ANOTHER VOICE [As if calling to a laggard.] Come along! We shan't get home till morning!
AN IMPATIENT VOICE
Are you ready?
ANOTHER VOICE
Fasten the shutters!
MAN'S VOICE
All right!
WOMAN'S VOICE
My sunshade!
MAN'S VOICE [Through the cracking of the whip.] Gee up!
THE MANAGER The wagon to the jingling of the harness rattles off, jolting out ditties. A turn in the road cuts off the unfinished song.—They are gone, quite gone. The performance can begin.
Some philosophers would say there was not a soul left, but we humbly believe that there are hearts. Man in leaving does not take with him all drama. One can laugh and suffer without him. [He listens again.]
Ardently humming, a velvety bumblebee hovers—then is still; he has plunged into a flower—Let us begin. Pray note that Aesop's hump to-night does duty as prompter's box!
The members of our company are small, but—[Calling toward the flies.] Alexander! [To the audience.] He is my chief machinist. [Calling again.] Let it down!
A VOICE [From the flies.] It's coming, sir!
MANAGER We have lowered between the audience and the stage an invisible screen of magnifying glass—
But there the violins are tuning up: Scraping of crystal bows, picking of strings!—Hush! Let the footlights now leap into brightness, for at a signal from their little leader the crickets' orchestra have briskly fallen to!
Frrrt! The bumblebee emerges from the flower, shaking the yellow dust—A
Hen comes on the scene as in La Fontaine's fable. A Cuckoo calls, as in
Beethoven's symphony.
Hush! Let the chandelier draw in its myriad lights—for the curious call-boy of the woods has, airily, to summon us, repeated thrice his double call—
And since Nature is one of our performers, and feathered notables are on our staff—Hush! the curtain must go up: A wood-pecker's bill has rapped out the three strokes!
ACT I
THE EVENING OF THE PHEASANT-HEN
A farmyard such as the sounds from behind the curtain have described. At the right, a house over-clambered with wistaria. At the left, the farmyard gate, letting on to the road. A dog-kennel. At the back, a low wall, beyond which distant country landscape. The details of the setting define themselves in the course of the act.
SCENE FIRST
The whole barnyard company, HENS, CHICKENS, CHICKS, DUCKS, TURKEYS, etc.; THE BLACKBIRD in his cage, THE CAT asleep on the wall, later A BUTTERFLY on the flowers.
THE WHITE HEN [Pecking.] Ah! Delicious!
ANOTHER HEN
What are you eating?
ALL THE HENS [Rushing to the spot.] What's she eating?
THE WHITE HEN A small green beetle, crisp and nice, tasting of the rose-leaves he had lived on.
THE BLACK HEN [Standing before the BLACKBIRD'S cage.] Really, the Blackbird whistles amazingly!
THE WHITE HEN
Any little street urchin can do as much!
THE TURKEY [Solemnly.] An urchin who had learned of a shepherd in Sicily!
THE DUCK
He never whistles his tune to the end—
THE TURKEY That's too easy, carrying it to the end! [He hums the tune the BLACKBIRD has been whistling.] "How sweet to fare afield, and cull—and cull—" You should know, Duck, that the thing in art is to leave off before the end! "And cull—and cull—" Bravo, Blackbird!
[The BLACKBIRD comes out on the little platform in front of his cage and bows.]
A CHICK [Astonished.] Can he get out?
BLACKBIRD
Applause is salt on my tail!
THE CHICK
But his cage?
THE TURKEY He can come out, and he can go in again. His cage has that sort of spring.—"And cull—and cull—" The whole point is missed if you tell them what you cull!
THE BLACK HEN [Catching sight of a BUTTERFLY alighting on the flowers above the wall at the back.] Oh, what a gorgeous butterfly!
THE WHITE HEN
Where?
THE BLACK HEN
On the honey-suckle.
THE TURKEY
That kind is called an Admiral.
THE CHICK [Looking after the BUTTERFLY.] Now he has settled on a pink.
THE WHITE HEN [To the TURKEY.] An Admiral, wherefore?
THE BLACKBIRD
Obviously because he is neither a seaman nor a soldier.
THE WHITE HEN
Our Blackbird has a pretty wit!
THE TURKEY [Nodding and swinging his red stalactite.] He has better than wit, my dear!
ANOTHER HEN [Watching the BUTTERFLY.] It's sweet—a butterfly!
THE BLACKBIRD
Easy as possible to make! You take a W and set it on top of a Y!
A HEN [Delighted.] A flourish of his bill, and there you have your caricature!
THE TURKEY He does better than execute caricatures! Hen, our Blackbird forces you to think while obliging you to laugh. He is a Teacher in wit's clothing.
A CHICK [To a HEN.] Mother, why does the Cat hate the Dog?
THE BLACKBIRD
Because he appropriates his seat at the theatre.
THE CHICK [Surprised.] They have a theatre?
THE BLACKBIRD
Where dumb-shows are given.
THE CHICK
Eh?
THE BLACKBIRD
The hearthstone from whence both alike wish to watch the play of the
Fire among the Logs.
THE TURKEY [Delighted.] How aptly he conveys that the hatred of peoples is at bottom a question of wanting the other's territory. There's a brain for you!
THE SPECKLED HEN [To the WHITE HEN, who is pecking.] Do you peck peppers?
THE WHITE HEN
Constantly.
THE SPECKLED HEN
How can you stand the sting?
THE WHITE HEN
It imparts to the feathers a delicate rosy tint.
THE