.
POLLY. There wa'n't enough
kindlin's to spare for that. It ought to lay
east there, towards the kitchen.
LINK. Let it go!
That's whar us Yanks left our back door ajar
and Johnson stuck his foot in: kep it thar,
too, till he got it squoze off by old Slocum.
Let Culp's Hill lay for now.--Lend me your marker.
[_POLLY hands him the hoe. From his chair, he reaches with it and digs
in the chips._]
Death Valley needs some scoopin' deeper. So:
smooth off them chips.
[_POLLY does so with her foot._]
You better guess 't was deep
as hell, that second day, come sundown.--Here,
[_He hands back the hoe to her._]
flat down the Wheatfield yonder.
[_POLLY does so._]
Goda'mighty!
that Wheatfield: wall, we flatted it down flatter
than any pancake what you ever cooked,
Polly; and 't wan't no maple syrup neither
was runnin', slipp'ry hot and slimy black
all over it, that nightfall.
POLLY. Here's the road
to Emmetsburg.
LINK. No, 'tain't: this here's the pike
to Taneytown, where Sykes's boys come sweatin',
after an all-night march, jest in the nick
to save our second day. The Emmetsburg
road's thar.--Whar was I, 'fore I fell cat-nappin'?
POLLY.
At sunset, July second, Sixty-three.
LINK [_nodding, reminiscent_].
The Bloody Sundown! God, that crazy sun:
she set a dozen times that afternoon,
red-yeller as a punkin jacko'lantern,
rairin' and pitchin' through the roarin' smoke
till she clean busted, like the other bombs,
behind the hills.
POLLY. My! Wa'n't you never scart
and wished you'd stayed t' home?
LINK. Scart? Wall, I wonder!
Chick, look a-thar: them little stripes and stars.
I heerd a feller onct, down to the store,--
a dressy mister, span-new from the city--
layin' the law down: "All this _stars and stripes_,"
says he, "and _red and white and blue_ is rubbish,
mere sentimental rot, spread-eagleism!"
"I wan't t' know!" says I. "In Sixty-three,
I knowed a lad, named Link. Onct, after sundown
I met him stumblin'--with two dead men's muskets
for crutches--towards a bucket, full of ink--
water, they called it. When he'd drunk a spell,
he tuk the rest to wash his bullet holes.--
Wall, sir, he had a piece o' splintered stick,
with _red and white and blue_, tore 'most t' tatters,
a-danglin' from it." "Be you color sergeant?"
says I. "Not me," says Link; "the sergeant's dead,
but when he fell, he handed me this bit
o' _rubbish_--red and white and blue." And Link
he laughed. "What be you laughin' for?" says I.
"Oh, nothin'. Ain't it lovely, though!" says Link.
POLLY.
What did the span-new mister say to that?
LINK.
I didn't stop to listen. Them as never
heerd dead men callin' for the colors don't
guess what they be. [_Sitting up and blinking hard._]
But this ain't keepin' school!
POLLY [_quietly_].
I guess I'm learnin' somethin', Uncle Link.
LINK.
The second day, 'fore sunset.
[_He takes the hoe and points with it._]