 | The collected works of Ambrose Bierce |  |
317
THE MUMMERY
319
THE TWO CAVEES
- Fitch a Pelter of Railrogues
- Pickering his Partner, an Enemy to Sin
- Old Nick a General Blackwasher
- Dead Cat a Missile
- Antique Egg Another
- Railrogues, Dump-Carters, Navvies and Unassorted Shovelry in the Lower Distance.
DRAMATIS PERSONÆ
Fitch:
Gods! what a steep declivity! Below
I see the lazy dump-carts come and go,
Creeping like beetles and about as big.
The delving Paddies—
Pickering:
Case of infra dig.
Fitch:
Loring, light-minded and unmeaning quips
Come with but scant propriety from lips
Fringed with the blue-black evidence of age.
'Twere well to cultivate a style more sage,
320
Our foulest missiles are but thrown in fun.
(Enter Dead Cat)
Here's one that thoughtfully has come to hand;
Slant your fine eye below and see it land.
(Seizes Dead Cat by the tail and swings it in act to throw.)
Dead Cat
(singing):
Merrily, merrily, round I go—
Over and under and at.
Swing wide and free, swing high and low
The anti-monopoly cat!
Over and under and at.
Swing wide and free, swing high and low
The anti-monopoly cat!
O, who wouldn't be in the place of me,
The anti-monopoly cat?
Designed to admonish,
Persuade and astonish
The capitalist and—
The anti-monopoly cat?
Designed to admonish,
Persuade and astonish
The capitalist and—
Fitch
(letting go):
Scat!
(Exit Dead Cat.)
Pickering
Huzza! good Deacon, well and truly flung!
Pat Stanford it has grassed, and Mike de Young.
Mike drives a dump-cart for the villains, though
'Twere fitter that he pull it. Well, we owe
The traitor one for leaving us!—some day
We'll get, if not his place, his cart away.
321
(Enter Antique Egg.)
Ha! we can give them an ovation, too!
Antique Egg:
In the valley of the Nile,
Where the Holy Crocodile
Of immeasurable smile
Blossoms like the early rose,
And the Sacred Onion grows—
When the Pyramids were new
And the Sphinx possessed a nose,
By a storkess I was laid
In the cool papyrus shade,
Where the rushes later grew,
That concealed the little Jew,
Baby Mose.
Where the Holy Crocodile
Of immeasurable smile
Blossoms like the early rose,
And the Sacred Onion grows—
When the Pyramids were new
And the Sphinx possessed a nose,
By a storkess I was laid
In the cool papyrus shade,
Where the rushes later grew,
That concealed the little Jew,
Baby Mose.
Straining very hard to hatch,
I disrupted there my yolk;
And I felt my yellow streaming
Through my white;
And the dream that I was dreaming
Of posterity was broke
In a night.
Then from the papyrus-patch
By the rising waters rolled,
Passing many a temple old,
I proceeded to the sea.
Memnon sang, one morn, to me,
And I heard Cambyses sass
The tomb of Ozymandias!
I disrupted there my yolk;
And I felt my yellow streaming
Through my white;
And the dream that I was dreaming
Of posterity was broke
In a night.
Then from the papyrus-patch
By the rising waters rolled,
Passing many a temple old,
322
Memnon sang, one morn, to me,
And I heard Cambyses sass
The tomb of Ozymandias!
Fitch:
O, venerablest orb of all the earth,
God rest the lady fowl that gave thee birth!
Fit missile for the vilest hand to throw—
I freely tender thee mine own. Although
As a bad egg I am myself no slouch,
Thy riper years thy ranker worth avouch.
Now, Pickering, please expose your eye and say
If—whoop!—
(exit Egg.)
I've got the range.
Pickering:
Horray! hooray!
A grand good shot, and Teddy Colton's down:
It burst in thunderbolts upon his crown!
Larry O'Crocker drops his pick and flies,
And deafening odors scream along the skies!
Pelt 'em some more.
Fitch:
There's nothing left but tar—
I wish I were a Yahoo.
323
Well, you are.
But keep the tar. How well I recollect,
When Mike was in with us—proud, strong, erect—
Mens conscia recti—flinging mud, he stood,
Austerely brave, incomparably good,
Ere yet for filthy lucre he began
To drive a cart as Stanford's hired man,
That pitch-pot bearing in his hand, Old Nick
Appeared and tarred us all with the same stick.
(Enter Old Nick.)
I hope he won't return and use his arts
To make us part with our immortal parts.
Old Nick:
Make yourself easy on that score my lamb;
For both your souls I wouldn't give a damn!
I want my tar-pot—hello! where's the stick?
Fitch:
Don't look at me that fashion!—look at Pick.
Pickering:
Forgive me, father—pity my remorse!
Truth is—Mike took that stick to spank his horse.
It fills my pericardium with grief
That I kept company with such a thief.
(Endeavoring to get his handkerchief, he opens his coat and the tar-stick falls out. Nick picks it up, looks at the culprit reproachfully and withdraws in tears.)
324
(excitedly):
O Pickering, come hither to the brink—
There's something going on down there, I think!
With many an upward smile and meaning wink
The navvies all are running from the cut
Like lunatics, to right and left—
Pickering:
Tut, tut—
'Tis only some poor sport or boisterous joke.
Let us sit down and have a quiet smoke.
(They sit and light cigars.)
Fitch
(singing):
When first I met Miss Toughie
I smoked a fine cigyar,
An' I was on de dummy
And she was in de cyar.
Both
(singing):
An' I was on de dummy
An' she was in de cyar.
