MODERN LITERATURE FOR ORAL INTERPRETATION GERTRUDE E.JOHNSON ^ ^ ,^ v -^ Ta. .* X ,<° * ^ $ % ' ^° /y ' ; ^ V^ %^ . ,.^ ^ % S * v °>* J> "V" A> ^ ^ vJ> X4 ' ^. I '< iv \v °o "" «*' 1 / o MODERN LITERATURE FOR ORAL INTERPRETATION MODERN LITERATURE FOR ORAL INTERPRETATION PRACTICE BOOK FOR VOCAL EXPRESSION BY GERTRUDE E. JOHNSON Assistant Professor in the department of Speech Education in the University of Wisconsin Author of "Choosing a Play" NEW YORK THE CENTURY CO. 1920 Copyright, 1920, by The Centuby Co. 7c? 21 I o° r <2 g)C!.A576522 TO THOSE FRIENDS AND STUDENTS WHOSE SYMPATHY, INTEREST, AND APPRECIATION HAVE MADE MY WORK POSSIBLE ACKNOWLEDGMENTS Thanks are due to the following publishers, editors, and individual owners of copyrights for their kind permission to include selections from their works as indicated below. I wish to thank also the several authors who have assisted me with kindly words and appreciation. To Bobbs-Merrill Co. and the author for "Part Panther or Something," by Booth Tarkington. To Boni & Liveright for selections from "Fairy Tales," by Oscar Wilde. To Barse & Hopkins, New York City, for selections from "The Spell of the Yukon" and "Rhymes of a Red Cross Man," by Robert W. Service, author of "Ballads of a Ckeechako." To the Century Co. for "The Ritual," by Wm. Rose Benet; "Questions" and "The Mystic," by Cale Young Roice; "Greetings for Two," by J. W. Foley; "The Party at Crogan's," by Florence G. Boyce ; "The Perfect One," by Laurence Housman ; "A Min- uet," by Louis N. Parker; selection from "Barnabetta," by Helen R. Martin. To Curtis Publishing Co. and to the author for "With the Tide," by Edith Wharton. To Geo. H. Doran Co. for selection from "Things As They Are," by Berton Braley (copyright, 1916). To Doubleday, Page & Co. for selection from "Whirligigs," by 0. Henry (copyright, 1910). To E. P. Dutton & Co. for selections from "Poems on Several Occasions," by Austin Dobson (copyright, 1889). To Dodd, Mead & Co. for selection from "Under the Trees and Elsewhere," by Hamilton Wright Mabie (copyright, 1891). To Forbes & Co. for selections by Nixon Waterman. To Harper & Bros, for selection from "Van Bibber and Others," by Richard Harding Davis (copyright, 1892, by Harper & Bros.; copyright, 1920, by Mrs. Richard Harding Davis). viii Acknowledgments To "Harper's Magazine" and to the authors, for "The Con- version of Johnny Harrington," by Elizabeth Jordan (copyright, 1917) ; "For Love of Mary Ellen," by Eleanor Hoyt Brainerd (copyright, 1912); "Mr. Bush's Kindergarten Christmas" and "The Kirby Wedding," by Hayden Carruth (copyright). To Henry Holt & Co. for selection from "Mountain Interval," by Robert Frost (copyright, 1916) ; for selection from "Poems of Earth's Meaning," by Richard Burton (copyright, 1918). To Little, Brown & Co. for selections from "Dreams," by Olive Schreiner, and "Sweet is Tepperary," by Dennis A. McCarthy (copyrighted by Little, Brown & Co.). To Lothrop, Lee & Shepherd Co. for selection from "Drunk in June," by Richard Burton. To Macmillan Co. for selections, reprinted by permission, from "Myself And I," by Fannie Stearns Davis (copyright, 1913) ; "Mothers to Men," b} 7 Zona Gale; "He Knew Lincoln," by Ida M. Tarbell; "The King of Boyville," by William Allen White; "A Dome of Many Colored Glass," by Amy Lowell. To David McKay Co. for selections from "Songs From Lein- ster," by W. M. Letts. To The Open Court Co. for fables from "iEsop and Hyssop," by William Ellery Leonard. To Charles Scribner's Sons for selections by Henry Van Dyke, Robert Louis Stevenson, Eugene Field, J. G. Holland, and Thomas Nelson Page. To Small, Maynard & Co. for selection from "The Poet, The Fool, and The Faeries," by Madison Cawein (copyright, 1912). To Frederick A. Stokes Co. for selections from "Grenstone Poems," by Witter Bynner (copyright, 1917). To Miss Harriet Monroe, editor of "Poetry: A Magazine of Verse," for the use of "Indian Summer," by Wm. Ellery Leonard. To the following authors for permission to use their material: Ina Coolbrith, Edna Ferber, Arthur Hopkins, Leon Huhner, Marjorie Kinnan, Constance Mackay, Arthur Stringer, Mrs. Wilson Woodrow; to Robert Underwood Johnson for "The Little Room of Dreams" from "Collected Poems" (Yale University Press, New Haven). To Edwin Markham for selections from "Lincoln, and Other Poems" (copyright, Edwin Markham, published by Doubleday, Page & Co.). Mary Stewart Cutting, George Wood- ruff Johnston, Zona Gale, Amy Lowell, Eleanor Hoyt Brainerd, William Ellery Leonard, Alfred Kreymborg, Dora Sigerson. Acknowledgment s ix To the following magazines for permission to reprint : "American Magazine/' for "His Place in the Line," by Marion Hill; "A Little Change for Edward," by Mary Stewart "Cutting; "Underneath the Highcut Vest/' by Edna Ferber. "Cosmopolitan Magazine," for "The World's Sublimes! Spec- tacle" (copyright, Sept., 1915, by The International Magazine Co.). To "Everybody's Magazine," for "The Battle of Pankow," by Geo. W. Johnston. To "Lippincott's Magazine/' for "The Legacy," by J. J. Bell; "Where There's a Will," by Ellis Parker Butler; "When Ma Rogers Broke Loose," by Hicks Bates Broderson. To the "Playboy Magazine," for "Pebble Song and Waterfall," by Alfred Kreymborg. To the "Smart Set Magazine," for "The Wanderer's Litany," by Arthur Stringer; "The Universal Impulse," by Mrs. Wilson Woodrow. To the "Theater Arts Magazine/' for "Moonshine," by Arthur Hopkins. To the estate of Marion Hill for "His Place in the Line," by Marion Hill. PREFACE Though obliged to omit many desired selections because of copyright restrictions, the author has endeavored to gather, largely such material as may be found useful for class purposes, study and practise, in earlier work in Ex- pression. For the most part the selections are by American authors, and many by contemporary writers. It has been found frequently, that the classics do not serve to establish the elements of true responsiveness which should be sought for in the beginning, and, indeed, throughout all work in Expression. In some cases, past analytic study seems to be the cause ; and in others, a lack of present interest in the material. Classics are perhaps better studied in a second year of work, when the channels of expression have been somewhat freed and the student has a better understanding and use of his means of Expression. First year work should aim, it seems to the author, at an all round responsiveness in the individual. Finished interpretation of material should not be its aim. The author has in mind work being given in classes of fifteen or more, purely elective, where the group represented is in no sense a chosen one with spe- cial talent for Expression, but one of widely differing per- sonalities, abilities, training and cultural background. A goodly portion of material in poetic form has been in- eluded as it offers the best medium for vocal training and emotional response desirable for initial practise. Prose se- lections covering the short story, allegories, bits of descrip- tion, and speeches in blank verse, have been included in sufficient number to permit of practise in these various prose xi xii Preface forms. The speeches from Shakespeare may be used for study of conversational form, with reference particularly to emphasis and phrasing. Some work should be done in the beginnings of impersonation and the scenes will be found useful for this purpose. Much of the prose material is longer than will do for the timed "piece" to be used in contests calling for indi- vidual time limits. Though abridged in many instances, it was purposely left longer than such contests permit. First, because to so time a selection frequently ruins the story, and secondly, because more values accrue in the stu- dent through the study and delivery of longer selections. If the objection is made that these stories are too long to memorize, it is suggested that memorized presentation is not necessarily the be all and end all of work in Expres- sion. Train students to use the text in delivering material, and a great portion of the glaring faults of false, artificial, elocutionary performances, so long a connotation on work in Expression, will be eliminated. Again, if desired, in most of the stories a further abridgement will be found possible. Such arranging should be left to those who wish to use the "material, as much benefit may be derived from the attempt at abridgement. It is hoped that this book may be of service to those who are working in the High Schools as well as the Colleges, and it is in response to many calls for suggestions concerning programs, books of selections, conduct of declamatory con- tests, etc., that reference is made to these matters at the qlose of the book. If these suggestions, or any of the material in this book, prove of assistance to those who are desirous of making work in Vocal Expression of more educational value, the author will feel repaid for having made the compilation. CONTENTS PART I INTRODUCTION SECTION" PAGE I A Word to Teachers 3 II Some Suggestions on Interpretation .... 11 PART II MATERIAL FOR INTERPRETATION III Poetical Selections 21 IV Prose Selections 115 V Speeches from Shakespeare 311 VI Scenes and One-Act Plays 323 PART III DECLAMATORY CONTESTS VII Problems in the Conduct of Declamatory Con- tests 391 VIII Contest Bibliography 407 List of authors for contest material; descriptive list of these authors; books of material for inter- pretation; books containing oratorical material only; addresses for typed material for contest use ; contest references ; texts on voice and inter- pretation; program suggestions. PAET I INTKODUCTION SECTION I A WORD TO TEACHERS MODERN LITERATURE FOR ORAL INTERPRETATION SECTION I A WORD TO TEACHERS INSTRUCTORS in the art of interpretative speech ex- pression have held so parlous a position, for so long a time, that they have had to hold firmly to their ideals in order to keep even a spark of hope aglow. Now, at last, we seem likely to be recognized, not alone as ornamental, but as actually useful and necessary. Rightfully, the firmest ground on which interpretative work can ever stand, the broadest uses to which it can ever be put, aside from its stage dominion, must be in con- nection with the study and teaching of literature. This is not to slight in any way the various lines in which vocal expression may be usefully and culturally pursued. But our strongest raison d'etre we have ourselves been slow to realize, and teachers of literature infinitely slower. It has been my privilege to instruct in interpretative expression for eighteen years, eight in preparatory schools, and the past ten in university work. I trust I may be per- mitted therefore, to speak from the teaching standpoint concerning standards in interpretative work, and the gen- eral attitude of many English teachers towards teachers of vocal expression. That we, as teachers of expression, have not made our- 3 4 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation selves, long ere this, an absolute necessity in the teaching of literature is, I believe, largely our own fault. I have al- ready indicated one reason why vocal expression has been slow to gain friends among teachers of literature, viz. : standards in our own work. Let us face the matter frankly. Too often we do find teachers of expression whose interests, sometimes from choice, sometimes from necessity, are chiefly concerned with the preparing of students for recital only, such preparation consisting largely of a coaching process with little or no effort to arouse original thought or feeling, or to emphasize in the student definite thought processes. Beyond this, and of paramount importance, the voice, ex- cept in its needs for that special recitation, is given abso- lutely no attention, and the student no idea at all of vocalization in general. Because of this many people are still under the impression that work in vocal expression is largely a coaching and imitative process. Nothing could be further from the aim of any true work in the art. Again we use, and permit the use of material for inter- pretation that is largely useless and hopeless. It has little literary value and no really human appeal. How long will it yet be, before we of this profession shall definitely insist upon the use of a higher grade of material for public read- ing ? There will always be a public, and the kind of public we want, for readings of some literary value. We have no right to complain if that same desirable public refuses to take notice, even, of so called recitals and reciters — or per- formers. If there must be performers, let them use the vaudeville stage where they, too, may find a proper audi- ence, one that expects costumes and lights, accessories and performance, but not necessarily thought. Another grievous weakness we have; we do not, as a body of teachers and interpretative artists, include enough people Introduction 5 of broad culture and thorough education. We have seen too many of mediocre scholarship and little personality leave their preparatory work, often only high school graduates, often after one or two years in a college or university, and with this preparation (?) enter a special school of expres- sion, fitted after two short years in such a school, to teach one of the most far reaching of subjects. "We are greatly handicapped in this regard, in that these special training schools have not sufficiently high entrance requirements, though this matter is now receiving attention, notably at Emerson. If there could be one school, even, which would insist upon a four year college or university course, with probably a degree, as entrance requirement, how soon the effects would be felt in our entire body of teachers and readers! So far as I know there is no such school. It would of necessity have to be an endowed institution, not obliged to exist on tuition received. " T is a consumma- tion devoutly to be wished" and seems almost Utopian. There is much opportunity, however, for those of us who have influence, to exert it always as we ought, by insisting on a completed course in college or university. And since so very much depends on personal qualifications for a teacher of this subject (does it not for any subject?) we should not encourage those, who, though they may have a certain amount of dramatic instinct, still are not adapted in personality or mentality to the teaching of vocal expres- sion and interpretative art. One other factor enters into our list of failings : we still lack personal sincerity and a business-like attitude toward our work, especially in the arrangement of our courses. The study of vocal expression should remove insincerities, and develop mind, body, and soul, until the three, acting together in simple, direct sincerity, make it possible to gftyry 6 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation conviction and persuasion in ourselves, as well as to re- veal the thoughts and emotions intrusted to us on the writ- ten page, by all the bards and sages. Such simplicity and sincerity, together with a clearer and more coherent idea in our arrangement of work, could not but add to our dignity and importance as teachers of vocal expression. I have admitted our weaknesses. We have them, as who has not, but even these admissions do not, to my mind, ex- plain the attitude that teachers of literature have, until recently, exhibited toward us. As I intimated at the first, there seems now to be a more general feeling that we may not only be helpful, but possibly really necessary to the teaching of English and literature. I have been much in- terested in several articles in the ' ' English Journal, ' ' com- ing from men and women in authoritative positions, teach- ers of English and literature, all suggesting a definite need for more vitalizing of the literature taught. These articles have called attention to a lack of voice, personality, and warm sympathy on the part of the teacher of literature. The articles have asked for more expression through the medium of the human voice; and for a somewhat warmer and more human, dare I say a somewhat more emotional or imaginative interpretation and presentation by the in- structor. Whatever else the study of literature should include, it would seem there could be no doubt as to the necessity of its carrying to the student's heart, as well as mind, its great human thought and feeling, and, if poetry, its beauty of musical expression as well. So utterly deaf are our ears in these days to music in the speaking voice, and this one great opportunity to reach the young is so slighted ! How many a testimony I could give from students, who, with kindling eyes, have told me they never grasped the sig- Introduction 7 nificance of that poem of Browning, of "Wordsworth, of Shelley, until now, when in the attempt to convey to others its meaning, that meaning has suddenly flashed clear, and they feel themselves in touch with the mind and heart — yes, and art, of the author about whom they have studied many facts — as they should — but whom they never knew till now ! Good reading, expressive reading that is, does indeed seem a lost art. It is never required of the student, the teacher does not attempt it himself. To quote a recent article in the " English Journal/' which, coming as it did from a member of an education faculty, gave me a distinct thrill of hope, "not one teacher in a hundred reads well, or attempts to read well. ' ' He has stated a small percentage, surely, but it is my observation and belief that it is not too small. It has been my privilege to work with many thoughtful English students, majors in the subject, and post-graduates taking master degrees. I have been repeat- edly amazed to find that this is their first consideration of the vocal problem, their first attempt in all their course to carry to others, not only their knowledge of all that con- cerns the work in hand, but also the emotional content or life lesson. Need I say these students, too, have been amazed at their inadequacy, that they have repeatedly said, "If I had only known sooner, but I didn't think anything about it." I will not multiply instances, but they are many. Possibly three out of ten students majoring or minoring in English think for themselves, of the necessity for a consideration of voice and interpretation. To a far smaller proportion is it even suggested or advised by the teachers of English. If this latter body will but cooperate a bit more cordially with us, we shall soon be able to have teachers of literature who will not be open to the eriti- 8 Modem Literature for Oral Interpretation cisnis which are now as justly theirs, as are any I have herein applied to teachers of vocal expression. It has been my personal observation .that far from help- ing us to be helpful, an English faculty, save in a few in- stances, hinders us, by utter ignorance of what classes in vocal expression are attempting to do, and by actually ad- vising students against the work (admitting, though, re- member, that they " really don't know much about the courses, ' ' but ' ' you don 't want to waste your time ; you can talk all right anyway ! ' ') . Had the majority of teachers of vocal expression no weaknesses, they could not hope to make much progress with students in English under such condi- tions. And I insist that such conditions are far more gen- eral than isolated or exceptional. I have always made it a practice to visit occasionally the classes in literature, that I might keep in touch with the material there under con- sideration, and so be helpful to the students in interpreta- tion. I have yet to see a member of an English faculty in a class in vocal expression or interpretation, for a simi- lar, or any other reason. Personally, I have followed the articles by English in- structors concerning the matter of the old and the new in the teaching of literature with eager hopefulness. It is because there is a new spirit that I urge that the teachers of vocal expression shall have a stronger sense of their re- sponsibilities and possibilities ; that they insist on scholarly standards in their members, their material, their courses. Lastly I plead for a more thoughtful consideration from the teachers of English with whom we are asked to co- operate. We can be helpful, we desire to be; we have made much improvement in all our short-comings, and we shall make more, in proportion as there is more active co- operation from the body of English teachers. SECTION II SOME SUGGESTIONS ON INTERPRETATION SECTION II SOME SUGGESTIONS ON INTERPRETATION 1TAKE it for granted that this book may come to be used by some who have had little opportunity to consider carefully the processes involved in the rendering of ma- terial in interpretative form, and while a little knowledge is a dangerous thing in this field as in many others, it may be possible to offer some general suggestions that will, at least, point the way. It should be borne in mind that