University of Virginia Library

Scene I.

—Canaan, Jacob's Tent.
Enter Reuben, Asher, Judah, Naphtali, and Dan.
Reuben.
What's to be done?

Asher.
Lie down and die.

Reuben.
Oft-times
The pregnant harvest at its early birth
Has so o'errun the measure of our need,
That the full bins have musted in the shed
For lack of use. Alas! our famish'd want
Would fain be friendly with our former waste,
And give God thanks.

Judah.
Alas! where will this end?
Two seasons now are past, and we have look'd
With hollow eye upon the fruitless earth;
And look'd in vain; for not a single blade
From all the thousand grains we scatter'd forth,
Comes in the emerald livery of spring
To cheer our anxious and desponding sight.

Enter Jacob and Benjamin.
Jacob.
How fare my sons?

Naphtali.
Idly, against our wills.

Jacob.
God's will be done! It is a grievous thing
For me and thee and all thy brethren here
To feel the lack of bread,—most pitiful.

Naphtali.
Come, and mark out our final resting place,
And make us coffins straight.

Jacob.
Despair is sin.

Naphtali.
It is as well to wrangle with despair,
As sigh to death with hope.—What hope have we?
The wind doth whistle through our granaries
(Enwomb'd and hollow as a dead man's skull),
Lord of the empty space; for the small beasts
Desert it as a thriftless tenement.
The paths that led to pastures and to fields
For want of use are over-laid with dust;
Old customs, too, that were our daily work
And daily bread, are bolted from our use
In the hard seasons. Spring doth blow the grain
Back in our faces ere it can be sown,
And autumn yields us ample crops of dust.
All savage things that we do kill for food
Are thrice as savage, being scant of food;
And leanness pays our danger.

Jacob.
Mark, oh Heaven!
Old Jacob's heart is wrung for all his tribe:
A heavy freight, wherein he doth forget
Himself.—Have mercy, then.

Naphtali.
What shall we do?

Judah.
Alas! I know not; patience is worn out.
The weary months, like to a stubborn brood
Of disobedient children, still do swerve
From nature's docile rule, and mar themselves.
Heaven does not weep to see so sad a spring,
And therefore is she parchèd in her youth,
And summer smoulders like a smother'd fire,
And bakes the crusted earth. Rivers dry up;
The winter is all wind; moist nourishment
Is suck'd up from the land; and barrenness,
In all its cruelty, mocks at man's need.

Enter Simeon, Levi, Zebulun, Gad, and Issachar.
Simeon.
We shall be starv'd to death,—

Naphtali.
What further ill?

Zebulun.
Lo you! we left ten cattle in the mead,
And nine have died of hunger.

Levi.
There is no mead;
But all the place that was a general swamp
Is as though struck by lightning, sing'd and burnt.

Dan.
Mountain or flat, low glen, or peering mound,
Hath cast its mantle for an umber gloom,
And summer's vestige only doth remain
In dying ivy or in holly sere.

Simeon.
Our cattle languish, bellowing for food:
And when they die, we lack the means to live.

Reuben.
Famine is like the demon of despair;
It swallows all the substance it can find,
Then preys on its own arms.

Zebulun.
Creatures of kin
We often see do feed upon their young;
Thus famine eats itself.

Gad.
I turn'd a mouse
From out its nest by chance—stor'd in the hold
With nuts, with acorns, almonds, and with rice:
‘Herein (said I) man's lofty pride's pull'd down,
Even by a creature that doth live in straws.
Had all my brothers had but half thy wit
We should be full and frugal, sleek as thou;
Not like the empty lions howling here.’

Reuben.
Yea, man's chief lesson is extremity.
He never knows what precious comfort is
Till it is lost.

Judah.
How weary are our days
That us'd to pass in healthful exercise,
In pleasurable thrift, and sweet repast!
Our nights were like a minute thrown away—
A draught of balm unto a parchèd thirst
Exchang'd for renovation and fresh joy.
Now all our minutes, fledg'd with leaden wings,
Are like to notes struck from a domèd bell
By a vast giant with an iron club.
The time we held as musing vacancy
We find was sweet content; and all in vain
We try to touch the hour with cheerfulness
Which hangs about us like a brooding cloud.

Issachar.
Yea, who shall mend it? What's the best to do?

Jacob.
A general vengeance from the hand of God,
In heavy visitation on the land,
Is spread around: it is a bitter cup!
A little mercy at the bottom still
Was ever left for man's affliction.—
Arise, my sons: I cannot mend your wants,
But I do hear there is a certain man
Of great renown, who rules the far-off land
Where Pharaoh, the Egyptian, reigns as king.
Go, get ye up, and take your mules and sacks,
With money in your palms, and crave of him
To sell you corn, that ye and yours may live,
Nor linger thus in want. Go, every man,
Excepting Benjamin, my youngest boy;
Him I will keep, lest danger by the way
Should be enamour'd of his tender youth,
And rob me of his sight.

Naphtali.
Better we may,—
Much worse we cannot be.

Jacob.
Heaven prosper you.

[Exeunt.