Fitch
(singing):
I couldn't go to her,
An' she wouldn't come to me;
An' I was as oneasy
As a gander on a tree.
Both
(singing):
An' I was as oneasy
As a gander on a tree.
325
(singing):
But purty soon I weakened
An' lef' de dummy's bench,
An' frew away a ten-cent weed
To win a five-cent wench!
Both
(singing):
An' frew away a ten-cent weed
To win a five-cent wench!
Fitch:
Is there not now a certain substance sold
Under the name of fulminate of gold,
A high explosive, popular for blasting,
Producing an effect immense and lasting?
Pickering:
Nay, that's mere superstition. Rocks are rent
And excavations made by argument.
Explosives all have had their day and season;
The modern engineer relies on reason.
He'll talk a tunnel through a mountain's flank
And by fair speech cave down the tallest bank.
(The earth trembles, a deep subterranean explosion is heard and a section of the bank as big as El Capitan starts away and plunges thunderously into the cut. A part of it strikes De Young's dump-cart abaft the axletree and flings him, hurtling, skyward, a thing of legs and arms, to descend on the distant mountains, where it is cold.
326
Fitch:
Well, since I'm down here I will help to grade,
And do dirt-throwing henceforth with a spade.
Pickering:
God bless my soul! it gave me quite a start.
Well, fate is fate—I guess I'll drive this cart.
(Curtain)
METEMPSYCHOSIS
- St. John a Presidential Candidate
- McDonald a Defeated Aspirant
- Mrs. Hayes a Former President
- Pitts-Stevens a Water Nymph
DRAMATIS PERSONÆ
St. John
(solus):
Hours I've immersed my muzzle in this tarn
And, quaffing copious potations, tried
To suck it dry; but ever as I pumped
Its waters into my distended skin
The labor of my zeal extruded them
In perspiration from my pores; and so,
327
They fell again into their source. Ah, me!
Could I but find within these ancient hills
Some long extinct volcano, by the rains
Of countless ages in its crater brimmed
Like a full goblet, I would lay me down
Prone on the outer slope, and o'er its edge
Arching my neck, I'd siphon out its store
And flood the valleys with my sweet for aye.
So should I be accounted as a god,
Even as Father Nilus is. What's that?
Methought I heard some sawyer draw his file
With jarring, stridulous cacophany
Across his notchy blade, to set its teeth
And mine on edge. Ha! there it goes again!
Song, within:
Cold water's the milk of the mountains,
And Nature's our wet-nurse. O then,
Glue thou thy blue lips to her fountains
Forever and ever, amen!
St. John:
Why surely there's congenial company
Aloof—the spirit, I suppose, that guards
This sacred spot; perchance some water-nymph
Who laving in the crystal flood her limbs
Has taken cold, and so, with raucous voice
Afflicts the sensitive membrane of mine ear
328
(Enter Pitts-Stevens.)
Hello!
What fiend is this?
Pitts-Stevens:
'Tis I, be not afraid.
St. John:
And who, thou antiquated crone, art thou?
I ne'er forget a face, but names I can't
So well remember. I have seen thee oft.
When in the middle season of the night,
Curved with a cucumber, or knotted hard
With an eclectic pie, I've striven to keep
My head and heels asunder, thou hast come,
With sociable familiarity,
Into my dream, but not, alas, to bless.
Pitts-Stevens:
My name's Pitts-Stevens, age just seventeen years;
Talking teetotaler, professional
Beauty.
St. John:
What dost thou here?
Pitts-Stevens:
I'm come, fair sir,
With paints and brush to blazon on these rocks
The merits of my master's nostrum—so:
(paints rapidly: —“McDonald's Vinegar Bitters!”)
329
What are they?
Pitts-Stevens:
A woman suffering from widowhood
Took a full bottle and was cured. A man
There was—a murderer; the doctors all
Had given him up—he'd but an hour to live.
He swallowed half a glassful. He is dead,
But not of Vinegar Bitters. A wee babe
Lay sick and cried for it. The mother gave
That innocent a spoonful and it smoothed
Its pathway to the tomb. 'Tis warranted
To cause a boy to strike his father, make
A pig squeal, start the hair upon a stone,
Or play the fiddle for a country dance.
(Enter McDonald, reading a Sunday-school book.)
Good morrow, sir; I trust you're well.
McDonald:
H'lo, Pitts!
Observe, good friends, I have a volume here
Myself am author of—a noble book
To train the infant mind (delightful task!)
It tells how one Samantha Brown, age six,
A gutter-bunking slave to rum, was saved
By Vinegar Bitters, went to church and now
Has an account at my Pacific Bank.
I'll read the whole work to you.
330
Heaven forbid!
I've elsewhere an engagement.
Pitts-Stevens:
I am deaf.
McDonald
(reading regardless):
“Once on a time there lived”—
(enter Mrs. Hayes, as a tree walking)
Behold our queen!
All:
Her eyes upon the ground
Before her feet she low'rs,
Walking, in thought profound,
As 'twere, upon all fours.
Her visage is austere,
Her gait a high parade;
At every step you hear
The plashing lemonade!
Mrs. Hayes
(to herself):
Once, sitting in the White House, hard at work
Signing state papers (Rutherford was there,
Knitting some hose) a sudden glory fell
Upon my paper. I looked up and saw
An angel, holding in his hand a rod
Wherewith he struck me. Smarting with the blow
I rose and (cuffing Rutherford) inquired:
“Wherefore this chastisement?” The angel said:
331
There's rum!”—then flew to Heaven. Contrite, I swore
Such oath as lady Methodist might take,
My second term should medicine my first.