the fundamentals of the work of Expression cannot be taught, or learned, in any number of lessons by mail, through anybody's system, nor can they be got from books. These too, can only point the way. Expression has to do with the very essence of the individual, and is, at first and always, a growth, not an acquisition. This is particularly true of interpretative Ex- pression, for which practise the material of this book is intended. "Elocution is a moral faculty," says John Rus- kin, "and no one is fit to be the head of a children's school (or any other school) who is not both by nature and atten- tion a beautiful speaker. ' ' It is the firm conviction of the writer, after many years of teaching, study and observation, that teachers in the field of speech education, particularly on the interpretative side, have placed too much emphasis on the presentation of material in memorized fashion. In the work of younger students I believe this is one of the elements which has 11 12 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation done most to keep interpretative Expression on the plane of extravagant performance, thus laying it open to severe criticism. The wider field of better material has been lim- ited by the memory insistence, and added values in per- sonal growth, mental and physical, restricted because of the intensive demand of the memory performance. Edu- cationally, the expressive interpretation of the printed page from that page, seems infinitely broader in scope than mem- orized presentation can be. If it is urged that certain spectacular elements, dear to the hearts of the audience, cannot be evidenced with the printed page intervening, I can only reply that intervention has long been desirable, nay, urgent. But further, I do not find that any action which should be included in the presentation is excluded because of the presence of the book. Of course I do not expect that the material used is to be held in the hands, it must rest upon some stand where the eye may find it readily. The hands and the whole body must be free to give the ex- pressive response desirable, and there should be no repres- sion of such response. Placed alone, in the center of an empty platform space, the attention of the audience focussed upon one, the ma- terial memorized, everything in the situation tends to dis- turb true spontaneous expression. The rhythm is very likely to be affected, and there is an instinctive feeling of the necessity to do something the audience can see, — in short, to act. It requires great skill technically, great per- sonal power, and much practise, to render memorized ma- terial interpretatively and keep away from falseness, arti- ficiality and over-acting. In this connection it is inter- esting to note what one entirely outside our special field has said, touching exactly upon the matter. In an article in the "Dial" Miss Amy Lowell, who appreciates fully Introduction 13 the necessity for oral rendition of literature, makes a clear distinction between the impersonative and the interpretative manner of presentation. She says: "Reading is not act- ing, and the point cannot be too strongly insisted upon. The pitfall of all elocution taught readers is that they fail to see this distinction. In a play, one can rely to a certain extent upon acting, and upon one's fellow actors. In read- ing, one is all alone, and one must not act. I do not mean that one should not read w T ith expression. I mean that it is more dangerous to overdo dramatic expression than to underdo it. The reader must not be confused with the impersonator. Impersonators act out their parts, although they are all alone upon the stage. They are approaching the brains of their audience from the same standpoint as the actor. They are acting in fact. In a play, the audience is intended to see the march of events w T ith its physical eyes. In reading, the audience must see nothing with its eyes which detracts from its mental vision. The dramatic qual- ity of the piece must be given just in so far as it stimulates the imagination, but never so far as to call attention to the reader as an actual personality. It must forget the reader in the thing read." (The italics are mine.) Is it not true that in preparing the student in a memorized presentation we are quite likely to stress the manner of the doing rather than the message of the selection? This should offer some suggestion upon the necessity for more careful consideration of the type of material used, and the capabilities of the interpreter. If the material be of the impersonative type, purely, then it should have impersonative presentation, perfect memorization being a part of that activity. Let it be noted that only a very small proportion of material falls under this type. Mono- logues, scenes from plays, though these are not necessarily 14 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation of this type, and dialect selections form the largest part of this group of material. This type of material offers the spectacular possibility and is frequently chosen, but the capability and aptitude of the interpreter to present in this form is greatly overlooked. To be given successfully it really requires a natural gift of an imitative sort. Unless one is gifted naturally with the impersonative instinct in a marked degree, it is most unlikely that any amount of train- ing or coaching will make one successful in presentation of this sort. More consideration of the type of material being used will result in a much clearer knowledge as to the form of presentation best suited to the selection. The story form is probably the most confusing, because it includes such a variety of elements, but I believe it to be the best form for general use because of this very variety. Care must be taken not to break the unity of the presentation of story forms by undue stressing of any one or another of the various elements. Even when the story is almost a mono- logue in form, as "Aunt Jane in Kentucky," care should be taken not to over impersonate. I am well aware that my meaning will be misconstrued; that seems inevitable when one writes. I would not do away with memory work. I would have it used with much more consideration, and I urge much more use of the printed page. It is an oft repeated experience to find even the trained graduate of a special school of Expression who recites quite well, but who is actually unable to interpret intelligently, certainly not sympathetically, from the printed page. This would not be true if in the continued process of training in memory presentation, something had not been omitted. Assuredly it should be possible for any glib performer of memorized material to read both in- telligently and adequately, from a printed page when asked Introduction 15 to do so. As a medium of training, every student should be required to give impersonative treatment of all material requiring that form of presentation. Their impersonative powers should be developed in every possible way. For an interpretative presentation, it is often well, even necessary, to work out in preparation as full an impersonative expres- sion of the selection as is possible. Physical expression of an active sort is of vital importance in all training for in- terpretative or other expression. When it comes to the fin- ished presentation, that form of presentation best suited to the student's individual possibilities and best adapted to the material, should be adopted for use. In all cases where memory work is to be done, be sure that every effort is made to keep it away from the mechani- cal type. See that it includes as many elements of mental and physical activity as possible. Remember that too often sounds and movements are memorized and the whole spon- taneous response of the individual seems lost. Even in memorized presentation, every idea and action should seem to be thought, and to occur, at the moment. Refuse to know anything except the present idea and its expression. There are so many excellent texts dealing with matters concerning the technique of Expression, it seems needless to set forth much in detail regarding these elements. I have listed the most helpful books in the latter portion of this text, and much assistance may be derived from a pe- rusal of these books. One should not attempt to teach the work without knowing the values of vocal changes, variety of pitch, rhythm, quality, and volume. If possible, only those who have acquired such knowledge from practise un- der direction, as well as study of text, should undertake to teach interpretative work. So much depends upon adequate and appropriate vocalization for desirable results, and imi- 16 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation tative methods fail so signally in this relation, it seems almost necessary that the instructor shall have knowledge of a sort that will make it possible to teach the student by other than imitative methods. Such methods must be avoided too, in the matter of physi- cal expression. Nowhere does the fact of imitation of the teacher's work show more clearly, or seem more completely out of key, than in this part of the rendering. Most stu- dents, younger or older, will find an adequate physical ex- pression if rightly directed and stimulated. One general suggestion may be of assistance. Too much attention seems to be given to individual gestures or movements and not enough to the expression of the body as a whole. Even in parts of a selection calling for no impersonative action or direct gesture, the body should still partake as a whole of the spirit or feeling of the selection. So often the body seems uninformed until just as the arms come into action in some given gesture, and this having been completed, the body goes to sleep again. Many gestures seem lacking in truthfulness and ease because the entire body fails to war- rant and support the expression of the individual gesture and action. A certain sense of animation or expansion should always be present; it is fundamental and necessary to all good movement or gesture. In general it is safe to advise that there be too little, rather than too much action and gesture in interpretative presentation. Very frequently, the young reciter has been directed into too many literal movements, such as the han- dling of a telephone, opening of letter, etc., in the midst of an interpretative rendering — or what should be such. This breaks entirely the unity of the presentation. The mind of the on-looker is at once diverted by obvious failures to live up to 1 ho Hteralness which has been partly established, Introduction 17 To complete such literal action is impossible and it should be omitted altogether. The trouble arises in the beginning when no clear distinction is made as to whether the ren- dering is to be an acted (impersonated) one, or an inter- pretative one. Having decided what sort of treatment the nature of the material requires, remain true to the form adopted. The story form will offer the most difficulties and compli- cations as it includes direct address, impersonative ele- ments, and all shades between. Even here, however, it is possible to avoid the uneven exhibitions so common. First and last and always there is an individual telling the story, the story's mouth-piece, and that individual should never give the impersonative elements in other than the sugges- tive manner with which we report such elements in reality. I appreciate again that it is utterly impossible to make a statement which w T ill apply to every type of story, or every type of literature. For instance, there is the story which is told in the first person almost the entire time, either in prose or verse. This is virtually a monologue and may be treated as such, usually impersonatively. There are many stories in this form, or monologues of the better type which lose value by such treatment, notably some of Brown- ing 's. In conclusion I quote from "How to Read," by J. B. Kerfoot, by far the best book on the subject I have ever read. If the following lines were kept well in mind it seems that a much better understanding of the possibilities and function of interpretative expression might be gained. i ' We have nothing to read with except our own experience — the seeing and hearing and smelling and tasting and touching that we have done; the fearing and hoping and hating and loving that has happened to us ; the intellectual 18 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation and spiritual reactions that have resulted ; and the assump- tions, understandings, prides, prejudices, hypocrisies, fer- vors, foolishnesses, finenesses, and faiths that have thereby been precipitated in us like crystals in a chemist's tube. " May we not have greater consideration of the elements that make for interpretative expression? May we not hope to better very considerably the tendency to over-do in spec- tacular action, and under-do in that action which reveals subtly and truly the real participation of the interpreter? This latter is the one desired end of Interpretative Expres- sion. PAET II MATERIAL FOR INTERPRETATION SECTION III POETICAL SELECTIONS SECTION III POETICAL SELECTIONS THE PATH TO THE WOODS ITS friendship and its carelessness Did lead me many a mile, Through goat's-rue, with its dim caress, And pink and pearl-white smile ; Through crowfoot, with its golden lure, And promise of far things, And sorrel with its glance demure And wide-eyed wonderings. It led me with its innocence, As childhood leads the wise, With elbows here of tattered fence, And blue of wildflowers' eyes; With whispers low of leafy speech, And brook-sweet utterance; With bird-like words of oak and beech, And whisperings clear as Pan's. It led me with its childlike charm, As candor leads desire, Now with a clasp of blossomy arm, A butterfly kiss of fire ; 21 22 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation Now with a toss of tousled gold, A barefoot sound of green, A breath of musk, of mossy mold, With vague allurements keen. It led me with remembered things Into an old-time vale, Peopled with faery glimmerings, And flower-like fancies pale ; Where fungous forms stood, gold and gray, Each in its mushroom gown, And, roofed with red, glimpsed far away, A little toadstool town. It led me with an idle ease, A vagabond look and air, A sense of ragged arms and knees In weeds grown everywhere; It led me, as a gypsy leads, To dingles no one knows, With beauty burred with thorny seeds, And tangled wild with rose. It led me as simplicity Leads age and its demands, With bee-beat of its ecstasy, And berry-stained touch of hands ; With round revealments, puff-ball white, Through rents of weedy brown, And petaled movements of delight In roseleaf limb and gown. It led me on and on and on, Beyond the Far Away, Into a world long dead and gone, — Material for Interpretation 23 The world of Yesterday : A faery world of memory, Old with its hills and streams, Wherein the child I used to be Still wanders with his dreams. Madison Cawein. THE ANGLER'S REVEILLE What time the rose of dawn is laid across the lips of night, And all the drowsy little stars have fallen asleep in light ; 'T is then a wandering wind awakes, and runs from tree to tree, And borrows words from all the birds to sound the reveille. This is the carol the Robin throws Over the edge of the valley ; Listen how boldly it flows, Sally on sally: Tirra-lirra, Down the river, Laughing water All a-quiver. Day is near, Clear, clear. Fish are breaking. Time for waking. Tup, tup, tup ! Do you hear? All clear — Wake up ! 24 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation The phantom flood of dreams has ebbed and vanished with the dark, And like a dove the heart forsakes the prison of the ark ; Now forth she fares through friendly woods and diamond- fields of dew, While every voice cries out "Rejoice !" as if the world were new. This is the ballad the Bluebird sings, Unto his mate replying, Shaking the tune from his wings While he is flying: Surely, surely, surely, Life is dear Even here. Blue above, You to love, Purely, purely, purely. There 's wild azalea on the hill, and roses down the dell, And just one spray of lilac still abloom beside the well ; The columbine adorns the rocks, the laurel buds grow pink, Along the stream white arums gleam, and violets bend to drink. This is the song of the Yellowthroat, Fluttering gaily beside you; Hear how each voluble note Offers to guide you : Which way, sir? I say, sir, Material for Interpretation 25 Let me teach you, I beseech you ! Are you wishing Jolly fishing? This way, sir! I '11 teach you. Then come, my friend, forget your foes, and leave your fears behind, And wander forth to try your luck, with cheerful, quiet mind; For be your fortune great or small, you 11 take what God may give, And all the day your heart shall say, ' ' 'T is luck enough to live." This is the song the Brown Thrush flings Out of his thicket of roses ; Hark how it warbles and rings, Mark how it closes: Luck, luck, What luck? Good enough for me! I 'm alive, you see. Sun shining, No repining; Never borrow Idle sorrow; Drop it ! Cover it up ! Hold your cup ! 26 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation Joy will fill it, Don't spill it, Steady, be ready, Good Luck! Henry Van Dyke. BIRCHES When I see birches bend to left and right Across the lines of straighter darker trees, I like to think some boy's been swinging them. But swinging doesn't bend them down to stay. Ice-storms do that. Often you must have seen them Loaded with ice a sunny winter morning After a rain. They click upon themselves As the breeze rises, and turn many-colored As the stir cracks and crazes their enamel. Soon the sun's warmth makes them shed crystal shells Shattering and avalanching on the snowcrust — Such heaps of broken glass to sweep away You 'd think the inner dome of heaven had fallen. They are dragged to the withered bracken by the load, And they seem not to break ; though once they are bowed So low for long, they never right themselves : You may see their trunks arching in the woods Years afterwards, trailing their leaves on the ground Like girls on hands and knees that throw their hair Before them over their heads to dry in the sun. But I was going to say when Truth broke in With all her matter-of-fact about the icestorm (Now am I free to be poetical?) I should prefer to have some boy bend them Material for Interpretation 27 As he went out and in to fetch the cows — Some boy too far from town to learn baseball, Whose only play was what he found himself, Summer or winter, and could play alone. One by one he subdued his father 's trees By riding them down over and over again Until he took the stiffness out of them, And not one but hung limp, not one was left For him to conquer. He learned all there was To learn about not launching out too soon And so not carrying the tree away Clear to the ground. He always kept his poise To the top branches, climbing carefully With the same pains you use to fill a cup Up to the brim, and even above the brim. Then he flung outward, feet first, with a swish, Kicking his way down through the air to the ground. So was I once myself a swinger of birches. And so I dream of going back to be. It 's when I 'm weary of considerations, And life is too much like a pathless wood Where your face burns and .tickles with the cobwebs Broken across it, and one eye is weeping From a twig's having lashed across it open. I 'd like to get away from earth awhile And then come back to it and begin over. May no fate willfully misunderstand me And half grant what I wish and snatch me away Not to return. Earth 's the right place for love : I don't know where it 's likely to go better. I 'd like to go by climbing a birch tree, And climb black branches up a snow-white trunk Toward heaven, till the tree could bear no more, 28 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation But dipped its top and set me down again. That would be good both going and coming back. One could do worse than be a swinger of birches. Robert Frost. THE LITTLE LAND When at home alone I sit And am very tired of it, I have just to shut my eyes To go sailing through the skies — To go sailing far away To the pleasant Land of Play; To the fairy land afar Where the Little People are; Where the clover-tops are trees, And the rain-pools are the seas, And the leaves like little ships Sail about on tiny trips ; And above the daisy tree Through the grasses, High o 'erhead the Bumble bee Hums and passes. In that forest to and fro I can wander, I can go; See the spider and the fly, And the ants go marching by Carrying parcels with their feet Down the green and grassy street. I can in the sorrel sit Where the ladybird alit. Material for Interpretation 29 I can climb the jointed grass; And on high See the greater swallows pass In the sky And the round sun rolling by Heeding no such things as I. Through that forest I can pass Till, as in a looking-glass, Humming fly and daisy tree And my tiny self I see, Painted very clear and neat On the rain-pool at my feet. Should a leaflet come to land Drifting near to where I stand, Straight I 11 board that tiny boat Round the rain-pool sea to float. Little thoughtful creatures sit On the grassy coasts of it ; Little things with lovely eyes See me sailing with surprise. Some are clad in armour green — (These have sure to battle been! — ) Some are pied with ev'ry hue, Black and crimson, gold and blue ; Some have wings and swift are gone; — But they all look kindly on. When my eyes I once again Open, and see all things plain: High bare walls, great bare floor; Great big knobs on drawer and door; 30 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation Great big people perched on chairs, Stitching tucks and mending tears, Each a hill that I could climb, And talking nonsense all the time — dear me, That I could be A sailor on the -rain-pool sea, A climber in the clover tree, And just come back, a sleepy-head, Late at night to go to bed. Robert Louis Stevenson. KIDS "Hey, I Ve found some money- wort, Some day I '11 be rich! — Or I wonder if it 's checkerberry ? — I don't know which is which. "Look, don't touch that blade of gra&s, Just keep away from it! For see that frothy bubbly ball? — That 's snake-spit ! ' ' Cover your lips, the darning-needle Loves to sew 'em up ! — Who likes butter? Lift your chin — Here 's a buttercup. "She loves me — she loves me not — I wish that I knew why It always comes a different way Every time I try. Material for Interpretation 31 "How many children? — Here you are — You can have three blows — And you don't want many children, For you have to buy 'em clo'es. "Now we can take the stems, see, And wet 'em into curls And stick 'em in our hair and run And make believe we 're girls. " D 'y ' ever whistle a blade of grass ? Look, I got a fat one. . . . You slit it, see? Here 's one for you — There 's no snake-spit on that one. "Aren't big people funny That they don't want to play? And some of 'em don't like ice-cream — I couldn't be that way. t ■ They just sit round and talk and talk — 0' course theii^ hands are clean. But they make us wash ours all the time. I could n 't be that mean, "No, honestly I couldn't, Could you? I 'd sooner die. We '11 dig some worms to-morrow And go fishin'! Goo '-by! Witter Bynner. 