The people would not have it that way; so
I seek some candidate who'll take my soul—
My spirit of reform, fresh from my breast,
Giving me his instead; and thus equipped
With my imperious and fiery essence,
Drive the Drink-Demon from the land and fill
The people up with water till their teeth
Are all afloat.
(St. John discovers himself.)
What, you?
St. John:
Aye, Madam, I'll
Swap souls with you and lead the cold sea-green
Amphibians of Prohibition on,
Pallid of nose and webbed of foot, swim-bladdered,
Gifted with gills—invincible!
Mrs. Hayes:
Enough,
Stand forth and consummate the interchange.
(While McDonald and Pitts-Stevens modestly turn their backs, the latter blushing a delicate shrimp-pink, St. John and Mrs. Hayes effect an exchange of immortal parts. When the transfer is complete McDonald turns and advances, uncorking a bottle of Vinegar Bitters.)
332
(chanting):
Nectar compounded of simples
Cocted in Stygian shades—
Acids of wrinkles and pimples
From faces of ancient maids—
Acrid precipitates sunken
From tempers of scolding wives
Whose husbands, sagaciously drunken,
Rejoice in oblivious lives,—
With this I baptize and appoint thee
(to St. John)
To marshal the vinophobe ranks.
In Neptune's name I anoint thee
(pours the liquid down St. John's back)
As King of aquatical cranks!
(The liquid blisters the royal back, and His Majesty starts on a dead run, energetically exclamatory. Exit St. John.)
Mrs. Hayes:
My soul! My soul! I'll never get it back
Unless I follow nimbly on his track.
(Exit Mrs. Hayes.)
Pitts-Stevens:
O my! he's such a beautiful young man!
I'll follow, too, and wed him if I can.
(Exit Pitts-Stevens.)
333
(solus):
He scarce is visible, his dust so great!
Methinks for so obscure a candidate
He runs quite well. But as for Prohibition—
I mean myself to hold the first position.
(Produces a pocket flask, topes a cruel quantity of
double-distilled thunder-and-lightning out of it, smiles
so grimly as to darken all the stage and sings):
Methinks for so obscure a candidate
He runs quite well. But as for Prohibition—
I mean myself to hold the first position.
Though fortunes vary, let all be merry,
And then if e'er a disaster befall,
At Styx's ferry is Charon's wherry
In easy call.
And then if e'er a disaster befall,
At Styx's ferry is Charon's wherry
In easy call.
Upon a ripple of golden tipple
That tipsy ship'll convey you best.
To king and cripple, the bottle's the nipple
Of Nature's breast!
That tipsy ship'll convey you best.
To king and cripple, the bottle's the nipple
Of Nature's breast!
(Curtain)
334
SLICKENS
- Hayseed a Granger
- Nozzle a Miner
- Ringdivvy a Statesman
- Feegobble a Lawyer
- Junket a Committee
DRAMATIS PERSONÆ
Feegobble, Ringdivvy, Nozzle
Nozzle:
My friends, since '51 I have pursued
The evil tenor of my watery way,
Removing hills as by an act of faith—
Ringdivvy:
Just so; the steadfast faith of those who hold,
In foreign lands beyond the Eastern sea,
The shares in your concern—a simple, blind,
Unreasoning belief in dividends,
Still stimulated by assessments which,
When the stars fall, upon the backs of toads,
Will bring, no doubt, a very great return.
All
(singing):
O the adequate assessment,
The annual assessment,
The regular assessment,
That makes the water flow.
335
The rascally assessment!
Feegobble:
The murderous assessment!
Nozzle:
The glorious assessment
That makes my mare to go!
Feegobble:
But, Nozzle, you, I think, were on the point
Of making a remark about some rights—
Some certain vested rights you have acquired
By long immunity; for still the law
Holds that if one do evil undisturbed
His right to do so ripens with the years;
And one may be a villain long enough
To make himself an honest gentleman.
All
(singing):
Hail, holy law,
The soul with awe
Bows to thy dispensation.
Nozzle:
It breaks my jaw!
Ringdivvy:
It qualms my maw!
336
It feeds my jaw,
It crams my maw,
It is my soul's salvation!
Nozzle:
Why, yes, I've floated mountains to the sea
For lo! these many years; though some, they say,
Do strand themselves along the bottom lands
And cover up a village here and there,
And here and there a ranch. 'Tis said, indeed,
The granger with his female and his young
Does not infrequently go to the dickens
By premature burial in slickens.
All
(singing):
Could slickens forever
Choke up the river,
And slime's endeavor
Be tried on grain,
How small the measure
Of granger's treasure,
How keen his pain!
Ringdivvy:
These rascal grangers would long since have been
Submerged in slimes, to the last man of them,
But for the fact that all their wicked tribes
Affect our legislation with their bribes.
337
(singing):
O bribery's great—
'Tis a pillar of State,
And the people they are free!
Feegobble:
It smashes my slate!
Nozzle:
It is thievery straight!
Ringdivvy:
But it's been the making of me!
Nozzle:
I judge by certain shrewd sensations here
In these callosities I call my thumbs—
A thrilling sense as of ten thousand pins,
Red-hot and penetrant, transpiercing all
The cuticle and tickling through the nerves—
That some malign and awful thing draws near.
(Enter Hayseed.)
Good Lord! here are the ghosts and spooks of all
The grangers I have decently interred,
Rolled into one!
Feegobble:
Plead, phantom.
Ringdivvy:
You've the floor.
338
From the margin of the river
(Bitter Creek, they sometimes call it)
Where I cherished once the pumpkin,
And the summer squash promoted,
Harvested the sweet potato,
Dallied with the fatal melon
And subdued the fierce cucumber,
I've been driven by the slickens,
Driven by the slimes and tailings!
All my family—my Polly
Ann and all my sons and daughters,
Dog and baby both included—
All were swamped in seas of slickens,
Buried fifty fathoms under,
Where they lie, prepared to play their
Gentle prank on geologic
Gents that shall exhume them later,
In the dim and distant future,
Taking them for melancholy
Relics antedating Adam.
I alone got up and dusted.
Nozzle:
Avaunt! you horrid and infernal shape!
What dire distress have you prepared for us?
Ringdivvy:
Were I a buzzard stooping from the sky
339
Into your honorable body I
Would introduce a bill.
Feegobble:
Defendant, hence, or, by the gods, I'll brain thee!—
Unless you saved some turnips to retain me.
Hayseed:
As I was saying, I got up and dusted,
My ranch a graveyard and my business busted!
But hearing that a fellow from the City,
Who calls himself a Citizens' Committee,
Was coming up to play the very dickens,
With those who cover up our farms with slickens,
And make himself—unless I am in error—
To all such miscreants a holy terror,
I thought if I would join the dialogue
I maybe might get payment for my dog.
All
(singing):
O the dog is the head of Creation,
Prime work of the Master's hand;
He hasn't a known occupation,
Yet lives on the fat of the land.
Adipose, indolent, sleek and orbicular,
Sun-soaken, door-matted, cross and particular.
Men, women, children, all coddle and wait on him,
Then, accidentally shutting the gate on him,
Miss from their calves, ever after, the rifted out
340
(Enter Junket.)
Junket:
Well met, my hearties! I must trouble you
Jointly and severally to provide
A comfortable carriage, with relays
Of hardy horses. This Committee means
To move in state about the country here.
I shall expect at every place I stop
Good beds, of course, and everything that's nice,
With bountiful repast of meat and wine.
For this Committee comes to see and mark
And inwardly digest.
Hayseed:
Digest my dog!
Nozzle:
First square my claim for damages: the gold
Escaping with the slickens keeps me poor!
Ringdivvy:
I merely would remark that if you'd grease
My itching palm it would more glibly glide
Into the public pocket.
Feegobble:
Sir, the wheels
Of justice move but slowly till they're oiled.
I have some certain writs and warrants here,
341
The tale of Zaccheus who did climb a tree,
And Jesus said: “Come down”?
Junket:
Why, bless your souls!
I've got no money; I but came to see
What all this noisy babble is about,
Make a report and file the same away.
Nozzle, Dingdivvy, Feegobble, Hayseed:
How'll that help us? Reports are not our style
Of provender!
Junket:
Well, you can gnaw the file.
(Curtain)
“PEACEFUL EXPULSION”
- Mountwave a Politician
- Hardhand a Workingman
- Tok Bak a Chinaman
- Satan a Friend to Mountwave
- Chorus of Foreign Voters.
DRAMATIS PERSONÆ
My friend, I beg that you will lend your ears
(I know 'tis asking a good deal of you)
342
Some certain wrongs you suffer. Men like you
Imperfectly are sensible of all
The miseries they actually feel.
Hence, Providence has prudently raised up
Clear-sighted men like me to diagnose
Their cases and inform them where it hurts.
The wounds of honest workingmen I've made
A specialty, and probing them's my trade.
Hardhand:
Well, Mister, s'pose you let yer bossest eye
Camp on my mortal part awhile; then you
Jes' toot my sufferin's an' tell me what's
The fashionable caper now in writhes—
The very swellest wiggle.
Mountwave:
Well, my lad,
'Tis plain as is the long, conspicuous nose
Borne, ponderous and pendulous, between
The elephant's remarkable eye-teeth
(enter Tok Bak)
That Chinese competition's what ails you.
Both
(singing):
O pig-tail Celestial,
O barbarous, bestial,
Abominable Chinee!
Simian fellow man,
343
Joshian devotee!
Shoe-and-cigar machine,
Oleomargarine
You are, and butter are we—
Fat of the land are we,
Salt of the earth;
In God's image planned to be—
Noble by birth!
You, on the contrary,
Modeled upon very
Different lines indeed,
Show in conspicuous,
Base and ridiculous
Ways your inferior breed.
Freak of biology,
Shame of ethnology,
Monster unspeakably low!
Fit to be buckshotted,
Brickbatted, boycotted—
Vanish—vamoose—mosy—go!
Tok Bak:
You listen me! You beatee the big dlum
An' tell me go to Flowly Kingdom Come.
You all too muchee fool. You chinnee heap.
Such talkee like my washee—belly cheap!
(Enter Satan.)
344
Why you no tackle me Safflisco, hay?
Satan:
Methought I heard a murmuring of tongues
Sound through the ceiling of the hollow earth,
As if the anti-coolie ques—ha! friends,
Well met. You see I keep my ancient word:
Where two or three are gathered in my name,
There am I in their midst.
Mountwave:
O monstrous thief!
To quote the words of Shakespeare as your own.
I know his work.
Hardhand:
Who's Shakespeare?—what's his trade?
I've heard about the work o' that galoot
Till I'm jest sick!
Tok Bak:
Go Sunny school—you'll know
Mo' Bible. Bime by pleach—hell-talkee. Tell
'Bout Abel—mebby so he live too cheap.
He mebby all time dig on lanch—no dlink,
No splee—no go plocession fo' make vote—
No sendee money out of clunty fo'
To helpee Ilishmen. Cain killum. Josh
He catchee at it, an he belly mad—
Say: “Allee Melicans boycottee Cain.”