32 Modem Literature for Oral Interpretation WHEN THE SUMMER BOARDERS COME Yes, June is here an' now, by jing! it won't be long until Our good old-fashioned neighborhood 'at seems so kind o' still An' solemn-like at times, as though the world had shut us in, 'LI sort o' waken from her dream an' stir herself agin. The medder 's full o' daisies an' the trees is full o' bloom, An' after dark the fireflies is sparkin' in the gloom; The birds is busy buildin' nests, the hives is full o' hum; It 's jest about the season when the summer boarders come. Peculiar lot o ' people is the ones 'at come from town, They 're full o' funny notions, but they plank the money down. It don 't much matter what they git ner what they have to pay,— Jes' give 'em lots o' buttermilk an' let 'em have their way. 'Pears 's if they yearn for scenery an' never git enough 0' sunsets an' o' moonlight nights, and highty-tighty stuff; But sence they pay me fer it, why, I 'm keepin' mighty mum; You '11 find me diplermatic when the summer boarders come. One year I thought I 'd please 'em, so I spent a good, big pile A-buyin' tony fixin's an' a-slingin' on the style. I painted up the house an' barn an' built a picket fence, "All moderrun conveniences" I planned at big expense. I got some patent foldin'-beds an' a pianner, too, An ' tried to make the place appear like city mansions do, Material for Interpretation S3 But when the folks come — jiminy! — they wouldn't stop a day; Such " comforts' ' made 'em tired, so they 's up an' go away. So then I scraped the paint all off the fence an' barn an' house, An' cast aside my nice store clothes fer overalls an' blouse. In place o' every door-knob I contrived a wooden latch, I ripped the shingles off the roof an' made a leaky thatch. The patent pump I traded fer a windlass an' a rope, The bath-room is a horse-trough an' a hunk o' home-made soap. The foldin'-beds an' likewise the planner's cheerful thrum — Oh, we hide 'em in the attic when the summer boarders come. An' sense I reconstructed things the house has overflowed With summer boarders every year — 'pears like the whole world knowed 'At here 's the place to find the joys 'at 's near to Nature's heart, The extry, duplex, simon-pure, without a touch o' art. Folks like, my homely dialect an' ask me fer to spin Some simple yarn an ' by an ' by they '11 ask fer it agin ; So I 've just got to jolly 'em; but say, it 's tough, by gum ! Fer me, who 's been through Harvard, when the summer boarders come. Nixon Waterman. 34 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation THE BALLAD OF SOULFUL SAM You want me to tell you a story, a yarn of the firin ' line, Of our thin red kharki 'eroes, out there where the bullets whine ; Out there where the bombs are bustin', and the cannons like 'ell-doors slam — Just order another drink, boys, and I 11 tell you of Soulful Sam. Oh, Sam, he was never 'ilarious, though I Ve 'ad some mates as was wus ; He 'ad n't C. B. on his programme, he never was known to cuss. For a card or a skirt or a beer-mug he 'ad n't a friendly word; But when it came down to Scriptures, say ! Was n 't he just a bird ! He always 'ad tracts in his pocket, the which he would haste to present, And though the fellers would use them in ways that they never was meant, I used to read 'em religious, and frequent I Ve been im- pressed By some of them bundles of 'oly dope he carried around in his vest. For I — and oh, 'ow I shudder at the 'orror the word conveys ! 'Ave been — let me whisper it 'oarsely — a gambler 'alf of me days; Material for Interpretation 35 A gambler, you 'ear — a gambler. It makes *ne wishful to weep, And yet 'ow it 's true, my brethren ! — I 'd rather gamble than sleep. I 've gambled the 'ole world over, from Monte Carlo to Maine ; From Dawson City to Dover, from San Francisco to Spain. Cards ! They 'ave been me ruin. They 've taken me pride and me pelf, And when I 'd no one to play with — why, I 'd go and I 'd play by meself . And Sam 'e would sit and watch me, as I shuffled a greasy deck, And 'e 'd say: "You 're bound to Perdition." And I 'd answer : i ' Get off me neck ! ' ' And that 's 'ow we came to get friendly, though built on a different plan, Me wot 's a desprite gambler, 'im sich a good young man. But on to me tale. Just imagine . . . Darkness ! The bat- tle-front ! The furious 'Uns attackin'! Us ones a-bearin' the brunt! Me crouchin' be'ind a sandbag, tryin' 'ard to keep calm, When I 'ears someone singin' a 'ymn toon; be'old! it is Soulful Sam. Yes ; right in the crash of the combat, in the fury of flash and flame, 'E was shootin' and singin' serenely as if 'e enjoyed the same. 36 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation And there in the 'eat of the battle, as the 'ordes of demons attacked, He dipped down into 'is tunic, and 'e 'anded me out a tract. Then a star-shell flared, and I read it : il Oh, Flee from the Wrath to Come." Nice cheerful subject, I tell yer, when you 're 'earin' the bullets 'urn. And before I 'ad time to thank 'im, just one of them bits of lead Comes slingin' along in a 'urry, and it 'its my partner . . . Dead? No, siree ! not by a long sight ! For it plugged 'im 'ard on the chest, Just where 'e 'd tracts for a army corps stowed away in 'is vest. On its mission of death that bullet 'ustled along, and it caved A 'ole in them tracts to 'is 'ide, boys — but the life o' me pal was saved. And there as 'e showed me in triumph, and 'orror was chokin' me breath, On came another bullet on its 'orrible mission of death ; On through the night it cavorted, seekin' its 'aven of rest, And it zipped through a crack in the sandbags, and it wal- loped me bang on the breast. Was I killed, do you ask? Oh, no, boys. Why am I sit- tin' 'ere Gazin' with mournful vision at a mug long empty of beer? Material for Interpretation 37 With a throat as dry as a — oh, thanky! I don't much mind if I do. Beer with a dash of 'ollands, that 's my particular brew. Yes, that was a terrible moment. It 'ammered me 'ard o'er the 'eart ; It bowled me down like a nine-pin, and I looked for the gore to start ; And I saw in the flash of a moment, in that thunder of hate and strife, Me wretched past like a pitchur — the sins of a gambler's life. For I 'ad no tracts to save me, to thwart that mad missile's doom; I 'ad no pious pamphlets to 'elp me to cheat the tomb ; I 'ad no 'oly leaflets to baffle a bullet 's aim ; I 'd only — a deck of cards, boys, but — it seemed to do just the same. Robert W. Service. THE SONG-SPARROW There is a bird I know so well, It seems as if he must have sung Beside my crib when I was young; Before I knew the way to spell The name of even the smallest bird, His gentle-joyful song I heard. Now see if you can tell, my dear, What bird it is that, every year, Sings ' ' Sweet-sweet-sweet-very merry cheer, ' ' 38 Modem Literature for Oral Interpretation He comes in March, when winds are strong, And snow returns to hide the earth ; But still he warms his heart with mirth, And waits for May. He lingers long While flowers fade; and every day Repeats his small, contented lay; As if to say, we need not fear The season 's change, if love is here With " Sweet-sweet-sweet-very merry cheer." He does not wear a Joseph ? s-coat Of many colours, smart and gay ; His suit is Quaker Brown and gray. With darker patches at his throat. And yet of all the well-dressed throng Not one can sing so brave a song. It makes the pride of looks appear A vain and foolish thing, to hear His tl Sweet-sweet-sweet-very merry cheer." A lofty place he does not love, But sits by choice, and well at ease, In hedges, and in little trees That stretch their slender arms above The meadow-brook ; and there he sings Till all the field with pleasure rings; And so he tells in every ear, That lowly homes to heaven are near In "Sweet-sweet-sweet-very merry cheer." I like the tune, I like the words; They seem so true, so free from art, So friendly, and so full of heart, That if but one of all the birds Material for Interpretation 39 Could be my comrade everywhere, My little brother of the air, This is the one I 'd choose, my dear, Because he 'd bless me, every year, With ' ' Sweet-sweet-sweet -very merry cheer. ' ' Henry Van Dyke. STOVES AND SUNSHINE Prate, ye who will, of so-called charms you find across the sea — The land of stoves and sunshine is good enough for me ! I Ve done the grand for fourteen months in every foreign clime, And I 've learned a heap of learning, but I Ve shivered all the time; And the biggest bit of wisdom I Ve acquired — as I can see — Is that which teaches that this land 's the land of lands for me. Now, I am of opinion that a person should get some Warmth in this present life of ours, not all in that to come ; So when Boreas blows his blast, through country and through town, Or when upon the muddy streets the stifling fog rolls down, Go, guzzle in a pub, or plod some bleak malarious grove, But let me toast my shrunken shanks beside some Yankee stove. The British people say they "don't believe in stoves, y' know"; 40 Modem Literature for Oral Interpretation Perchance because we warmed 'em so completely years ago ! They talk of "drahfts" and " stuffiness' ' and "ill effects of heat," As they chatter in their barny rooms or shiver 'round the street ; With sunshine such a rarity, and stoves esteemed a sin, What wonder they are wedded to their fads — catarrh and gin? In Germany are stoves galore, and yet you seldom find A fire within the stoves, for German stoves are not that kind ; The Germans say that fires make dirt, and dirt 's an odious thing, But the truth is that the pfennig is the average Teuton's king, And since the fire costs pfennigs, why, the thrifty soul denies Himself all heat except what comes with beer and exercise. The Frenchman builds a fire of cones, the Irishman of peat; The frugal Dutchman buys a fire when he has need of heat — That is to say, he pays so much each day to one who brings The necessary living coals to warm his soup and things; In Italy and Spain they have no need to heat the house — 'Neath balmy skies the native picks the mandolin and louse. Now, we 've no mouldy catacombs, no feudal castles grim, No ruined monasteries, no abbeys ghostly dim; Our ancient history is new, our future 's all ahead, Material for Interpretation 41 And we Ve got a tariff bill that 's made all Europe sick abed — But what is best, though short on tombs and academic groves, We double discount Christendom on sunshine and on stoves. Dear land of mine ! I come to you from months of chill and storm, Blessing the honest people whose hearts and hearths are warm; A fairer, sweeter song than this I mean to weave to you When I Ve reached my lakeside 'dobe and once get heated through ; But, even then, the burthen of that fairer song shall be That the land of stoves and sunshine is good enough for me. Eugene Field. THE LITTLE ROOM OF DREAMS Next to the shelving roof it stood — My boyhood 's cozy bed ; So near I felt the serried storm Go charging o'er my head. 'T is fifty summers, yet I hear The branch against the pane, The midnight owl, the thunder crash, The rhythm of the rain. The golden apples long desired Fell thumping from the trees, Till the Dream transformed them to the fruit Of fair Hesperides. 42 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation The owl within his chimney porch Became Minerva's own, The lightning was the bolt of Jove, Each tree a dryad's groan. From there the flames of Troy were seen, There Salamis was won ; Now Hannibal would cross the Alps, And now Napoleon. On Valley Forge's scene of prayer My winter window gave; Bed Jacket there was eloquent, And Osceola, brave. Who could divine that from my sill Fought wounded Tvanhoe? — That there I saw Sir Galahad Gleam in the moon, below? "Who knew that I was veteran Of Bayard's noble strife? — That there for many a hapless maid I offered up my life? There, too, I knew the midnight trance Of not unwholesome grief, (Since tears for others' sorrow shed Bring to our own, relief) : I felt the lash on Uncle Tom, And mourned Don Quixote 's fall ; With David wept for Absalom, With Dombey, Little Paul. More oft a father's bedtime lore So filled with joy the night, Material for Interpretation 43 I woke at dawn from rosy dreams Expectant of delight. For I had roamed the enchanted wood With Puck or Rosalind, Or shared with dainty Ariel The visions of the wind. 11 Another little bed I know — With dreams I never knew — That holds a maid as brave and fair As she Carpaccio drew. Her fragrant pillow oft I seek To find its magic power, As one recalls a day of youth By the perfume of a flower. The beasts that did my sleep affright Are from her fancy hid. She finds the jungle full of friends, As little Mowgli did. For her the Aesop of our day Summons his crafty clan. The Blue-bird is her happy goal, Her hero, Peter Pan. What visions of a spirit world About her slumber float, Pure as the Swan whose Silver Knight Glides in a silver boat ! There, too, — most blessed of the dreams That have the world beguiled, — 44 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation An Angel with a lily kneels To greet the Holy Child. Far be the time when care and toil Shall wrest these joys away, Whereby this darling of my blood Makes yesterday to-day. For ah — so near the things that be Are to the things that seem — Soon I to her, as Youth to me, Shall be a thing of dream. Robert Underwood Johnson. THE GEESE OF ATHABASCA Somewhat southward from Alaska Lie the moors of Athabasca; And in these bleak uncouth dominions — So far detached from our opinions That none can ever misconstrue The tale I want to tell to you — There gathered at the equinox Some eager migratory flocks Of ganders, geese, and goslings — and The ganders had the upper hand, Debating with a gaping mouth On whom to choose to lead them south. In spite of casual digressing They thought the matter was progressing, When all the geese began to flap With wings, and cackle too, and rap With bills on sundry sticks and stocks Material for Interpretation 45 And crane their necks around the flocks. Their actions, though surprising, new, (Bizarre at times it may be, too), Betrayed such aim and fervor, surely One should n 't chide them prematurely, And fiery hot as salamanders, They much impressed the puzzled ganders, Who paused and pondered in their pates, What their vociferating mates Intended by these frantic states. "Give us" they cry, "a chance to say Who 't is shall guide us on our way ; Give us" they cry, "a voice, a voice — Who shares the risk, should share the choice." And now and then from some old goose More deft, it seems, in logic's use, The ganders heard reflections meant To ridicule their government, As antiquated precedent, And divers observation tending To show how much it needed mending — The more, since geese were different. One says: "Our judgment lacks in poise, And all we do is make a noise? — But can't we tell as well as you Where trees are green and skies are blue?" Another: "You, sirs, should elect, Since 't is your business to protect ? — Define protection . . . more than skill In thrusting out an angry bill With anserine intent to kill. Our wings are weapons, sirs, as good — When clasped around the little brood." 46 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation Another: "Yes, the goslings, goslings? — Now that 's a point that 's full of puzzlings For these our ganders — Hear my queries ! — Have we no business with the dearies ? — Have we no right at all to say Who 's fit to lead them on the way?," And then a younger goose, an active And in her person most attractive, Eemarked with widely parted lips That put her eyeballs in eclipse: "We wouldn't be so charming, — pooh! — If we should choose along with you? You wouldn't like to see us sniffle, And wrangle round — piffle, piffle : The fact is, nature made us so That nothing w T e might undergo Could take that something from us which Oft gives your heartstrings such a twitch And furthermore, you 'd better drop The sugar-plum and lollipop — That sort of argument won't please The intellectual type of geese." "The intellect, the intellect," Another cries, "they don't suspect — And think the issue to confuse By queer domestic interviews About our functions and the aim — As if the privilege we claim Might shrink the size and number of The eggs we lay, the chicks we love." I do not note for special causes The interjections and applauses. "Give us," they cry again, "a voice, Material for Interpretation 47 Who share the risk should share the choice." And though some points might need apology, As shaky in their sociology, That cry appealed to instincts, reason — So ganders yielded for the season. But whether it became a practice In future times, and what the fact is About the sex of guide and leader The muse conceals from bard and reader, Assuring only that they ne'er Had made a trip more safe and fair Down the continental air, From the moors of Athabasca, Somewhat southward of Alaska, From those bleak, uncouth dominions So far detached from our opinions That none can ever misconstrue The tale I here have told to you. William Ellery Leonard. A MUSICAL INSTRUMENT What was he doing, the great god Pan Down in the reeds by the river ? Spreading ruin and scattering ban, Splashing and paddling with hoofs of a goat, And breaking the golden lilies afloat With the dragon-fly on the river? He tore out a reed, the great god Pan, From the deep cool bed of the river, The limpid water turbidly ran. 48 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation And the broken lilies a-dying lay, And the dragon-fly had fled away, Ere he brought it out of the river. High on the shore sat the great god Pan, While turbidly flowed the river; And hacked and hewed as a great god can, With his hard bleak steel at the patient reed, Till there was not a sign of a leaf indeed To prove it fresh from the river. He cut it short did the great god Pan, (How tall it stood in the river!) Then drew the pith, like the heart of a man, Steadily from the outside ring, And notched the poor dry empty thing In holes, as he sat by the river. "This is the way," laughed the great god Pan, (Laughed as he sat by the river,) * 6 The only way since gods began To make sweet music, they could succeed! Then, dropping his mouth to a hole in the reed, He blew in power by the river. Sweet, sweet, sweet, Pan ! Piercing sweet by the river ! Blinding sweet, great god Pan ! The sun on the hill forgot to die, And the lilies revived, and the dragon-fly Came back to dream on the river. Yet half a beast is the great god Pan, To laugh as he sits by the river, Material for Interpretation 49 Making a poet out of a man ; The true gods sigh for the cost and pain, — For the reed which grows never more again As a reed with the reeds in the river. Elizabeth Barrett Browning. PEBBLE, SONG AND WATER FALL Have you a religion, a philosophy, a theory or two or three? — bring them out here — a bath in this air won't hurt them — or you can keep them in your pockets — nobody here for you to show them to — for you and your thought to be doubted by— and scatter them at the last (you may find them useless?) down the mountain slope — poke them with a stick and watch them slide over strange soil and past stranger surroundings, only to bounce and skip and twirl and fly — (fancy the joy they 'd have, pent up as they were back East!) then to nestle out of sight, beyond* all argumentation ! Have you no religion, no philosophy, no theory or two or three? — you can pick them up, have them for the mere stooping, 50 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation or break them, pluck them pleasantly — Indian paint-brush, baby-blue-eyes, forget-me-not, the yellow monkey weed — dizzier climbing (like a bug up the side of a wall!) will give you clouds of wild lilac, or wild clematis — or a spray of the manzanita, so named by the race of Fray Junipero ! Or come and steal a bird song — (the mocking bird will teach you how!) or don't steal it — let them play on you, (so many snatches the birds have here!) let them start innocent counterpoint with the aid of the wood-choir falls, these water falls, the high snow and higher sun contrive with the aid of the chance of the day ! Pebble, song or water fall, pebble, song or water fall — which one will you choose ? — (why not have them all?) there 's only the sky — and this is a sky, Brother, this great Sierra sky, big and round and blue, meeting the horizon wherever you stare — there 's only this sky to see what you do or don't do — (it doesn't spy!) Material for Interpretation 51 and these trees ! These trees ? — out here they 're so still and so silent, you 'd fancy them dead — they don't even whisper a ghostly phrase — and if they have thoughts, (like the folk back East!) they have a way of sharing them without polluting the air with conjecture — and there 's no wind to carry their gossip — if of a sudden they gossiped a trifle! Let us go — you and I — with creeds — without creeds — or with and without — the mountains out here — these gray Sierra elephants — you can crawl up their sides — and from high broad shoulder to higher and highest — (if there is a highest?) they won't shrug you off — not that they 're docile — they simply don't care! Nevertheless and notwithstanding, for the sake of imbroglio — suppose we gave them a tickle or two, right through their hides to a rib or two ? — (elephants must have a rib somewhere?) and suppose they did mind and did shrug us off? Pebble, song or water fall — which one would you choose for toppling and sliding and bouncing and skipping and twirling and flying? — 52 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation (fancy the joy we 'd have, pent up as we were back East!) but why not have all three? — pebble, song and water fall, pebble, song and water fall — then to nestle out of sight, beyond all argumentation! Come on, Brother! But wait ! One moment! Don 't forget to bring your humility ! Alfred Kreymborg. THE HOUSE OF CLOUDS I would build a cloudy house For my thoughts to live in When for earth too fancy-loose, And too low for heaven ! Hush ! I talk my dreams aloud — I build it bright to see, — I build it on the moonlit cloud To which I looked with thee. Cloud-walls of the morning's gray, Faced with amber column, Crowned with amber cupola From a sunset solemn! May-mists for the casements fetch, Pale and glimmering, With a sunbeam hid in each, And a smell of spring. Material for Interpretation 53 Build the entrance high and proud, Darkening and then brightening, Of a riven thundercloud, Veined by the lightning, Use one with an iris stain For the door so thin, Turning to a sound like rain As I enter in. Build a spacious hall thereby, Boldly, never fearing; Use the blue place of the sky Which the wind is clearing; Branched with corridors sublime, Flecked with winding stairs Such as children wish to climb, Following their own prayers. In the mutest of the house I will have my chamber. Silence at the door shall use Evening's light of amber, Solemnizing every mood, Softening in degree, Turning sadness into good, As I turn the key. Be my chamber tapestried With the showers of summer, Close, but soundless, — glorified, When the sunbeams come here; Wandering harpers, harping on Waters stringed for such, 54 Modem Literature for Oral Interpretation Drawing color for a tune, With a vibrant touch. Bring a shadow, green and still, From the chestnut forest; Bring a purple from the hill, When the heat is sorest; Spread them out from wall to wall, Carpet-wove around, Whereupon the foot shall fall In light instead of sound. Bring fantastic cloudlets home From the noontide zenith ; Range for sculptures round the room Named as fancy weeneth: Some be Junos, without eyes; Naiads, without sources; Some be birds of paradise; Some, Olympian horses. Bring the dews the birds shake off Waking in the hedges, — Those, too, perfumed for a proof, From the lilies' edges; From our England's field and moor Bring them calm and white in, Whence to form a mirror pure For love's self -delighting. Bring a gray cloud from the East, Where the lark is singing, Something of the song, at least, Material for Interpretation 55 Unlost in the bringing, That shall be a morning chair, Poet-dream may sit in, When it leans out on the air, Unrhymed and unwritten. Bring the red cloud from the sun ! While he sinketh, catch it. That shall be a couch, — with one Sidelong star to watch it, — Fit for poet's finest thought At the curfew sounding, Things unseen being nearer brought Than the seen around him. Poet's thought, not poet's sigh, 'Las, they come together ! Cloudy walls divide, and fly, As in April weather! Cupola and column proud, Structure bright to see — Gone — except that moonlit cloud, To which I looked with thee ! Let them! Wipe such visionings From the fancy's cartel — Love secures some fairer things Dowered with his immortal. The sun may darken, — heaven be bowed — But still unchanged shall be, — Here in my soul, — that moonlit cloud, To which I looked with thee! Elizabeth Barrett Browning. 56 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation THE CAT, THE RAVEN, AND THE PUBLIC A Cat and Raven quarreled once. The Cat called Raven coward, dunce, Lobster, blatherskite, poltroon, Blackguard, scullion, and coon, Hatchet-face and scrawny pate, And other names I must not state If I wish this tale to be Sound in its morality. And ere the Raven could reply, The Cat had clawed it in the eye ; And ere the Raven had upsprung, The Cat had bitten off its tongue. The Public, ignorant of what A handicap the Bird had got, Admired its passive reticence And said, "What dignity, what sense, What lofty self-control! This Raven Deigns not to answer such a craven. Aye, silence is the wise retort — It makes your foe feel like a wart/* MORAL It ? s often nothing of the sort ! William Ellery Leonard. Material for Interpretation 57 THE DUCK AND THE NIGHTINGALE An ancient Duck, complacent, fat, Whose miserable habitat Had been the stagnant pool behind The barnyard of Boeotian hind, — Save when she waddled by the fence Among the roosters and the hens, To snap with bony bill at corn Her owner scattered every morn, Or when within the crib she sate To hatch her eggs and meditate, — Began to make some slight pretense To wisdom and experience. She heard at dark a Nightingale At no great distance down the dale — The winged Nightingale who 'd flown In every sky, in every zone, And sung while moon or morning star Descended over hills afar — And thus the Dame began to quack: ' £ Nightingale, you '11 surely crack That voice of yours, unless your soul Can learn a little self-control; Try settling down and doing good, And earn a sober livelihood." MORAL Conceited ignorance with ease Pronounces its banalities. William Ellery Leonard. 58 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation APOLLO TROUBADOUR "When a wandering Italian Yesterday at noon Played upon his hurdy-gurdy Suddenly a tune, There was magic in my ear-drums: Like a baby's cup and spoon Tinkling time for many sleigh-bells, Many no-school, rainy-day-bells, Cow-bells, frog-bells, run-away-bells, Mingling with an ocean medley As of elemental people More emotional than wordy — Mermaids laughing off their tantrums, Mermen singing loud and sturdy, — Silver scales and fluting shells, Popping weeds and gurgles deadly, Coral chime from coral steeple, Intermittent deep-sea bells Ringing over floating knuckles, Buried gold and swords and buckles, And a thousand bubbling chuckles, Yesterday at noon, — Such a melody as star-fish, And all fish that really are fish. In a gay, remote battalion Play at midnight to the moon ! Could any playmate on our planet, Hid in a house of earth's own granite, Be so devoid of primal fire Material for Interpretation 59 That a wind from this wild crated lyre Should find no spark and fan it ? Would any lady half in tears, Whose fashion, on a recent day Over the sea, had been to pay Vociferous gondoliers, Beg that the din be sent away And ask a gentleman, gravely treading As down the aisle at his own wedding, To toss the foreigner a quarter Bribing him to leave the street; That motor-horns and servants' feet Familiar might resume, and sweet To her offended ears, The money-music of her peers ! Apollo listened, took the quarter With his hat off to the buyer, Shrugged his shoulder small and sturdy, Led away his hurdy-gurdy Street by street, then turned at last Toward a likelier piece of earth Where a stream of chatter passed, Yesterday at noon ; By a school he stopped and played Suddenly a tune. . . . What a melody he made ! Made in all those eager faces, Feet and hands and fingers ! How they gathered, how they stayed With smiles and quick grimaces, Little man and little maid! — How they took their places, 60 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation Hopping, skipping, unafraid, Darting, rioting about, Squealing, laughing, shouting out! How, beyond a single doubt, In my own feet sprang the ardor (Even now the motion lingers) To be joining in their paces! Round and round the handle went, — Round their hearts went harder; — Apollo urged the happy rout And beamed, ten times as well content With every son and daughter As though their little hands had lent The gentleman his quarter. (You would not guess — nor I deny — That that same gentleman was I!) No gentleman may watch a god With proper happiness therefrom; So street by street again I trod The way that we had come. He had not seen me following And yet I think he knew; For still, the less I heard of it, The more his music grew: As if he made a bird of it To sing the distance through. . . . And, Apollo, how I thrilled, You liquid-eyed rapscallion, With every twig and twist of spring, Because your music rose and filled Each leafy vein with dew — With melody of olden sleigh-bells, Material for Interpretation 61 Over-the-sea-and-far-away-bells, And the heart of an Italian, And the tinkling cup and spoon, — Such a melody as star-fish, And all fish that really are fish, In a gay remote battalion Play at midnight to the moon! Witter Bynner. AMBITION I want to be a Highbrow, I want to take my stand, With elevated eye-brow And manner very grand, Amid the tea-room chatter And learnedly rehearse Exactly what 's the matter With all the universe. I want to be a Highbrow, Who looks, with very wry brow, On things that others praise; Who passes cruel strictures On artists who can draw But raves o'er Cubist pictures With rapt adoring awe ! I want to be a Highbrow, Who follows mystic creeds And laurel decks the shy brows Of poets no one reads, 62 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation I ? d join the weird outre rites Of ultra Highbrow bands, Discussing unknown playwrights, "Whom no one understands. I want to be a Highbrow, With air of perfect poise, Who lifts a scornful eyebrow At all the rough world's noise, Oh, I could fill with glee so Desirable a shelf, A Highbrow seems to be so Delighted with himself. Berton Braley. THE LAW OF THE YUKON This is the law of the Yukon and ever she makes it plain : ' ' Send not your foolish and feeble ; send me your strong and your sane — Strong for the red rage of battle ; sane, for I harry them sore ; Send me men girt for the combat, men who are girt to the core; Swift as the panther in triumph, fierce as the bear in defeat, Sired of a bulldog parent, steeled in the furnace heat. Send me the best of your breeding, lend me your chosen ones ; Them will I take to my bosom, them will I call my sons ; Them will I gild with my treasure, them will I glut with my meat ; Material for Interpretation 63 But the others — the misfits, the failures — I trample under my feet. Dissolute, damned and despairful, crippled and palsied and slain, Ye would send me the spawn of your gutters — Go ! take back your spawn again. "Wild and wide are my borders, stern as death is my sway; From my ruthless throne I have ruled alone for a million years and a day ; Hugging my mighty treasure, waiting for man to come, Till he swept like a turbid torrent, and after him swept the scum. The pallid pimp of the dead-line, the enervate of the pen, One by one I weeded them out, for all that I sought was — Men. One by one I dismayed them, frighting them sore with my glooms ; One by one I betrayed them unto my manifold dooms. Drowned them like rats in my rivers, poisoned the blood in their veins ; Burst with my winter upon them, searing forever their sight, Lashed them with fungus white faces, whimpering wild in the night ; Staggering blind through the storm-whirl, stumbling mad thru the snow, Frozen stiff in the ice-pack, brittle and bent like a bow; Featureless, formless, forsaken, scented by wolves in their flight, Left for the wind to make music thru ribs that are glit- tering white; 64 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation Gnawing the black crust of failure, searching the pit of despair, Crooking the toe in the trigger, trying to patter a prayer ; Going outside with an escort, raving with lips all afoam, Writing a check for a million, driveling feebly of home ; Lost like a louse in the burning ... or else in the tented town Seeking a drunkard's solace, sinking and sinking down; Steeped in the slime at the bottom, dead to a decent world, Lost 'mid the flotsam, far on the frontier hurled ; In the camp at the bend of the river, with its dozen saloons aglare, Its gambling dens ariot, its gramophones all ablare ; Crimped with the crimes of a city, sin-ridden and bridled with lies, In the hush of my mountained vastness, in the flush of my midnight skies. Plague-spots, yet tools of my purpose, so nathless I suffer them thrive, Crushing my weak in their clutches, that only my Strong may survive. ' l But the others, the men of my mettle, the men who would 'stablish my fame Unto its ultimate issue, winning me honor, not shame; Searching my uttermost valleys, fighting each step as they go, Shooting the wrath of my rapids, scaling the ramparts of snow; Ripping the guts of my mountains, looting the beds of my creeks, Them will I take to my bosom, and speak as a mother speaks. Material for Interpretation 65 I am the land that listens, I am the land that broods ; Steeped in eternal beauty, crystalline waters and woods. Long have I waited lonely, shunned as a thing accurst, Monstrous, moody, pathetic, the last of the lands and the first; Visioning camp-fires at twilight, sad with a longing forlorn, Feeling my womb o'er-pregnant with the seed of cities unborn. Wild and wide are my borders, stern as death is my sway, And I wait for the men who will win me — and I will not be won in a day; And I will not be won by weaklings, subtle, suave and mild, But by men with the hearts of Vikings, and the simple faith of a child ; Desperate, strong and resistless, unthrottled by fear or defeat, Them will I gild with my treasure, them will I glut with my meat. " Lofty I stand from each sister land, patient and wearily wise, With the weight of a world of sadness in my quiet, pas- sionless eyes; Dreaming alone of a people, dreaming alone of a day, When men shall not rape my riches, and curse me and go away; Making a bawd of my bounty, fouling the hand that gave — Till I rise in my wrath and I sweep on their path and I stamp them into a grave. Dreaming of men who will bless me, of women esteeming me good, Of children born on my borders, of radiant motherhood, Of cities leaping to stature, of fame like a flag unfurled, 66 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation As I pour the tide of my riches in the eager lap of the world. ' ' This is the Lav/ of the Yukon, that only the strong shall thrive ; That surely the weak shall perish, and only the Fit survive. Dissolute, damned and despairful, crippled and palsied and slain, This is the Will of the Yukon, — Lo, how she makes it plain ! Robert W. Service. A WANDERER'S LITANY When my life has enough of love, and my spirit enough of mirth, When the ocean no longer beckons me, when the roadway calls no more, Oh, on the anvil of Thy wrath, remake me, God, that day ! When the lash of the wave bewilders, and I shrink from the sting of the rain When I hate the gloom of Thy steel-gray wastes, and slink to the lamp-lit shore, Oh, purge me in Thy primal fires, and fling me on my way! When I house me close in a twilit inn, when I brood by a dying fire When I kennel and cringe with fat content, where a pillow and loaf are sure, Oh, on the anvil of Thy wrath, remake me, God, that day ! When I quail at the snow on the uplands, when I crawl from the glare of the sun, Material for Interpretation 6? When the trails that are lone, invite me not, and the half- way lamps allure, Oh, purge me in Thy primal fires, and fling me on my way! When the wine has all ebbed from an April, when the autumn of life forgets The call and the lure of the widening West, the wind in the straining rope, Oh, on the anvil of Thy wrath, remake me, God, that day ! When I waken to hear adventurers strange throng valiantly forth by night, To the sting of the salt-spume, dust of the plain, and width of the western slope, Oh, purge me in Thy primal fires, and fling me on my way! When swarthy and careless and grim they throng out under my rose-grown sash, And I — I bide me there by the coals, and I know not heat nor hope Then, on the anvil of Thy wrath, remake me, God, that day! Arthur Stringer, WELCOME TO ALEXANDRA Sea-king's daughter from over the sea, Alexandra! Saxon and Norman and Dane are we, But all of us Danes in our welcome of thee, Alexandra ! Welcome her, thunders of fort and of fleet ! 