345
You all same lie.
Mountwave:
This cuss must be expelled.
(Draws pistol.)
Mountwave, Hardhand, Satan
(singing):
For Chinese expulsion, hurrah!
To mobbing and murder, all hail!
Away with your justice and law—
We'll make every pagan turn tail.
Chorus of Foreign Voters:
Bedad! off dot tief o'ze vorld—
Zat Ivan Tchanay vos got hurled
In Hella, da debil he say:
“Wor be yer return pairmit, hey?”
Und gry as 'e shaka da boot:
“Zis haythen haf nevaire been oot!”
Hardhand:
Too many cooks are working at this broth—
I think, by thunder, 'twill be mostly froth!
I'm cussed ef I can sarvy, up to date,
What good this dern fandango does the State.
Mountwave.
The State's advantage, sir, you may not see,
But think how good it is for me.
Satan:
And me.
(Curtain)
346
ASPIRANTS THREE
DRAMATIS PERSONÆ
- De Young a Brother to Mushrooms
QUICK:
- Swift an Heirloom
- Estee a Relic
DEAD:
- The Spirit of Broken Hopes. The Author.
IMMORTALS.
- A Troupe of Coffins. The Moon. Various Colored Fires.
MISCELLANEOUS.
De Young
(solus):
This is the spot agreed upon. Here rest
The sainted statesmen who upon the field
Of honor have at divers times laid down
Their own, and ended, ignominious,
Their lives political. About me, lo!
Their silent headstones, gilded by the moon,
Half-full and near her setting—midnight. Hark!
Through the white mists of this portentous night
(Which throng in moving shapes about my way,
As they were ghosts of candidates I've slain,
347
Engulfs a footstep.
(Enter Estee from his tomb.)
Ah, 'tis he, my foe,
True to appointment; and so here we fight—
Though truly 'twas my firm belief that he
Would send regrets, or I had not been here.
Estee:
O moon that hast so oft surprised the deeds
Whereby I rose to greatness!—tricksy orb,
The type and symbol of my politics,
Now draw my ebbing fortunes to their flood,
As, by the magic of a poultice, boils
That burn ambitions with defeated fires
Are lifted into eminence.
(Sees De Young.)
What? you!
Faith, if I had suspected you would come
From the fair world of politics wherein
So lately you were whelped, and which, alas,
I vainly to revisit strive, though still
Rapped on the rotting head and bidden sleep
Till Resurrection's morn,—if I had thought
You would accept the challenge that I flung
I would have seen you damned ere I came forth
In the night air, shroud-clad and shivering,
To fight so mean a thing. But since you're here,
348
Who'll be Postmaster-General!
De Young:
We will—
I'll fight (for I am lame) with any blue
And redolent remain that dares aspire
To wreck the Grand Old Grandson's cabinet.
Here's at you, nosegay!
(They draw tongues and are about to fight, when from an adjacent whited sepulcher, enter Swift.)
Swift:
Hold! put up your tongues!
Within the confines of this sacred spot
Broods such a holy calm as none may break
By clash of weapons, without sacrilege.
(Beats down their tongues with a bone.)
Madmen! what profits it? For though you fought
With such heroic skill that both survived,
Yet neither should achieve the prize, for I
Would wrest it from him. Let us not contend,
But friendliwise by stipulation fix
A slate for mutual advantage. Why,
Having the pick and choice of seats, should we
Forego them all but one? Nay, we'll take three,
And part them so among us that to each
Shall fall the fittest to his powers. In brief,
Let us establish a Portfolio Trust.
349
Agreed.
De Young:
Aye, truly, 'tis a greed—and one
The offices imperfectly will sate,
But I'll stand in.
Swift.
Well, so 'tis understood,
As you're the junior member of the Trust,
Politically younger and undead,
Speak, Michael: what portfolio do you chose?
De Young:
I've thought the Postal service best would serve
My interest; but since I have my pick,
I'll take the War Department. It is known
Throughout the world, from Market street to Pine,
(For a Chicago journal told the tale)
How in this hand I lately took my life
And marched against great Buckley, thundering
My mandate that he count the ballots fair!
Earth heard and shrank to half her size! Yon moon,
Which rivaled then a liver's whiteness, paused
That night at Butchertown and daubed her face
With sheep's blood! Then my serried rank I drew
Back to my stronghold without loss. To mark
My care in saving human life—my own—
The Peace Society bestowed on me
Its leather medal and the title, too,
350
I naturally dote on a brass band!
(Sings.)
O, give me a life on the tented field,
Where the cannon roar and ring,
Where the flag floats free and the foemen yield
And bleed as the bullets sing.
But be it not mine to wage the fray
Where matters are ordered the other way,
For that is a different thing.
Where the cannon roar and ring,
Where the flag floats free and the foemen yield
And bleed as the bullets sing.
But be it not mine to wage the fray
Where matters are ordered the other way,
For that is a different thing.
O, give me a life in the fierce campaign—
Let it be the life of my foe:
I'd rather fall upon him than the plain;
That service I'd fain forego.
O, a warrior's life is fine and free,
But a warrior's death—ah me! ah me!
That's a different thing, you know.
Let it be the life of my foe:
I'd rather fall upon him than the plain;
That service I'd fain forego.
O, a warrior's life is fine and free,
But a warrior's death—ah me! ah me!
That's a different thing, you know.
Estee:
Some claim I might myself advance to that
Portfolio. When Rebellion raised her head,
And you, my friends, stayed meekly in your shirts,
I marched with banners to the party stump,
Spat on my hands, made faces fierce as death,
Shook my two fists at once and introduced
Brave resolutions terrible to read!