68 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation Welcome her, thundering cheer of the street ! Welcome her, all things youthful and sweet, Scatter the blossoms under her feet! Break, happy land, into earlier flowers ! Make music, bird, in the new-budded bowers ! Blazon your mottoes of blessing and prayer ! Welcome her, welcome her, all that is ours ! Warble, bugle, and trumpet, blare ! Flags, flutter out upon turrets and towers ! Flames, on the windy headland, flare ! Utter your jubilee, steeple and spire ! Clash, ye bells, in the merry March air!. Flash, ye cities, in rivers of fire ! Rush to the roof, sudden rocket, and higher Melt into stars for the land 's desire ! Roll and rejoice, jubilant voice, Roil as a ground-swell dash'd on the strand, Roar as the sea when he welcomes the land, And welcome her, welcome the land's desire, The sea-king ? s daughter as happy as fair, Blissful bride of a blissful heir, Bride of the heir of the kings of the sea — joy to the people and joy to the throne, Come to us, love us and make us your own; For Saxon or Dane or Norman we, Teuton or Celt, or whatever we be, We are each all Dane in our welcome of thee, Alexandra ! Alfred Tennyson. Material for Interpretation 69 TIPPERARY IN THE SPRING 1 Ah, sweet is Tipperary in the springtime of the year, When the hawthorn 's whiter than the snow, When the feathered folk assemble, and the air is all a-tremble With their singing and their winging to and fro : When queenly Slievenamon puts her verdant vesture on, And smiles to hear the news the breezes bring, And the sun begins to glance on the rivulets that dance — Ah, sweet is Tipperary in the Spring. Ah, sweet is Tipperary in the springtime of the year, When mists are rising from the lea, When the Golden Vale is smiling with a beauty all beguiling, And the Suir goes crooning to the sea ; And the shadows and the showers only multiply the flowers That the lavish hand of May w r ill fling ; Where in unfrequented ways, fairy music softly plays — Ah, sweet is Tipperary in the Spring! Ah, sweet is Tipperary in the springtime of the year, When life like the year is young, When the soul is just awaking like a lily blossom breaking, And love words linger on the tongue ; When the blue of Irish skies is the hue of Irish eyes, And love dreams cluster and cling Round the heart and round the brain, half of pleasure, half of pain — Ah, sweet is Tipperary in the spring. Denis A. McCarthy. i' Copyright, Little, Brown & Co. 70 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation THE JOY OF THE HILLS I bide on the mountain tops, I ride ; I have found my life and am satisfied. Onward I ride in the blowing oats, Checking the field-lark's rippling notes — Lightly I sweep From steep to steep : Over my head through the branches high Come glimpses of a rushing sky; The tall oats brush my horse's flanks ; Wild poppies crowd on the sunny banks ; A bee booms out of the scented grass ; A jay laughs with me as I pass. I ride On the hills, I forgive, I forget Life's hoard of regret — All the terror and pain Of the chafing chain. Grind on, cities, grind: I leave you a blur behind. I am lifted elate — the skies expand : Here the world's heaped gold is a pile of samL Let them weary and work in their narrow walls : I ride with the voices of waterfalls ! I swing on as one in a dream — I swing Down the airy hollows, I shout, I sing ! The world is gone like an empty word : My body 's a bough in the wind, my heart a bird ! Edwin Markham. Material for Interpretation 71 THE SEA-FAIRIES Slow sail'd the weary mariners and saw, Betwixt the green brink and the running foam, Sweet faces, rounded arms, and bosoms prest To little harps of gold ; and while they mused, Whispering to each other half in fear, Shrill music reach 'd them on the middle sea. Whither away, whither away, whither away? fly no more. Whither away from the high green field, and the happy blossoming shore ? Day and night to the billow the fountain calls; Down shower the gamboling waterfalls From wandering over the lea: Out of the live-green heart of the dells They freshen the silvery-crimson shells, And thick with white bells the clover-hill swells hither, come hither and furl your sails, Come hither to me and to me: Hither, come hither and frolic and play ; Here it is only the mew that wails ; We will sing to you all the day: Mariner, mariner, furl your sails, For here are the blissful downs and dales^ And merrily, merrily carol the gales, And the spangle dances in bight and bay, And the rainbow forms and flies on the land Over the islands free ; And the rainbow lives in the curve of the sand; Hither, come hither and see; And the rainbow hangs on the poising wave, 72 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation And sweet is the color of cove and cave, And sweet shall your welcome be : hither, come hither, and be our lords For merry brides are we : We will kiss sweet kisses, and speak sweet words : listen, listen, your eyes shall glisten ^ With pleasure and love and jubilee : listen, listen, your eyes shall glisten When the sharp clear twang of the golden chords Runs up the ridged sea. Who can light on as happy a shore All the world o 'er, all the world o 'er ? Whither away? listen and stay: mariner, mariner fly no more. Alfred Tennyson. THE MERMAN Who would be A merman bold, Sitting alone, Sitting alone, Under the sea, With a crown of gold, On a throne ? I would be a merman bold ; I would sit and sing the whole of the day ; I would fill the sea-halls with a voice of power ; But at night I would roam abroad and play Material for Interpretation 73 With the mermaids in and out of the rocks, Dressing their hair with the white sea-flowers ; And holding them back by their flowing locks I would kiss them often under the sea, And kiss them again till they kiss'd me, Laughingly, laughingly ; And then we would wander away, away To the pale green sea-groves straight and high, Chasing each other merrily. There would be neither moon nor star, But the wave would make music above us afar — Low thunder and light in the magic night — Neither moon nor star We would call aloud in the dreamy dells, Call to each other and whoop and cry All night, merrily, merrily ; They would pelt me with starry spangles and shells, Laughing and clapping their hands between, All night, merrily, merrily; But I would throw to them back in mine Turkis and agate and almondine : Then leaping out upon them unseen I would kiss them often under the sea, And kiss them again till they kiss'd me, Laughingly, laughingly. Oh ! what a happy life were mine Under the hollow-hung ocean green ! Soft are the moss-beds under the sea : We would live merrily, merrily. Alfred Tennyson. 74 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation THE MERMAID Who would be A mermaid fair, Singing alone. Combing her hair Under the sea, In a golden curl With a comb of pearl, On a throne? I would be a mermaid fair ; I would sing to myself the whole of the day ; With a comb of pearl I would comb my hair ; And still as I comb 'd I would sing and say, "Who is it loves me? who loves not me?" I would comb my hair till my ringlets would fall, Low adown, low adown. From under my starry- sea-bud crown Low adown and around, And I should look like a fountain of gold Springing alone With a shrill inner sound, Over the throne In the midst of the hall ; Till that great sea-snake under the sea From his coiled sleep in the central deeps Would slowly trail himself sevenfold Round the hall where I sate, and look in at the gate With his large calm eyes for the love of me. Material for Interpretation 75 And all the mermen under the sea Would feel their immortality Die in their hearts for the love of me. But at night I would wander away, away, I would fling on each side my low-flowing locks, And lightly vault from the throne and play With the mermen in and out of the rocks ; We would run to and fro, and hide and seek, On the broad sea-wolds in the crimson shells, Whose silvery spikes are nighest the sea. But if any came near I would call, and shriek And adown the steep like a wave I would leap From the diamond ledges that jut from the dells ; For I would not be kiss'd by all who would list, Of the bold merry mermen under the sea ; They would sue me, and woo me, and flatter me, In the purple twilights under the sea; But the king of them all would carry me, Woo me, and win me, and marry me, In the branching jaspers under the sea; Then all the dry pied things that be In the hueless mosses under the sea Would curl round my silver feet silently, All looking up for the love of me. And if I should carol aloud, from aloft All things that are forked, and horned, and soft Would lean out from the hollow sphere of the sea, All looking down for the love of me. Alfred Tennyson. 76 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation INDIAN SUMMER (After completing a book . . . for one now dead.) (0 Earth-and- Autumn of the Setting Sun, She is not by, to know my task is done!) In the brown grasses slanting with the wind, Lone as a lad whose dog 's no longer near, Lone as a mother whose only child has sinned, Lone on the loved hill . . . and below me here The thistle-down in tremulous atmosphere Along red clusters of the sumach streams ; The shrivelled stalks of goldenrod are sere, And crisp and white their flashing old racemes. (. . . forever . . . forever . . . forever . . .) This is the lonely season of the year, This is the season of our lonely dreams. (0 Earth-and- Autumn of the Setting Sun, She is not by, to know my task is done!) The corn-shocks westward on the stubble plain Show like an Indian village of dead days ; The long smoke trails behind the crawling train, And floats atop the distant woods ablaze With orange, crimson, purple. The low haze Dims the scarped bluffs above the inland sea, Whose wide and slaty waters in cold glaze Await yon full-moon of the night-to-be. (. . . far . . . and far . . . and far . . .) There are the solemn horizons of man's ways, These the horizons of solemn thought to me. Material for Interpretation 77 (0 Earth-and- Autumn of the Setting Sun, She is not by, to know my task is done!) And this the hill she visited, as friend ; And this the hill she lingered on, as bride — Down in the yellow valley is the end : They laid her ... in no evening Autumn tide . . . Under fresh flowers of that May morn, beside The queens and cave-women of ancient earth . . . This is the hill . . . and over my city 's towers, Across the world from sunset, yonder in air, Shines, through its scaffoldings, a civic dome Of piled masonry, which shall be ours To give, completed, to our children there . . . And yonder far roof of my abandoned home Shall house new laughter. . . . Yet I tried. ... I tried. . . . And, ever wistful of the doom to come, I built her many a fire for love . . . for mirth. (When snows were falling on our oaks outside, Dear, many a winter fire upon the hearth) . . . (. . . farewell . . . farewell . . . farewell . . .) We dare not think too long on those who died, While still so many yet must come to birth. William Ellery Leonard. EITUAL Lord God, what may we think of Thee, Save that in stars we drink of Thee, Save that in the abundance of Thy sunlight we have seen Thine excellent intention; And Thy marvelous invention In great and little living things and all the grades between ? 78 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation Lord God, what may we say to Thee Who know our hearts give way to Thee Surely at last in secret depths, though protest long denies, And that to live is wonder With worlds above and under Unreached of any mortal heart, blurred to all mortal eyes? Lord God, the fitting praise to Thee Rather would seem to raise to Thee Only pure honesty of mind, waiting Thy stalwart will ; Like as the hills believe Thee, Like as the seas receive Thee, Like as the trees whose rustlings cease, — who hear Thee and are still ! William Rose Benet. A BALLAD OF THE ROAD Oh, a gypsy longing stirs your heart When Autumn ? s sounding the rover's calif "Oh, leave the city and leave the mart, Come out, come out where the red leaves fall, And asters flame by each gray stone wall ! Have done with cares that fetter and goad, Heed ye and harken ye one and all, And know the joys of the winding road!" A veil of purple lies on the hills, Your step moves swift to some unknown air — Forgotten music of boughs and rills — The oaks are russet, the maples flare, The sumach's splendor glows here and there, Material for Interpretation 79 And your weary heart has slipped its load, Oh, bright the sunlight as on you fare Tasting the joys of the winding road ! Odors of earth when the wild winds blow, New views to greet you at each hill 's crest, Color and beauty where'er you go — These shall add to your journey's zest. And when the daylight dies in the west A star-hung roof for your night 's abode, A bed of pine and a dreamless rest — These are the joys of the winding road. Oh, ye of the town who do not know How blithe and free is the rover 's code ! Come out, come out where the glad winds blow ! There 's joy for all on the winding road ! Constance D'Arcy Mackay. QUESTIONS "What shall I do when blows blind me? How fare on when counsels cross? Where shall I turn when life behind me Seems like a course run at a loss ? Through what throes shall I beat to windward, Uncontent with a lesser port? Whom shall I trust when Heaven of me, Heaven itself, seems making sport? How shall I answer a knave's rating, Done in a liar's arithmetic? 80 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation What shall I say to a fool's prating, In destructiyeness as quick? How shall I meet a friend 's treason When it has scuttled the good ship Faith? Whose are the stars, if wide disaster At its will can do me scathe? Answer there is, a brief order : ' ' Bear all blows, and yet be free ; Let no bitterness set a border To your will, no treachery. Speak, if you are the bigger for it ; Keep the silence, if you are less; And if the stars indeed be godless, Steer still by their godliness." Gale Young Bice. HILL-FANTASY 1 Sitteth by the red cairn a brown One, a hoofed One, High upon the mountain, where the grasses fail. Where the ash-trees flourish far their blazing bunches to the sun, A brown One, a hoofed One, pipes against the gale. .( I was on the Mountain, wandering, wandering; No one but the pine trees and the white birch knew. Over rocks I scrambled, looked up and saw that Strange Thing, Peaked ears and sharp horns, pricked against the blue. i "Reprinted, by permission of the publishers, from "Myself And I" by Fannie Stearns Davis. Copyright, 1913, by the Macmillan Co, Material for Interpretation 81 Oh, and how he piped there ! piped upon the high reeds Till the blue air crackled like a frost -film on a pool ! Oh, and how he spread himself, like a child whom no one heeds, Tumbled chuckling in the brook, all sleek and kind and cool ! He had berries 'twixt his horns, crimson-red as cochineal. Bobbing, wagging wantonly they tickled him, and oh, How his deft lips puckered round the reed, and seemed to chase and steal Sky-music, earth-music, tree-music low ! I said, "Good-day, Thou!" He said, "Good-day, Thou!" Wiped his reed against the spotted doe-skin on his back. He said, "Come up here, and I will teach thee piping now. While the earth is singing so, for tunes we shall not lack. ' ' Up scrambled I then, furry fingers helping me. Up scrambled I. So we sat beside the cairn. Broad into my face laughed that horned Thing so naughtily. Oh, it was a rascal of a woodland Satyr's bairn! "So blow, and so, Thou! Move thy fingers faster, look! Move them like the little leaves and whirling midges. So ! Soon, 't will twist like tendrils and out-twinkle like the lost brook. Move thy fingers merrily, and blow! blow! blow!" Brown One ! Hoofed One ! beat the time to keep me straight. Kick it on the red stone, whistle in my ear. Brush thy crimson berries in my face, then hold thy breath, for — wait ! Joy comes bubbling to my lips. I pipe ! oh, hear ! 82 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation Blue sky, art glad of us? Green wood, art glad of us? Old hard-heart mountain, dost thou hear me, how I blow ? Far away the sea-isles swim in sun-haze luminous. Each one has a color like the seven-splendored bow. Wind, wind, wind, dost thou mind me how I pipe now? Chipmunk chattering in the beech, rabbit in the brake? Furry arm around my neck : ' ' Oh, thou art a brave one, Thou!' 7 Satyr, little satyr-friend, my heart with joy doth ache ! Sky-music, earth-music, tree-music tremulous, Water over steaming rocks, water in the shade, Storm-tune and sun-tune, how they flock up unto us, Sitting by the red cairn, gay and unafraid ! Brown One, hoofed One, give me nimble hoofs, Thou ! Give me furry fingers and a secret furry tail ! Pleasant are thy smooth horns : if their like were on my brow Might I not abide here, till the strong sun fail ? — Oh, the sorry brown eyes! Oh, the soft kind hand-touch, Sudden brush of velvet ears across my wind-cool cheek! "Play-mate, Pipe-mate, thou askest one good boon too much. I could never find thee horns, though day-long I should seek. "Yet, keep the pipe, Thou: I will cut another one. Keep the pipe and play on it for all the world to hear. Ah, but it was good once to sit together in the sun ! Though I have but half a soul, it finds thee very dear ! Material for Interpretation 83 "Wise Thing, Mortal Thing, yet my half -soul fears thee! Take the pipe and go thy ways, — quick now, for the sun Reels across the hot west and stumbles dazzled to the sea. Take the pipe, and oh — one kiss ! then run ! run ! run ! ' ' — Silence on the mountain. Lonely stands the high cairn. All the leaves a-shivering, all the stones dead-gray. thou cold small pipe, which way is fled that Satyr's bairn ? 1 am lost and all alone, and down drops the day. I was on the mountain, wandering, wandering. There I got this Pipe o' dreams. Strange, when I blow, Something deep as human love starts a-crying, troubling. Is it only sky-music, earth-music low? Fannie Stearns Davis. THE MONASTERY Over the wall is — home. The window of my cell Stares at my truancy as if to ask, "Why should a mission to the town mean this — A day-long absence in the woods and hills ?" It seems so strange, the monastery there, So questioning, so alien; but I see The duties filling up the sunset hour, Picture the others passing to and fro. There afe long balconies above the court, With lattice-work that checkers out the sun ; And dark-cowled forms behind stalk up and down, Telling their Pater Nosters on the beads. The court, a still oasis buried deep Within the monastery's breast, is green 84 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation With slender blades of grass and myrtle leaves, Where spring has wantoned in and left a kiss. Shadows are gathering about the shrines, The tapers down the halls will soon be lit, When Father Andre makes his shuffling round, Dressing the saints and altars for the night. I know that silence fills the corridors, Save when a windy sigh goes rustling through, A door swings wide, and in the distance hums A resonant chant — then the door 's shut again, Leaving an echo and a memory. Here in the grove outside the wall I lie, Where the last ribbon 'd sunlight filters in Between the saplings ; shadows here are bold And purple, warm as the damp earth under me. Silence is here, as there; but breathing deep, Pregnant, alive — not ominous and chill. I had not meant to loiter here so long — This means a penance and a fast for me, — Who should be now before the crucifix. Something like hands has kept me here tonight, Something in tree and bird and wind and sky, That would not let me go away again. I must go back — must throw aside this flower Tight-crushed within my fingers ; when it 's gone I 11 be myself again ; and can go back. Arbutus — it was waiting here for me — It was not odor — it was suffering Borne on the breath of April to my soul, Out of a past long-buried and forgot. The earthly incense, passion-sweet, rose up, Material for Interpretation 85 And passion-painful curled about my heart, Bringing remembrance of warm years of spring, Filled with arbutus, filled with wind — with life. And then I digged it, underneath the mould Laid bare the fragrance of its small pink face, And held it to me, drinking in the pain. I could not get enough, it seemed ; must strain To breathe the utmost of the agony in — Such, I remember now, were love — and death — And all the aching mortal things I knew So long ago. Ah, it was sweet to taste That mad and stabbing passion once again, That wrestling of the flesh and soul to touch The infinity of beauty crowned with stars ! To find eternity through hungry sense, That needed God to be quite satisfied! I felt it all again ; the throbbing surge That used to stir me like an organ-peal Thrilling into the cloister ; life aflame, Calling me, world to man, and God to man — Daring to fight, despite the suffering! Arbutus — poignant — crushed between my palms — Burning my heart out with the love of life — I must go back — the vesper bell has rung — Twilight is filling up the grove ; the stars Are showing past the monastery dome Like an old painting. Father Andre 's there, Holding the lamp above the gate. I 11 go, And take my chastisement as is my due — I '11 leave the arbutus here — I have been mad — Marjoric Rinnan. 86 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation IN BLOSSOM TIME It 's my heart, my heart, to be out in the sun and sing, to sing and shout in the fields about in the balm and blos- soming. Sing loud, bird in the tree ; bird sing loud in the sky, and honey-bees blacken the clover seas; there are none of you glad as I. The leaves laugh low in the wind, laugh low with the wind at play, and the odorous call of the flowers all entices my soul away. For but the world is fair, and but the world is sweet, I will out of the gold of the blossoming mold, and sit at the Master's feet. And the love my heart would speak, I will fold in the lily's rim, that the lips of the blossom, more pure and meek may offer it up to him. Then sing in the hedgerow green, thrush, O skylark, sing in the blue; sing loud, sing clear, that the King may hear, and my soul shall sing with you. Ina Coolbrith. IF WE HAD THE TIME If I had the time to find a place And sit me down full face to face With my better self, that cannot show In my daily life that rushes so : It might be then I would see my soul Was stumbling still toward the shining goal, I might be nerved by the thought sublime, — If I had the time ! If I had the time to let my heart Speak out and take in my life apart, To look about and stretch a hand To a comrade quartered in no-luck land ; Material for Interpretation 87 Ah, God ! If I might but just sit still And hear the note of the whip-poor-will, I think that my wish with God's would rhyme, — If I had the time ! If I had the time to learn from you How much for comfort my word could do ; And I told you then of my sudden will To kiss your feet when I did you ill ; If the tears aback of the coldness feigned Could flow, and the wrong be quite explained, — Brothers, the souls of us all would chime, If we had the time ! Richard Burton. THEODORE ROOSEVELT Gigantic figure of a mighty age! How shall I chant the tribute of thy praise, As statesman, soldier, scientist, or sage? Thou wert so great in many different ways. And yet in all there was a single aim — To fight for truth with sword and tongue and pen ! In wilderness, as in the halls of fame, Thy courage made thee master over men. Like some great magnet, that from distant poles Attracts the particles and holds them fast, So thou didst draw all men, and fill their souls "With thy ideals, — naught caring for their past, Their race or creed. There was one only test : To love our country and to serve it best ! Leon Huhner. 88 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation QUENTIN ROOSEVELT As falls the fragment of a mighty star Into the night, where all was dark before; A brilliant flash attracting men afar, Seen but a moment, to be seen no more; So, in the sky, this youthful warrior bold, Outlined a brilliant course before he fell, Turning a silver star to one of gold, A star to be remembered long and well. "What matters that the fitful course was brief And vanished swiftly in eternal night ? In such a fall there is no cause for grief, For souls like these leave trails of golden light. He spread the glory of his country's fame, And added lustre to a noble name. Leon Huhner. WHEN THE TRAIN COMES IN Well, yes, I calkerlate it is a little quiet here Per one who 's b'en about the world and traveled fur an' near; But maybe 'cause I never lived no other place, to me The town seems 'bout as lively as a good town ort to be. We go about our bizness in a quiet sort o ' way, Ner thinkin' o' the outside world, exceptin' wunst a day We gather at the depot, where we laff an' talk an' spin Our yarns an' watch the people when the train comes in. Si Jenkins, he 's the jestice o' the peace, he allers spends His money fer a paper which he glances through an' lends Material for Interpretation 89 To some the other fellers, an' we all take turns an' chat, An' each one tells what he 'u'd do if he was this er that; An' in a quiet sort o' way, afore a hour 's gone, We git a purty good idee o' what 's a-goin' on, An' gives us lots to think about until we meet ag'in The follerin , to-morrer when the train comes in. When I git lonesome-like I set aroun' the barber-shop Er corner groc'ry, where I talk about the growing crop With fellers from the country; an' if the sun ain't out too hot, We go to pit chin' hoss-shoes in Jed Thompson's vacant lot Behin' the livery stable; an' afore the game is done As like as not some feller '11 say his nag kin clean outrun The other feller's an' they take 'em out an' have a spin ; But all git back in town afore the train comes in. I see it in the papers 'at some folks, when summer 's here, Pack up their trunks an' journey to the seashore every year To keep from gittin' sunstruck; I 've a better way than that, Fer when it 's hot I put a cabbage-leaf inside my hat An' go about my bizness jes as though it was n't warm — Fact is I ain 't a-doin ' much sense I moved off my farm ; An' folks 'at loves the outside world, if they 've a mind to, kin See all they ort to of it when the train comes in. An' yit I like excitement, an' they 's nothin' suits me more 'An to git three other fellers, so 's to make a even four, 'At knows the game jest to a T, an' spend a half a day In some good place a-fightin' out a battle of croquet. There 's Tubbs who tends the post-office, an' old Doc Smith and me 90 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation An ' Uncle Perry Louden — it 'u 'd do you good to see Us fellers maul them balls aroun'; we meet time an' agin An' play an' play an' play until the train comes in. An' take it all in all I bet you 'd have to look aroun' A good, long while afore you 'd find a nicer little town 'An this 'n' is. The people live a quiet sort o' life, Ner carin' much about the world with all its woe an' strife. An' here I mean to spend my days, an' when I reach the end I '11 say, "God bless ye!" an' " Good-bye," to every faith- ful friend ; An' when they f oiler me to where they ain't no care ner sin, I '11 meet 'em at the depot when the train comes in. Nixon Waterman. THE LADIES OF ST. JAMES'S A PROPER NEW BALLAD OF THE COUNTRY AND THE TOWN The ladies of St. James 's go swinging to the play ; Their footmen run before them, with a il Stand by! Clear the way!" But Phyllida, my Phyllida ! she takes her buckled shoon, When we go out a-courting beneath the harvest moon. The ladies of St. James's wear satin on their backs; They sit all night at Ombre, with candles all of wax : But Phyllida, my Phyllida ! she dons her russet gown, And runs to gather May dew before the world is down. The ladies of St. James's they are so fine and fair, You 'd think a box of essences was broken in the air : Material for Interpretation 91 But Phyllida, my Phyllida ! the breath of heath and furze, When breezes blow at morning, is not so fresh as hers. The ladies of St. James's they 're painted to the eyes ; Their white it stays for ever, their red it never dies : But Phyllida, my Phyllida ! her color comes and goes ; It trembles to a lily, — it wavers to a rose. The ladies of St. James's! You scarce can understand The half of all their speeches, their phrases are so grand : But Phyllida, my Phyllida! her shy and simple words Are clear as after rain-drops the music of the birds. The ladies of St. James's ! they have their fits and freaks : They smile on you — for seconds, they frown on you — for weeks : But Phyllida, my Phyllida ! come either storm or shine, From Shrove-tide unto Shrove-tide, is always true — and mine. My Phyllida ! my Phyllida ! I care not though they heap The hearts of all St. James's, and give me all to keep; I care not whose the beauties of all the world may be, For Phyllida — for Phyllida is all the world to me ! Austin Dobson. SOULS 1 My soul goes clad in gorgeous things, Scarlet and gold and blue; And at her shoulder sudden wings Like long flames flicker through. i Reprinted, by permission of the publishers, from "Myself And I" by Fannie Stearns Davis. Copyright, 1913, by the Macmillan Co. 92 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation And she is swallow-fleet, and free From mortal bonds and bars. She laughs, because Eternity Blossoms for her with stars! O folk who scorn my stiff gray gown, My dull and foolish face, — Can ye not see my Soul flash down, A singing flame through space? And folk, whose earth-stained looks I hate, Why may I not divine Your Souls, that must be passionate, Shining and swift, as mine ! Fannie Stearns Davis, LINCOLN, THE MAN OF THE PEOPLE When the Norn Mother saw the Whirlwind Hour Greatening and darkening as it hurried on, She left the Heaven of Heroes and came down To make a man to meet the mortal need. She took the tried clay of the common road — Clay warm yet with the genial heat of Earth, Dasht through it all a strain of prophecy; Tempered the heap with thrill of human tears ; Then mixt a laughter with the serious stuff. Into the shape she breathed a flame to light That tender, tragic, ever-changing face; And laid on him a sense of the Mystic Powers, Moving — all husht — behind the mortal veil. Here was a man to hold against the world, A man to match the mountains and the sea. Material for Interpretation 93 The color of the ground was in him, the red earth; The smack and tang of elemental things : The rectitude and patience of the cliff; The good-will of the rain that loves all leaves ; The friendly welcome of the wayside well; The courage of the bird that dares the sea; The gladness of the wind that shakes the corn; The pity of the snow that hides all scars ; The secrecy of streams that make their way Under the mountain to the rifted rock ; The tolerance and equity of light That gives as freely to the shrinking flower As to the great oak flaring to the wind — To the grave's low hill as to the Matterhorn That shoulders out the sky. Sprung from the West, He drank the valorous youth of a new world. The strength of virgin forests braced his mind, The hush of spacious prairies stilled his soul. His words were oaks in acorns ; and his thoughts Were roots that firmly gript the granite truth. Up from log cabin to the Capitol, One fire was on his spirit, one resolve — To send the keen ax to the root of wrong, Clearing a free way for the feet of God, The eyes of conscience testing every stroke, To make his deed the measure of a man. He built the rail-pile and he built the State, Pouring his splendid strength through every blow : The grip that swung the ax in Illinois Was on the pen that set a people free. So came the Captain with the mighty heart ; 94 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation And when the judgment thunders split the house, Wrenching the rafters from their ancient rest, He held the ridgepole up, and spikt again The rafters of the Home. He held his place — Held the long purpose like a growing tree — Held on through blame and faltered not at praise. And when he fell in whirlwind, he went down As when a lordly cedar, green with boughs, Goes down with a great shout upon the hills, And leaves a lonesome place against the sky. Edwin Markham. By permission of the Author, from "Lincoln and Other Poems. 55 THE MYSTIC There is a quest that calls me, In nights when I am lone, The need to ride where the ways divide The Known from the Unknown. I mount what thought is near me And soon I reach the place, The tenuous rim where the Seen grows dim And the Sightless hides its face. I have ridden the wind, I have ridden the sea, I have ridden the moon and stars. I have set my feet in the stirrup seat Of a comet coursing Mars. And everywhere Thro' the earth and air My thought speeds, lightning-shod, Material for Interpretation 95 It comes to a place where checking pace It cries, "Beyond lies God!" It calls me out of the darkness, It calls me out of sleep, "Ride ! ride ! for you must, to the end of Dust !" It bids, — and on I sweep To the wide outposts of Being, Where there is Gulf alone — And thro ' a Vast that was never passed I listen for Life's tone. I have ridden the wind, I have ridden the night, I have ridden the ghosts that flee From the vaults of death like a chilling breath Over eternity. And everywhere Is the world laid bare — Ether and star and clod — Until I wind to its brink and find But the cry, "Beyond lies God!" It calls me and ever calls me! And vainly I reply. "Fools only ride where the ways divide What Is from the Whence and Why!" I 'm lifted into the saddle Of thoughts too strong to tame And down the deeps and over the steeps I find — ever the same. I have ridden the wind, I have ridden the stars, 96 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation I have ridden the force that flies With far intent thro ' the firmament And each to each allies. And everywhere. That a thought may dare To gallop, mine has trod — Only to stand at last on the strand "Where just beyond lies God. Cole Young Bice. GREETINGS FOR TWO Knowed him more 'n twenty year; Liked him through an ' through : Him an ' me was neighbors here When the land was new. He druv past here every day, Wave' his hand jes' so; Then he 'd holler "Howdy!" an' I 'd holler back, "Hello!" I 'd be workin' in the field, He 'd be off to town \ An' I 'd hear that rattle-wheeled Buggy comin' down; I 'd look up from hoein' corn, An' I 'd see him go; Then he 'd holler "Howdy!" an 9 I 'd holler back, "Hello!" Never was no other talk Had by him an' me; Material for Interpretation 97 See him go by, trot or walk, Wave — an' let him be. Alwus knowed when I looked up Jest how it 'u 'd go : He 'u'd holler, ' ' Howdy !" an' I 'd holler back, " Hello!" Say, I call that neighborin' In the proper way ; Ain't no kith o' mine er kin Fur as I kin say; Alwus friendly, cheery-like, Sunshine, rain, er snow, He jest hollers, " Howdy!" an* I holler back, "Hello!" He 'ten's to his own affairs, An' I 'ten' t' mine; He don't put on any airs, I don't cut no shine; "Weather bad or weather fair, Drivin' fast or slow, He jest hollers, "Howdy!" an' I holler back, "Hello!" That 's the way we started out When we settled here; Like t ' keep it up about 'Nother twenty year. Look out yonder in the road — There ! Now see him go ! Soon he '11 holler, "Howdy!" an' I '11 holler back, "Hello!" J. W. Foley. 98 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation A SOFT DAY A soft day, thank God! A wind from the south With a honeyed mouth ; A scent of drenching leaves, Briar and beech and lime, White elder-flower and thyme And the soaking grass smells sweet, Crushed by my two bare feet, While the rain drips, Drips, drips, drips from the eaves. A soft day, thank God! The hills wear a shroud Of silver cloud; The web the spider weaves Is a glittering net ; The woodland path is wet, And the soaking earth smells sweet Under my two bare feet, And the rain drips, Drips, drips, drips from the leaves. W. M. Letts. A WINTER RIDE 1 Who shall declare the joy of the running ! Who shall tell of the pleasures of flight ! Springing and spurning the tufts of wild heather, Sweeping, wide-winged, through the blue dome of light. i Reprinted, by permission of the publishers, from "A Dome of Many Colored Glass" by Amy Lowell, copyright by the Macmillan Co. Material for Interpretation 99 Everything mortal has moments immortal, Swift and God-gifted, immeasurably bright. So with the stretch of the white road before me, Shining snow crystals rainbowed by the sun, Fields that are white, stained with long, cool, blue shadows. Strong with the strength of my horse as we run. Joy in the touch of the wind and the sunlight ! Joy ! With the vigorous earth I am one. Amy Lowell. THE GYPSIES' ROAD I shall go on the gypsies' road, The road that has no ending; For the sedge is brown on the lone lakeside, The wild geese eastward tending. I shall go as the unfettered wave, From shore to shore, forgetting The grief that lies 'neath a roof -tree 's shade, The years that bring regretting. No law shall dare my wandering stay, No man my acres measure; The world was made for the gypsies' feet, The winding road for pleasure. And I shall drift as the pale leaf strayed, Whither the wild wind listed; I shall sleep in the dark of the hedge, 'Neath rose and thorn entwisted. 100 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation This was a call in the heart of the night, A whispering dream 's dear treasure ; 1 ' The world was made for nomads ' feet, The winding road for pleasure. ' ' I stole at dawn from my roof -tree's shade, And the cares that it did cover; I flew to the heart of the fierce north wind, As a maid will greet her lover. But a thousand hands did draw me back And bid me to their tending; I may not go on the gypsies' road — The road that has no ending. Dora Sigerson. TIM, AN IRISH TERRIER It 's wonderful dogs they 're breeding now: Small as a flea or large as a cow By my old lad Tim he '11 never be bet By any dog that ever he met. "Come on," says he, "for I 'm not kilt yet." No matter the size of the dog he '11 meet, Tim trails his coat the length o' the street. D ' ye mind his scars an ' his ragged ear, The like of a Dublin Fusilier? ' He 's a massacree dog that knows no fear. But he 'd stick to me till his latest breath ; An ' he 'd go with me to the gates of death. He 'd wait for a thousand years, maybe, Material for Interpretation 101 Scratching the door an ' whining for me If myself were inside in Purgatory. So I laugh when I hear thim make it plain That dogs and men never meet again. For all their talk who 'd listen to thim, With the soul in the shining eyes of him? Would God be wasting a dog like Tim? W. M. Letts. MYSTERIOUS DOINGS As once I rambled in the woods I chanced to spy amid the brake A huntsman ride his way beside A fair and passing tranquil lake; Though velvet bucks sped here and there, He let them scamper through the green — Not one smote he, but lustily He blew his horn — what could it mean? As on I strolled beside that lake, A pretty maid I chanced to see Fishing away for finny prey, Yet not a single one caught she ; All round her boat the fishes leapt And gambolled to their hearts ' content, Yet never a thing did the maid but sing — I wonder what on earth it meant. As later yet I roamed my way, A lovely steed neighed loud and long, And an empty boat sped all afloat 102 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation Where sang a fishermaid her song; All underneath the prudent shade, Which yonder kindly willows threw, Together strayed a youth and maid — I can't explain it all, can you? Eugene Field. WATER FANTASY 1 O brown brook, blithe brook, what will you say to me If I take off my heavy shoon and wade you childishly? take them off, and come to me. You shall not fall. Step merrily! Butj cool brook, but, quickly brook, and what if I should float White-bodied in your pleasant pool, your bubbles at my throat ? If you are but a mortal maid, Then I shall make you half afraid. The water shall be dim and deep, And silver fish shall lunge and leap About you, coward mortal thing. But if you come desiring To win once more your naiadhood, How you shall laugh and find me good — My golden surfaces, my glooms My secret grottoes' dripping rooms, My depths of warm wet emerald, My mosses floating fold on fold! And where I take the rocky leap i Reprinted, by permission of the publishers, from "Myself And I" by Fannie Stearns Davis. Copyright, 1913, by the Macmillan Co. Material for Interpretation 103 Like wild white water shall you sweep ; Like wild white w r ater shall you cry, Trembling and turning to the sky, While all the thousand-fringed trees Glimmer and glisten through the breeze. I bid you come ! Too long, too long, You have forgot my undersong. And this perchance you never knew: E'en I, the brook, have need of you. My naiads faded long ago, — My little nymphs, that to and fro "Within my waters sunnily Made small white flames of tinkling glee. I have been lonesome, lonesome- yea, E'en I, the brook, until this day. Cast off your shoon: ah. come to me, And I will love yon lingering! y ! wild brook, wise brook, I cannot come, alas! 1 am but mortal as the leaves that flicker, float, and pass. My body is not used to you ; my breath is fluttering sore ; You clasp me round too icily. Ah, let me go once more ! Would God I were a naiad-thing whereon Pan's music blew ; But woe is me ! you pagan brook, I cannot stay with you ! Fannie Steams Davis. SCARED These dusky evenings in December I do be scared with sudden fright, So many things you 'd disremember Shows quare an' darkish in the night. Sure kilt you ? d be if a dog should bark, 104 Modem Literature for Oral Interpretation Or an old cow wheeze in the lonesome dark; For who can tell who 's in it at all, With the Tax man murdered there by the wall, An' the druidy stone foreninst the wood, Where you 'd maybe see what isn't good. An' the haunted house — Och! glory be, There 's a power of terrible things you 'd see In the dark. I 'm feared itself lest some black stranger Would step behind me on the grass ; Or goodness knows what sudden danger Might lep upon me as I pass. For strange an' lonesome the roads do seem Like a far-off place you 'd see in a dream ; An' you 'd never know who you 'd meet at the turn, Old crazy Nelly or mad John Byrne, Or the headless one that wrings her hands, Where the old deserted cabin stands, Or the fairy dog. Och ! glory be — There 's a power of terrible things you 'd see In the dark. W. M. Letts. THE SYMBOL What is the symbol underneath it all, The secret message of the throb of things : The flower tossings and the whirl of wings, The glow and scent when June makes carnival? 'T is like a sweet lost word of some old speech Man has forgotten can almost reach. Material for Interpretation 105 Listen ! The sap doth murmur it, the rain Chants it in sibilant monotone, the breeze Lifting a voice among the fluttered trees, Takes up the song, repeats it once again; And all the movement in the summer grass Seems pulsing to express it ere it pass. Ever and alway, iterant and low, The whisper and the hint, the half untold Suggestion that is as the ages old, Yet fresh-faced now as in the long ago : "Seek, ye shall find, for you and I are one, Bound each to other since the years begun. "You hear the call of kinship in my voice, My very breathing makes me part of you ; The gifts I offer are a residue Of your inheritance and natural choice ; Man is not man who hath not eye to see My luminous gloss on Nature's mysterious. "Rich-languaged fraught with memories and dreams, I lure you back in sacred moments when You learn, oblivious to the lore of men, The lesson of the forests, fields and streams ; Deep at my heart, deeper than all my mirth, The long-withholden meaning of the earth." In syllables of beauty, yea, with words That move like music through the summer ways, Nature doth speak, and in her every phrase, — The choiring rivers and the lyric birds, — She draws us from false gods, and our release Is certified by joy and love and peace. Richard Burton. 