Nay, only recently, as you do know,
351
And slew again (to her surprise) the South!
Swift:
You once fought Stanford, too.
Estee:
Enough of that—
Give me the Interior and I'll devote
My mind to agriculture and improve
The breed of cabbages, especially
The Brassica Celeritatis, named
For you because in days of long ago
You sold it at your market stall,—and, faith,
'Tis said you were an honest huckster then.
I'll be Attorney-General if you
Prefer; for know I am a lawyer too!
Swift:
I never have heard that!—have you, De Young?
De Young:
Never, so help me! And I swear I've heard
A score of Judges say that he is not.
Swift
(to Estee):
You take the Interior. I might aspire
To military station too, for once
I led my party into Pixley's camp,
And he paroled me. I defended, too,
The State of Oregon against the sharp
352
But I've an aptitude exceeding neat
For bloodless battles of diplomacy.
My cobweb treaty of Exclusion once,
Through which a hundred thousand coolies sailed,
Was much admired, but most by Colonel Bee.
Though born a tinker, I'm a diplomat
From old Missouri, and I—ha! what's this?
(Exit Moon. Enter Blue Lights on all the tombs, and a circle of Red Fire on the grass; in the center the Spirit of Broken Hopes, and round about, a Troupe of Coffins, dancing and singing.)
Chorus of Coffins:
Two bodies dead and one alive—
Yo, ho, merrily all!
Now for office strain and strive—
Buzzards all a-warble, O!
Prophets three, agape for bread;
Raven with a stone instead—
Providential raven!
Judges two and Colonel one—
Run, run, rustics, run!
But it's O, the pig is shaven,
And oily, oily all!
(Exeunt Coffins, dancing. The Spirit of Broken Hopes advances, solemnly pointing at each of the Three Worthies in turn.)
353
Governor, Governor, editor man,
Rusty, musty, spick-and-span,
Harlequin, harridan, dicky-dout,
Demagogue, charlatan—o, u, t, OUT!
(De Young falls and sleeps.)
Antimonopoler, diplomat,
Railroad lackey, political rat,
One, two, three—SCAT!
(Swift falls and sleeps.)
Boycotting chin-worker, working to woo
Fortune, the fickle, to smile upon you,
Jo-coated acrobat, shuttle-cock—SHOO!
(Estee falls and sleeps.)
Now they lie in slumber sweet,
Now the charm is all complete,
Hasten I with flying feet
To where beyond the farther sea
A babe upon its mother's knee
Is gazing into skies afar
And crying for a golden star.
I'll drag a cloud across the blue
And break that infant's heart in two!
(Exeunt the Spirit of Broken Hopes and the Red and Blue Fires. Re-enter Moon.)
Estee
(waking):
Why, this is strange! I dreamed I know not what.
It seemed that certain apparitions were,
354
And yet ambiguous—half-understood—
Portending evil; and an awful spook,
Even as I stood with my accomplices,
Counted me out, as children do in play.
Is that you, Mike?
De Young
(waking):
It was.
Swift
(waking):
And I all that?
Then I'll reform my life.
(Reforms his life.)
Ah! had I known
How sweet it is to be an honest man
I never would have stooped to turn my coat
For public favor, as chameleons take
The hue (as near as they can judge) of that
Supporting them. Henceforth I'll buy
With money all the offices I need,
And know the profit of an honest life,
Or stay forever in this dismal place.
Now that I'm good, it will no longer do
To make a third with such a wicked two.
(Returns to his tomb.)
De Young:
Prophetic dream; by some good angel sent
To make me with a quiet life content.
355
To go to Washington or go to work.
From Fame's debasing struggle I'll withdraw,
And taking up the pen lay down the law.
I'll leave this rogue, lest my example make
An honest man of him—his heart would break.
(Exit De Young.)
Estee:
Out of my company these converts flee,
But that advantage is denied to me:
My curst identity's confining skin
Nor lets me out nor tolerates me in.
But since my hopes eternally have fled,
And, dead before, I'm more than ever dead,
To find a grander tomb be now my task,
And pack my pork into a stolen cask.
(Exit, searching. Loud calls for the Author, who appears, bowing and smiling. Enter Faint Odor of Mortality. Exit the Gas.)
356
THE BIRTH OF THE RAIL
- Leland the Kid a Road Agent
- Cowboy Charley Same Line of Business
- Happy Hunty Ditto in All Ways
- Sootymug a Devil
DRAMATIS PERSONÆ
Cowboy Charley:
I fear the coach will not come by to-night.
Already it is past the hour, and yet
My ears have reached no sound of wheels; no note
Melodious, of long, luxurious oaths
Betokens the traditional dispute
(Unsettled from the dawn of time) between
The driver and off wheeler; no clear chant
Nor carol of Wells Fargo's messenger
Unbosoming his soul upon the air—
Singing his prowess to the tenderfoot,
And how at divers times in sundry ways
He strewed the roadside with our carcasses.
Clearly, the stage-coach will not pass to-night.
Leland the Kid:
I now remember that but yesterday
I saw three ugly looking fellows start
357
Did seem on business of importance bent,
Furtively casting all their eyes about
And covering their tracks with all the care
That business men do use. I think perhaps
They were Directors of that rival line,
The great Pacific Mail. If so, they have
Indubitably taken in that coach,
And we are overreached. Three times before
This thing has happened, and if once again
These outside operators dare to cut
Our rates of profit I shall quit the road
And take my money out of this concern.
When robbery no longer pays expense
It loses then its chiefest charm for me,
And I prefer to cheat—you hear me shout!