106 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation THE PARTY AT CROGAN'S 'T was a foine time we had down at Crogan's ; The five av us slept not a wink, Wid a fiddle to stir up our brogans, An' plenty o' toddy to dhrink. The grog it was free as the air is, An' w r e managed to store it away; We whistled and sang like canaries. An' Who was the five, did ye say? ■ The two Crogans, that 's one ; Mike Sployd, that 's two ; Tim Horrigan 's three ; an ' meself — but there was five av us. We played forty-five. Mike was b'atin' An' Horrigan called him a cheat, Then they threw off their coats widout waitin ' An' tuk at it like dogs in the shtreet. They stirred up our blood wid their brawlin' Till we all got mixed up in the fray, The five av us pullin' an' haulin' But who was the five, did ye say ? Mike Sployd, that 's one ; Tim Horrigan 's two; the two Crogans is three; an' meself — sure, there was five av us. Pat Crogan he tuk up his fiddle, — Och, Pat is a merry gossoon ! — An' he drew the bow over the middle An' played us a bit av a chune; Material for Interpretation 107 Himself round the kitchen went prancin ', — Such a jig as Pat Crogan can play! — An' it set the whole five av us dancing Now who was the five, did ye say? Meself , that 's one : Mike Sployd, that \s two ; the two Crogans is three ; Tim Horri- gan 's four — I thought there was five av us. It was early daylight in the mor-rning When the party at Crogan 's broke up; The cock in the shed called a war-rning, An' we all tuk a turn at the cup: But the truest of friends must be parted, An' each av us then went our way, The five av us all happy hearted. But who was the five, did ye say? The two Crogans, that 's one ; Mike Sployd, that 's two; Tim Horrigan 's three; meself — och, I guess there was only four av us, afther all. Florence J. Boyce. GIVE US MEN Give us men ! Men from every rank, Fresh and free and frank; Men of thought and reading, Men of light and leading, Men of loyal breeding, The nation's welfare speeding; 108 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation Men of faith and not of fiction, Men of lofty aim in action, Give us men — I say again Give us men ! Give us men ! Strong and stalwart ones: Men whom highest hope inspires, Men whom purest honor fires. Men who trample self beneath them. Men who make their country wreathe them As her noble sons, Worthy of their sires: Men who never shame their mothers, Men who never fail their brothers, True however false all others, Give us men — I say again, i Give us men ! Give us men ! Men who when the tempest gathers Grasp the standard of their fathers In the thickest fight; Men who strike for home and altar, (Let the coward cringe and falter,) God defend the right ! True as truth though low and lonely, Tender as the brave are only; Men who tread where saints have trod, Men for country, home, and God; Give us men — I say again, Give us such men ! J. G. Holland. Material for Interpretation 109 WITH THE TIDE Somewhere I read, in an old book whose name Is gone from me, I read that when the days Of a man are counted, and his business done, There comes up the shore at evening, with the tide, To the place where he sits, a boat — And in the boat, from the place where he sits, he sees, Dim in the dusk, dim and yet so familiar, The faces of his friends long dead ; and knows They come for him, brought in upon the tide, To take him where men go at set of day. Then rising, with his hands in theirs, he goes Between them his last steps, that are the first Of the new life — and with the ebb they pass, Their shaken sail grown small upon the moon. Often I thought of this, and pictured me How many a man who lives with throngs about him, Yet straining through the twilight for that boat Shall scarce make out one figure in the stern, And that so faint its features shall perplex him With doubtful memories — and his heart hang back. But others, rising as they see the sail Increase upon the sunset, hasten down, Haiids out and eyes elated ; for they see Head over head, crowding from bow to stern, Repeopling their long loneliness with smiles, The faces of their friends ; and such go forth Content upon the ebb tide, with safe hearts. But never To worker summoned when his day was done 110 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation Did mounting tide bring in such freight of friends As stole to you up the white wintry shingle That night while they that watched you thought you slept. Softly they came, and beached the boat, and gathered In the still cove under the icy stars, Your last-born, and the dear loves of your heart, And all men that have loved right more than ease, And honor above honors ; all who gave Free-handed of their best for other men, And thought their giving taking ; they who knew Man's natural state is effort, up and up — All these were there, so great a company Perchance you marveled, wondering what great ship Had brought that throng unnumbered to the cove Where the boys used to beach their light canoe After old happy picnics — But these, your friends and children, to whose hands Committed, in the silent night you rose And took your last faint steps — These led you down, great American, Down to the Winter night and the white beach, And there you saw that the huge hull that waited Was not as are the boats of the other dead, Frail craft for a brief passage; no, for this Was first of a long line of towering transports, Storm-worn and ocean-weary every one, The ships you launched, the ships you manned, the ships That now, returning from their sacred quest With the thrice-sacred burden of their dead, Lay waiting there to take you forth with them, Out with the ebb tibe, on some farther quest. Edith Wharton. Material for Interpretation 111 THE HARBOUR I t^ink if I lay dying in some land Where Ireland is no more than just a name, My soul would travel back to find that strand From whence it came. I 'd see the harbour in the evening light, The old men staring at some distant ship, The fishing-boats they fasten left and right Beside the slip, The sea-wrack lying on the wind-swept shore, The grey thorn bushes growing in the sand; Our Wexford coast from Arklow to Cahore — My native land. The little houses climbing up the hill, Sea daisies growing in the sandy grass, The tethered goats that wait large-eyed and still To watch you pass. The women at the well with dripping pails, Their men colloguing by the harbour wall, The coils of rope, the nets, the old brown sails, I 'd know them all. And then the Angelus — I 'd surely see The swaying bell against a golden sky, So God, Who kept the love of home in me, Would let me die, W. M. Letts. SECTION IV PROSE SELECTIONS SECTION IV PROSE SELECTIONS THE SELFISH GIANT EVERY afternoon, as they were coming from school, the I children used to go and play ;n the Giant's garden. It was a large lovely garden, with soft green grass. Here and there over the grass stood beautiful flowers like stars, and there were twelve peach-trees that in the spring- time broke out into delicate blossoms of pink and pearl, and in the autumn bore rich fruit. The birds sat on the trees and sang so sweetly that the children used to stop their games in order to listen to them. One day the Giant came back. He had been to visit his friend the Cornish ogre, and had stayed with him for seven years. After the seven years were over he had said all that he had to say, for his conversation was limited, and he determined to return to his own castle. When he ar- rived he saw the children playing in the garden. "What are you doing there ?" he cried in a very gruff voice. "My own garden is my own garden. Anyone can understand that, and I will allow nobody to play in it but myself/ ' So he built a high wall all round it, and put up a notice-board. TRESPASSERS WILL BE PROSECUTED 115 116 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation He was a very selfish Giant. The poor children had now nowhere to play. They tried to play on the road, but the road was very dusty and full of hard stones, and they did not like it. They used to wander round the high wall when their lessons were over, and talk about the beautiful garden inside. Then the Spring came, and all over the country there were little blossoms and little birds. Only in the garden of the Selfish Giant it was still winter. The birds did not care to sing in it as there were no children, and the trees forgot to blossom. Once a beautiful flower put its head out from the grass, but when it saw the notice-board it was so sorry for the children that it slipped back into the ground again, and went off to sleep. The only people who were pleased were the Snow and the Frost. "Spring has forgotten this garden, so we will live here all the year round," they cried. ' ' I cannot understand why the Spring is so late in coming/ 7 said the Selfish Giant, as he sat at the window and looked out at his cold white garden ; " I hope there will be a change in the weather." But the Spring never came, nor the Summer. The Autumn gave golden fruit to every garden, but to the Giant's garden she gave none. One morning the Giant was lying awake in bed when he heard some lovely music. It sounded so sweet to his ears that he thought it must be the King's musicians passing by. It was really only a little linnet singing out- side his window, but it was so long since he had heard a bird sing in his garden that it seemed to him to be the most beautiful music in the world. He jumped out of bed and looked out. Material for Interpretation 117 He saw a most wonderful sight. Through a little hole in the wall the children had crept in, and they were sit- ting in the branches of the trees. In every tree that he could see there was a little child. And the trees were so glad to have the children back again that they had covered themselves with blossoms, and were waving their arms gently above the children's heads. The birds were flying about and twittering with delight, and -the flowers were looking up through the green grass and laughing. It was a lovely scene, only in one corner it was still winter. It was the farthest corner of the garden, and in it was stand- ing a little boy. He was so small that he could not reach up to the branches of the tree, and he was wandering all round it, crying bitterly. And the Giant's heart melted as he looked out, and he said: "How selfish I have been! Now I know why the Spring would not come here. I will put that poor little boy on the top of the tree, and then I will knock down the wall, and my garden shall be the children's play-ground for ever and ever." So he crept downstairs and opened the front door quite softly, and went out into the garden. But when the chil- dren saw him they were so frightened that they all ran away, and the garden became winter again. Only the little boy did not run, for his eyes were so full of tears that he did not see the Giant coming. And the Giant stole up behind him and took him gently in his hand, and put him up into the tree. And the tree broke at once into blossom, and the birds came and sang on it, and the little boy stretched out his two arms and flung them round the Giant's neck, and kissed him. And the other children, when they saw that the Giant was not wicked any longer, 118 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation came running back, and with them came the Spring. "It is your garden now, little children/' said the Giant, and he took a great axe and knocked down the wall. And when the people were going to market at twelve o 'clock they found the Giant playing with the children in the most beautiful garden they had ever seen. All day long they played, and in the evening they came to the Giant to bid him good-bye. " But where is your little companion? The boy I put up into the tree?" "You must tell him to be sure and come here tomorrow." But the children said that they did not know where he lived, and had never seen him before; and the Giant felt very sad. Every afternoon, when school was over, the children came and played with the Giant. But the little boy whom the Giant loved was never seen again. The Giant was very kind to all the children, yet he longed for his first little friend, and he' often said, "How I would like to see him!" Years went over, and the Giant grew very old and feeble. He could not play about any more, so he sat in a huge arm- chair, and watched the children at their games, and ad- mired his garden. "I have many beautiful flowers, but the children are the most beautiful flowers of all." One winter morning he looked out of his window as he was dressing. He did not hate the Winter now, for he knew that it was merely the Spring asleep, and that the flowers were resting. Suddenly he rubbed his eyes in wonder, and looked and looked. It certainly was a marvellous sight. In the farthest corner of the garden was a tree quite covered with Material for Interpretation 119 lovely white blossoms. Its branches were all golden, and silver fruit hung down from them, and underneath it stood the little boy he had loved. Downstairs ran the Giant in great joy, and out into the garden. He hastened across the grass, and came near to the child. And when he came quite close his face grew red with anger, and he said, "Who hath dared to wound thee?" For on the palms of the child's hands were the prints of two nails, and the prints of two nails were on the little feet. "Who hath dared to wound thee? Tell me that I may take my big sword and slay him." "Nay!" answered the child; "but these are the wounds of Love." "Who art thou?" said the Giant, and a strange awe fell on him, and he knelt before the little child. And the child smiled on the Giant, and said to him, "You let me play once in your garden, today you shall come with me to my garden, which is Paradise." And when the children ran in that afternoon, they found the Giant lying dead under the tree, all covered with white blossoms. Oscar Wilde. "HIS PLACE IN THE LINE" Without reference to geometry or astronomy, relying merely upon his own daily observations, Bennie-Boy had arrived at the reasonable conclusion that he was the exact mathematical center of the universe. This internal con- 120 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation elusion was not without reinforcements from the outside. He had been definitely told that the sun rose in the morn- ing "to kiss Bennie-Boy awake." From Lodora, his Sty- gian-hued friend in the kitchen, he learned that i ' De moon shun unner de crib an' kep' de boogoos f'm roostin'." Diana's silvery business, therefore, being to preserve him from shocks in the night-time. Such evenings as the moon evidently had engagements elsewhere, he noticed that the city authorities obligingly turned on the arc-lights for him. As for his age — he could not remember when he had been one, two, or three, but on account of pink cakes and can- dles he easily remembered the fourth, the fifth, because it instituted the circus of beginning to dress himself, and now here he was at six which had brought with it the twin amusements of brushing his teeth and going to school. He awoke quite ready for discoveries. Benjamin senior was awaking likewise, but seemed ready for nothing but sleep again and was shaking the bed with gigantic erup- tions to an accompaniment of groans. When Bennie-Boy put a^ide the shackles of slumber, he merely swept open his lashes and simultaneously slipped from his crib, the prod of immediate achievement restive within him. Pearly as to skin, satiny as to hair, baggy as to night- robe, a complete little Pierrot even as to the dabs of pink on his cheeks, he sought the bedside of the frowsy, mottled, sleep-scarred Titan and asked "Is today tomorrow?" Benjamin the Big intermitted his groans and heroically explained in words of one syllable or thereabouts, that to- morrow was an abstract and fugitive futurity whose very essence was, that it never permitted itself to be overtaken and captured by an ever pursuing present. "I know — but tell me — is today tomorrow?" "Yes" — gave in the Titan weakly. Material for Interpretation 121 "Then it 's the day I 'm going to school." 6 ' School ? You don 't say ! Why, how old are you ? ' ' "For a long time I was five going on six, then I went six while I was having a party, and now I have commenced six going on seven." The Titan smiled with his mouth and looked sad with his eyes, a habit of Titan's at times, and remarked re- flectively : "Well, you '11 have to work till your heart breaks to 'go' twenty; but after twenty, pshaw, it 's easier than falling off a log. The swiftness with which you '11 'go' thirty and forty will make your head swim." ' ' Only my head ? Won 't my body swim too ? ' ' "Urn — maybe." Here his mother came, fully appareled, and bore him off for his bath. To Bennie-Boy's knowledge, his mother never undressed and went to bed and became useless; but was always commendably garbed for service. After the bath, the teeth brushing. This was completely fascinating and he would have kept it up for ever had not his mother curtailed it. "Aren't you finished yet, Bennie-Boy?" He tasted his teeth critically. "I think so. They feel just the right slippery." "Are any of them loose yet?" "No." He felt very pale. He had placed perfect con- fidence in the stability of his teeth heretofore. "Why son-bunny, it is nothing to be frightened about. You have to lose all your first teeth." "Then how shall I bite my nails?" "You are not supposed to bite them. But you get new teeth." Bennie-Bov recalled a certain enviable attribute he had 122 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation noticed as belonging to adult jaws and inquired hopefully : "Do some of them come in gold?" "No, dear. Dress yourself." Ha! So it was upon him was it? that exhaustive, ex- hausting, continuing, non-productive calisthenics called dressing. As a mental process he knew just how to do it. For instance, one started with an undershirt. But the material crux was finding the undershirt, picking it out rather, from the bewildering miscellany which had been shucked off him the night before. Even after it was found, the trouble was anything but over, for then he had to de- termine the shirt's aperture of exit from its aperture of entrance. He had rotated it in his hands fifty times and had started on the fifty-first when his mother made the usual inquiry : "What are you trying to do?" "I am following round the ends of it to find out where it goes on me." "Whether Bennie-Boy or his mother was the one most charmed when the combination was approximated is a ques- tion. The superimposing of the Russian blouse was a mat- ter she always took in her own hands, and this finished, came breakfast. At last, he was ready to start for school. The school- ward walk had a walk's usual attractions, beginning with the huge policeman. Bennie-Boy gripped his mother's hand rather tighter when he hove in sight. Not that he was afraid of him — no, indeed ; but then he had heard there was no knowing what way a cat would jump; so why be too cocksure of a policeman? Guarded by love more safely than a king by his armies, Bennie-Boy eventually reached the schoolbuilding. Material for Interpretation 123 The preliminaries did not interest him, chiefly perhaps because they took place so high in the air above him. Finally, however, he felt himself captured by a new hand, which controlled rather than led, and found himself be- reft of hat and bereft of his senses, but in possession of a desk. "We are glad to have your little boy and we '11 make a fine scholar of him/' said the lady of the capturing hand to his mother, who was leaving. But the temperance of the lady's joy was astounding. When the door was closed, she said to her class in a shovelling snow sort of way: — "And because / am busy with a visitor is no reason why you should be." Whereupon fifty little boys and girls hurled themselves squeakingly upon their slates. And Bennie-Boy had no mother (but he had been pre- pared for that catastrophe) — had no slate — had no exist- ence, apparently. For the lady who was glad to have him forgot about him even before she promised to make him a fine scholar, remembering too much the fifty others, their deficiencies, and the progress laid down in the Course of Study. So with his chubby hands trying to fold them- selves on the desk-top in unconscious imitation of stray ex- amples set before him here and there, Bennie-Boy watched the teacher through a long forenoon drilling and grilling them, wringing tears from them, perspiration from them, all sorts of penitential juices, till his own heart wept drops of blood, in advance of demand. But underneath this