Happy Hunty:
My chief, you do but echo back my thoughts:
This competition is the death of trade.
'Tis plain (unless we wish to go to work)
Some other business we must early find.
What shall it be? The field of usefulness
Is yearly narrowing with the advance
Of wealth and population on this coast.
There's little left that any man can do
Without some other fellow stepping in
And doing it as well. If one essay
358
(With what disgust I need not say to you)
Another hand inserted in the same.
You crack a crib at dead of night, and lo!
As you explore the dining-room for plate
You find in session there a graceless band
Stuffing their coats with spoons, their skins with wine.
And so it goes. Why, even undertake
To salt a mine and you will find it rich
With noble specimens placed there before!
Leland the Kid:
And yet this line of immigration has
Advantages superior to aught
That elsewhere offers: all these passengers,
If punched with care—
Cowboy Charley:
Significant remark!
It opens up a prospect wide and fair,
Suggesting to the thoughtful mind—my mind—
A scheme that is the boss lay-out. Instead
Of stopping passengers, let's carry them.
Instead of crying out: “Throw up your hands!”
Let's say: “Walk up and buy a ticket!” Why
Should we unwieldy goods and bullion take,
Watches and all such trifles, when we might
Far better charge their value three times o'er
For carrying them to market?
359
Put it there,
Old son!
Happy Hunty:
You take the cake, my dear. We'll build
A mighty railroad through this pass, and then
The stage folk will come up to us and squeal,
And say: “It is bad medicine for both;
What will you give or take?” And then we'll sell.
Cowboy Charley:
Enlarge your notions, little one; this is
No petty, slouching, opposition scheme,
To be bought off like honest men and fools;
Mine eye prophetic pierces through the mists
That cloud the future, and I seem to see
A well-devised and executed scheme
Of wholesale robbery within the law
(Made by ourselves)—great, permanent, sublime,
And strong to grapple with the public throat—
Shaking the stuffing from the public purse,
The tears from bankrupt merchants' eyes, the blood
From widows' famished carcasses, the bread
From orphans' mouths!
Happy Hunty:
Hooray!
Leland the Kid:
Hooray!
360
Hooray!
(They tear the masks from their faces, and discharging their shotguns, throw them into the chaparral. Then they join hands, dance and sing the following song):
Ah! blessed to measure
The glittering treasure!
Ah! blessed to heap up the gold
Untold
That flows in a wide
And deepening tide—
Rolled, rolled, rolled
From multifold sources,
Converging its courses
Upon our—
Leland the Kid:
Just wait a bit, my pards: I seem to hear
A sneaking grizzly cracking the dry twigs.
Such an intrusion might deprive the State
Of all the good that we intend it. Ha!
(Enter Sootymug. He saunters carelessy in and gracefully leans his back against a redwood.)
Sootymug:
My boys, I thought I heard
Some careless revelry,
361
By some new devilry.
I too am in that line. Indeed, the mission
On which I come—
Happy Hunty:
Here's more damned competition!
(Curtain)
362
A BAD NIGHT
- Villiam a Sen
- Needleson a Sidniduc
- Smiler a Scheister
- Ki-Yi a Trader
- Grimghast a Spader
- Saralthia a Lovelorn Nymph
- Nellibrac a Sweetun
- A Body; a Ghost; an Unmentionable Thing; Skulls; Hoodoos; etc.
DRAMATIS PERSONÆ
Saralthia:
The red half-moon is dipping to the west,
And the cold fog invades the sleeping land.
Lo! how the grinning skulls in the level light
Litter the place! Methinks that every skull
Is a most lifelike portrait of my Sen,
Drawn by the hand of Death; each fleshless pate,
Cursed with a ghastly grin to eyes unrubbed
With love's magnetic ointment, seems to mine
To smile an amiable smile like his
Whose amiable smile I—I alone
Am able to distinguish from his leer!
See how the gathering coyotes flit
363
Star the black shadows with a steadfast gaze!
About my feet the poddy toads at play,
Bulbously comfortable, try to hop,
But tumble clumsily with all their warts;
While pranking lizards, sliding up and down
My limbs, as they were public roads, impart
A singularly interesting chill.
The circumstance and passion of the time,
The cast and manner of the place—the spirit
Of this confederate environment,
Command the rights we come to celebrate
Obedient to the Inspired Hag—
The seventh daughter of the seventh daughter,
Who rules all destinies from Minna street,
A dollar a destiny. Here at this grave,
Which for my purposes thou, Jack of Spades—
(to Grimghast)
Corrupter than the thing that reeks below—
Hast opened secretly, we'll work the charm.
Now what's the hour?
(Distant clock strikes thirteen.)
Enough—hale forth the stiff!
(Grimghast by means of a boat-hook stands the coffin on end in the excavation; the lid crumbles, exposing the remains of a man.)
Ha! Master Mouldybones, how fare you, sir?
364
Poorly, I thank your ladyship; I miss
Some certain fingers and an ear or two.
There's something, too, gone wrong with my inside,
And my periphery's not what it was.
How can we serve each other, you and I?
Nellibrac:
O what a personable man!
(Blushes bashfully, drops her eyes and twists the corner of her apron.)
Saralthia:
Yes, dear,
A very proper and alluring male,
And quite superior to Lubin Rroyd,
Who has, however, this distinct advantage—
He is alive.
Grimghast:
Missus, these yer remains
Was the boss singer back in '72,
And used to allers git invites to go
Down to Swellmont and sing at every feed.
In t'other Villiam's time, that was, afore
The gent that you've hooked onto bought the place.
The Body
(singing):
Down among the sainted dead
Many years I lay;
Beetles occupied my head,
Moles explored my clay.
365
I and bug and beast;
They provided appetite
And I supplied the feast.
The raven is a dicky-bird,
Saralthia
(singing):
The jackal is a daisy,
Nellibrac
(singing):
The wall-mouse is a worthy third,
A Spook
(singing):
But mortals all are crazy.
Chorus of Skulls:
O mortals all are crazy,
Their intellects are hazy;
In the growing moon they shake their shoon
And trip it in the mazy.
Their intellects are hazy;
In the growing moon they shake their shoon
And trip it in the mazy.
But when the moon is waning,
Their senses they're regaining:
They fall to prayer and from their hair
Remove the straws remaining.
Their senses they're regaining:
They fall to prayer and from their hair
Remove the straws remaining.
Saralthia:
That's right, Rogues' Gallery, pray keep it up:
Your song recalls my Villiam's “Auld Lang Syne,”
What time he came and (like an amorous bird
That struts before the female of its kind,
366
His cracked falsetto out of reach. Enough—
Now let's to business. Nellibrac, sweet child,
Saint Cloacina's future devotee,
The time is ripe and rotten—gut the grip!
(Nellibrac brings forward a valise and takes from it five articles of clothing, which, one by one, she lays upon the points of a magic pentagram that has thoughtfully inscribed itself in lines of light on the wet grass. The Body holds its late lamented nose.)
Nellibrac
(singing):
Fragrant socks, by Villiam's toes
Consecrated to the nose;
Consecrated to the nose;
Shirt that shows the well worn track
Of the knuckles of his back,
Of the knuckles of his back,
Handkerchief with mottled stains,
Into which he blew his brains;
Into which he blew his brains;
Collar crying out for soap—
Prophet of the future rope;
Prophet of the future rope;
An unmentionable thing
It would sicken me to sing.
It would sicken me to sing.
Unmentionable Thing
(aside):
What! I unmentionable? Just you wait!
In all the family journals of the State
367
With supereditorial grace and strength.
Saralthia
(singing):
Throw them in the open tomb—
They will cause his love to bloom
With an amatory boom!
Chorus of Invisible Hoodoos:
Hoodoo, hoodoo, voudou-vet
Villiam struggles in the net!
By the power and intent
Of the charm his strength is spent!
By the virtue in each rag
Blessed by the Inspired Hag
He will be a willing victim
Limp as if a donkey kicked him!
By this awful incantation
We decree his animation—
By the magic of our art
Warm the cockles of his heart.
Villiam, if alive or dead,
Thou Saralthia shalt wed!
(They cast the garments into the grave and push over the coffin. Grimghast fills up the hole. Hoodoos gradually become apparent in a phosphorescent light about the grave, holding one another's back-hair and dancing in a circle.)
368
(singing):
O we're the larrikin hoodoos!
The chirruping, lirruping hoodoos!
We mix things up that the Fates ordain,
Bring back the past and the present detain,
Postpone the future and sometimes tether
The three and drive them abreast together—
We rollicking, frolicking hoodoos!
The chirruping, lirruping hoodoos!
We mix things up that the Fates ordain,
Bring back the past and the present detain,
Postpone the future and sometimes tether
The three and drive them abreast together—
We rollicking, frolicking hoodoos!
To us all things are the same as none
And nothing is that is under the sun.
Seven's a dozen and never is then,
Whether is what and what is when,
A man is a tree and a cuckoo a cow
For gold galore and silver enow
To magical, mystical hoodoos!
And nothing is that is under the sun.
Seven's a dozen and never is then,
Whether is what and what is when,
A man is a tree and a cuckoo a cow
For gold galore and silver enow
To magical, mystical hoodoos!
Saralthia:
What monstrous shadow darkens all the place,
(enter Smyler)
Flung like a doom athwart—ha!—thou?
Portentous presence, art thou not the same
That stalks with aspect horrible among
Small youths and maidens, baring snaggy teeth,
Champing their tender limbs till crimson spume,
Flung from thy lips in cursing God and man,
Incarnadines the land?
369
Thou dammid slut!
(Exit Smyler.)
Nellibrac:
O what a pretty man!
Saralthia:
Now who is next?
Of tramps and casuals this graveyard seems
Prolific to a fault!
(Enter Needleson, exhaling, prophetically, an odor of decayed eggs and, actually, one of unlaundered linen. He darts an intense regard at an adjacent marble angel and places his open hand behind his ear.)
Needleson:
Hay?
(Exit Needleson.)
Nellibrac:
Sweet, sweet male!
I yearn to play at Copenhagen with him!
(Blushes diligently and energetically.)
Chorus of Skulls:
Hoodoos, hoodoos, disappear—
Some dread deity draws near!
(Exeunt Hoodoos.)
Smitten with a sense of doom,
The dead are cowering in the tomb,
370
And appalling is the gloom!
Fragmentary flames are flung
Through the air the trees among!
Lo! each hill inclines its head—
Earth is bending 'neath his tread!
(On the contrary, enter Villiam on a chip, navigating an odor of mignonette. Saralthia springs forward to put him in her pocket, but he is instantly retracted by an invisible string. She falls headlong, breaking her heart. Reënter Villiam, Needleson, Smyler. All gather about Saralthia, who loudly laments her accident. The Spirit of Tar-and-Feathers, rising like a black smoke in their midst, executes a monstrous wink of graphic and vivid significance, then contemplates them with an obviously baptismal intention. The cross on Bone Mountain takes fire, splendoring the peninsula. Tableau. Curtain.)
| The collected works of Ambrose Bierce | |