pre- monitory anguish there was actuality that was sharper yet, the slowly gathered knowledge that he was ignored, neg- lected, forgotten. The chilliness of it sent many a positive 124 Modem Literature for Oral Interpretation shiver through his small body, took the warm light from his eyes, £ut a tired curve upon his lips. In time to save his sanity, giving him a new horror to contemplate, there occurred a Massacre of St. Bartholomew called Eecess, His hat miraculously dropped from some Bough of Dreams on to the desk before him, an efficient maid of five summers poked him off his seat into the aisle, and he found himself marching toward the yard in a con- stantly separating line, little girls streaking off in one di- rection, little boys in another. Little boys decorously filed down the yard steps to a nail which apparently cured them of leg-trouble and lung trouble, for each one who reached it gave a yelp and a leap and hurled his restored self into the general surge of which Bennie-Boy was the sole atom to preserve silence and dejection. If it had been hard to find himself ignored in a hub-bub of work, it was harder to be ignored in a hub-bub of play. With senses sharpened by misery, he soaked in a great deal more than his mother would ever be able to squeeze out of him — heard scraps of conversation which discounted the teamsters', and became acquainted with death from its worst side, its sportive side — furnished by a boy with a defunct frog. There was an austere, perambulating lady whom Bennie- Boy heard referred to as the "Yar '-Teach'. " The mission of the "Yar '-Teach' " seemed to be to walk devastatingly among her young charges stiffening them into seemliness, then to turn, still more devastatingly, and surprise relaxa- tions which had taken place behind her back. The boy in a most magnificent state of relaxation was sternly waved to a seat on the Bench, where he proceeded to have the time of his life, making faces at the Yar '-Teacher's back, and kicking his companions in exile. To make faces behind a person's back was something entirely new to Bennie-Boy. Material for Interpretation 125 Heretofore he had held no conceptions of any warfare that was not done valiantly face to face with the enemy. The doctrines of Expediency and Concealment whispered their doctrines in his small ear for the first time. f At last, a bell sounded. In miraculous obedience to it every yell and scuffle died and petrified. The hen-like twit- ter of the little girls on the other side of a high board fence ceased also. Millennium ! It was wonderful ! Then an- other bell, and more wonderful, still, an orderly forming of lines was instituted, little boys stretched from fence to fence in lines like trees, as straight, as unswerving, as if drawn up by a giant's ruler. Bennie-Boy, watching in fascination, grew from a spectator into an abject spectacle, the fact dawning slowly upon him, as it had dawned long ago on the others — that he alone in all the orderly world was making chaos. From the center of the universe, he had fallen to be a clog in its wheel. Every eye was boring him accusingly. The glances seared him with all the real agony of hot irons. What, in Heaven's dear name did they want him to do ? "Find your place in the line," came the voice of the "Yar'-Teach'," and it was not in balmy helpfulness but in icy censure. "Find your place in line," was what she had said, and she might just as well have said : "Concomitate your centrifugal infinity" for all the meaning her words had for him. Mercifully, someone took him by the shoulder and tweaked him into the oblivion where he belonged, and march, march, marching began again, till, with the magical reappearance of lines of little girls, the class found itself in its own room, and in its own seats. The only time when Bennie-Boy seemed to participate 126 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation in affairs to the slightest degree was purely accident,, then his participation was not cheerfully active, but as tire- somely passive as all the rest had been. With his mates he listened to a "Nature Talk." It consisted chiefly in a harrowing disclosure about the private life of a cow — how she reared up a beautiful bossy-infant for herself and manufactured milk for it, chewing early and late, only to have both infant and commissary thieved from her. Al- though it was amelioratingly explained — the cow had no real maternal love, only instinct, which was the very identi- cal same thing only it wasn't — how she was tortured by flies, oft-times by thirst and how finally she exchanged her integral existence upon the grassy verdures of sylvan fields for a section distribution upon the hooks of meat-markets. The nature talk over, the others had to draw a sectional quadrilateral cow upon their slates, but Bennie-Boy not having this article, very sensibly went to sleep and let so- ciety giddily whirl about him, as it fully intended to do and was competent of doing. The capable maiden of five summers woke him by affixing his hat to his head with a vim that suggested it was a hatch instead of a hat and needed a deal of battering down. Then she shoved him efficiently into the aisle and the lines commenced to march again, this time for freedom for the day. At home, he sought hurriedly for his toys and occupied himself with their astonishing newness. He had been sep- arated from them for the dark length of an Arctic night. His mother tried to pry information from him, but his salvation was silence. "I can't get a word from him," she confided to the Titan, across Bennie-Boy 's head at the tea-table. "Yes, I know every mother thinks her child intelligent, Material for Interpretation 127 but Bennie-Boy is, and I 'm sure the teacher was agree- ably surprised at his proficiency. He knows every one of his letters. Didn't she say anything nice to you, Bennie- Boy?" Bennie-Boy accommodatingly began to think. Had she spoken to him at alH She had. "She said I was a bright child/' said Bennie-Boy slowly. Then he heroically thought farther. "The brightest she ever had." "There/' said his mother triumphantly. "Here!" said his father tumultuously, laying a quarter of a dollar on Bennie-Boy 's plate. Bennie-Boy, up to this time the incarnate smiler, eyed the money with a distrustful frown. There was something not quite right ^bout it, though for the life of him he could not explain why or wherefore. On the top of what was surely complications enough, in came Lodora with a new one in the guise of a glass of milk. "Hyar 's yer milk f 'r yo', honey, w'at cle caow sent yo' wid her love." But he had learned a thing or two about that cow. This milk was her offspring's. And she had no love. The whole message was a silly fiction. And Lodora, by virtue of size and maturity of her color must know it. She, therefore, had been a tolerant, perhaps, contemptuous participator in a lying system of cajolery. Surely his mother — ? Surely his father — ? Were they not to be believed? — were they? With the establishing of the doubt, the whole glittering kingdom of his babyhood fell in clattering ruins around him, never to be built back. The world was not his prop- erty, he was the world's — perhaps. The universe was not one little boy, but hundreds and thousands of little boys. 128 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation stretching in vanishing lines of order. The new universe did not want him, did not need him, but offered a place in its lines— if he could find the place. If ! What was there to smile about? So, with downcast lashes, and down-curved lips, Bennie-Boy reached reluct- antly for his glass. "He is cross," accused his mother. "He 's tired," defended his father. But Bennie-Boy was neither. The cloud upon his soft face came from a distance so remote that he could not even guess about it. Somewhere — away, away off, on the edge of the fields of Endeavor — his life's sun had risen high enough to strike for the first time the mile-post of his Manhood. And the long shadow of it touched him even where he sat. Marion Hill. THE WORLD'S SUBLIMEST SPECTACLE I thank the ruler of my mortal circumstances that it has been my fortune once to see the Grand Canon of the Colorado. No mortal eye has ever held so great a scene. I should be ashamed— as any American' should be ashamed — if, by my own choice, I had looked on Egyptian Pyramid, or Asian height, or European alp, and never seen my own country's glory in this sublimest spectacle of all the world. It is one great gulch of grandeur let down into the eter- nities. It is the soul and substance of all the mountains and all the chasms, of all the deeps and all the heights, sculptured and chiseled, majestically masoned, and mag- Material for Interpretation 129 nificently upholstered in myriad splendors of light and shadow, of shape and color, by the Lord God Almighty. Here are vast Gibraltars that no artillery of earth could ever shake. Here are alhambras more splendid than any sultan's dream. Here are thrones too magnificent for any mortal king — the heights unspeakable, depths unutterable, and colors divine; crimson falling softly into brown, old gold fading into violet, domes of chalcedony on temples of porphyry, auroras crouching splendid among the rocks, and mighty cathedrals of purple and gold, where sunrise and sunset are married to the setting of a rainbow ring. No canvas or camera has ever caught the grandeur of the Canon. No pen or tongue has ever done justice to this matchless peroration of the universe. Put away words! There is nothing to do before this unspeakable glory but to be silent and still, while the poor cramped soul beats against its bosom for expression, and in the impotence of all human speech simply whispers, i ' God ! ' ' John Temple Graves. WHEN MA RODGERS BROKE LOOSE x It was a hot, smothery July morning. Heat waves shimmered above the thick white dust of the country road, and the sun broiled down upon the vegetable-patch beside it with fierce intensity. As Ma Rodgers stood in the kitchen doorway, a huge tin pan in one hand and a sunbonnet in the other, she sighed a meek little sigh, for she was tired. She had been at work many hours already, and the prospect of gathering peas in that pitiless heat was not an inviting one. But i Copyrighted J. B. Lippincott Co., Aug., 1911. 130 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation the sigh was followed by a smile as she put on her sun- bonnet and hurried down the path, saying to herself, "Oh, well, I ought to be glad I have any peas to gather." Ma Rodgers had what might be termed an "Oh, well' 7 disposition. If she wanted to go anywhere and was dis- appointed, she said to herself, "Oh, well, I hadn't any- thing to v/ear," and if sometimes she wished she had a new dress, she said, "Oh, well, I don't go many places to wear it." A unique epitaph found in a quaint graveyard ran thus : "She was so pleasant," and that is the best description that could be given of Ma Rodgers — she was so pleasant. She was pleasant when she came down in the morning, which is more than can be said of most people; she was pleasant all through a hard, worrying day, and she was pleasant when she went to bed at night, tired past all belief and aching in every joint. She had made herself a slave to her husband and to her boy >and girl, and, as is often the way with families, they had let her do it. They never noticed that she was wear- ing out, that she was always tired and always shabby. They were used to her sacrifices and they actually never realized them. At least this much credit is due them. The sun was still broiling down on the vegetable-patch, and the July morning was an hour older, when Eliza Bon- ner, carrying a large basket, came up the front path and scowled darkly at the picture of Susan Rodgers lolling in the hammock under a tree, reading a novel. Eliza had a sharp face, a spare frame, a shrewd mind, a big, kind heart which she went to all sorts of trouble to conceal. "Susan, where 's your Ma?" she asked sourly. "What je say? Oh, Ma! I dunno. I guess she 's down in the garden." Material for Interpretation 131 "Humph!" quoth Eliza shortly, and passed around the side of the house. Just as she reached the back steps, Ma Rodgers came wavering up from the garden. She had pushed her bonnet back to get air; her face was purple, and perspiration streamed from every feature. The swol- len veins on her forehead and neck throbbed visibly. She smiled bravely, and sank down in a little heap on the step in the shade of the arbor. "My!" she panted, ''it 's hot, ain't it? But the peas are fine ! ' ' Eliza shut her mouth into a straight line. She always hated interfering, but injustice made her so mad that the words just boiled up, and she had hard work to keep them from boiling over. "My!" said Ma Rodgers, wiping her dripping face with her apron. ' ' Seems 's if I 'd never cool off, ' ' Eliza's mouth opened. "Why didn't you git Susan to help you?" "Oh, well, she 's readin' a story, an' I hated to ast her." "Why didn't Jim Rodgers or Joe pick 'em las' night, afore sundown?" "Why you know, they like 'em right fresh picked, an' seems 's if they do taste better." All of a sudden Eliza boiled over : "The trouble with you is, you 're too pleasant, Jane Rodgers, an' your family jest tromp over you. If your bein' pleasant clone anybody any good, I wouldn't say a word, but it don't. It don't do any good to you, that 's certain, fer everybody jest natchurally puts on you because you ain't got gumption enough to object; and it don't do them any good, fer they 're turnin' into tho laziest, selfish- est lot o' lumps I ever set eyes on." 132 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation Ma Rodgers gasped out, "I 've tried so hard to bring 'em up right. " "I know yon Ve tried, but you ain't succeeded, because you ain't gone about it right. If you want folks to be o' some use in the world, don't wait on 'em hand an' foot. Make 'em wait on 3^ou. "Look at that big loppos of a husband o' your'n! You on your knees, after a hard day's washin', takin' off his shoes an' puttin 7 on his slippers fer 'im. 'T ain't no won- der people use you fer a doormat when you crawl right under their feet. An' look at 'im — he ain't got any more manners than a pig, all because you got 'im out o' the habit. "Look at that fat son o' your'n in front o' the fire, winter days, with his feet cocked up an' a book in his hand, yellin', 'Ma, the fire needs attention,' an' never even lookin' up with a word o' thanks when you come staggerin' in w T ith both arms full o' logs an' stirrin' up the fire to keep him warm. ' ' Look at that saucy snub of a daughter. Instead o ' her hustlin' roun' to git breakfast fer you, she lays abed an' lets you bring 'er coffee an' rolls in the mornin', because she read about it in a book onct. "An' what good 's it goin' to do 'em? They may be more comf'bable now, but it can't keep on ferever, fer you 're wearin' yourself out, an' when you die, nobody 's goin' to do things fer 'em, fer nobody '11 like 'em well enough. They 're growin' too hateful an' selfish. "I hope I ain't spoke too plain — but it 's all Gawspel truth. What you want to do is to break loose some o' these days an ' scare the wits out of 'em. Then maybe they '11 sit up an ' take notice. Material for Interpretation 133 "Well, I must be goin'. Good-bye, Jane, an' don't let yourself git overhet like this again — if you kin help it." Then she remembered why she had come, and, stooping, she took out of her basket an enormous pan filled with some- thing redolent of cinnamon and brown sugar. This she carefully carried inside and placed on the table, saying as she came out, "I baked buns this morning, an' I wanted you should have some. I didn't take 'em out of the pan, because they 're so gooey. You kin bring back the pan when you 've a mind to." And primly she descended the steps and went her way. Ma Rodgers sat stunned. She never even thanked Eliza for the buns. Her mind had no room for anything but what Eliza had said about him and the children. "Was it true? Was she making them so nobody would like them? She had never thought of anything except that she loved them so dearly that she wanted to make everything easier for them. Eliza had s'aid they were hateful and selfish. They were n't hateful, but then, of course, she never crossed them. Selfish ! Now that she thought of it, they never did try to do anything for her — or for anybody. She sat and thought and thought and tried to reason it out. If it had been just for her own comfort, she would never have bothered. But the thing that rankled was that she was doing them harm instead of good. Finally, with a funny mixture of fright and resolution on her face, she got up and went around the side of the house. "Susan," she said, with a little quaver in her voice, "I wish you 'd help me shell the peas. I 'm afraid dinner '11 be late." ^** "Oh, Ma, I can't," Susan complained. "I 'm just in the middle of this book, ' ' 134 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation Ma Rodgers went back to the kitchen-step and stood there. Yes, there was no doubt of it: Susan was selfish; and nothing mild-mannered would cure her of it. She had tried politeness, now she 'd have to "break loose/' as Eliza had told her. Suddenly she whirled about, rushed around to the ham- mock, and snatched the book out of Susan's hand. "Now," she said, before the astonished girl could get her breath, "you hike around there and shell them peas as fast as you kin shell. An', what 's more, you don't git a peek in this book until you 've done a day's work. After you 've helped with the meals an' washed the dishes an' cleaned up, you kin think about readin'. " Ma Eodgers had hard work to retain the look of stern command throughout this long speech, for Susan looked so funny and got out of the hammock so fast that it was as much as Ma Rodgers could do to keep from looking astonished herself. As Susan went out of sight, Ma Rodgers suddenly sat down in the hammock, more to keep herself from falling than anything else, for her knees had begun to give under her. Then she got to thinking it all over again, and, as she thought, she swung gently back and forth. It was pleasant there, cool and shady, and a little breeze fanned her as she swung. Then she wondered how it would feel to lie down and swing. With a childish look of mischief and apprehension on her face, she let herself sink into the depths of the hammock, gave herself a last mighty push, and then tucked both feet in clear of the ground. Up she swung, down she swung; up again, down again. The air rushed past her, a little less each time, and delightfully cool and soothing. The birds sang and the insects hummed. Material for Interpretation 135 The motion of the hammock had quieted to a little swaying, this way, that way. With a smothered chuckle, she remem- bered a game of childhood — she was "letting the old cat die." She wondered what people would say. She won- dered what Susan — The miracle had happened. Ma Rodgers was asleep in the hammock in the middle of the day. Through a heavenly dream of rest and joy and wild free- dom, a feeling of impending doom filtered. Blacker and more insistent it became. Eestlessly she stirred, and finally opened her eyes on the awe-struck face of Susan standing beside the hammock. "I Ve shelled the peas, an' pared the potatoes, but I dunno what else to do, an' Pa an' Joe are just comin' over the hill." Ma Rodgers flew up in a panic. Pa and Joe ! And din- ner could n 't be on time, and they always fussed so if it was five minutes late. She scrambled out of the hammock and rushed back to the kitchen. Breathlessly she put on the water for the vegetables, and ran here and there, after the meat and milk and butter ; and then in they came. "Gee, I 'm hungry," growled Joe. "Ain't dinner ready, Ma?" Pa Rodgers walked over to the fire and grumbled, ' c Why don't ye put some wood in this fire? Looks to me 's if dinner won't be ready fer an hour." A violent trembling fit took possession of Ma Rodgers, and her hand shook so that she dropped the butter-dish, butter and all; and then she "broke loose." "No, and what 's more, it won't ever be ready without 'n you two big lazy things git out there in the woodshed an' chop some wood. Do you think I 'm goin' to work my fingers to the bone doin' two or three women's work an' 136 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation then do men's work beside? Not much, I ain't! You git out there an' hustle in that wood. No wood, no dinner. Quick, now! Don't stand starin' like a couple o' calves." With that, she flounced out of the room, skilfully dropping an apron over a little pile of wood she had chopped that morning. Silently, in a dazed sort of way, the two men passed on out to the woodshed. Ma Rodgers, watching through the crack of the door, rocked back and forth with suppressed laughter, their faces were so unutterably funny, and they walked along so meekly. For a while, in the w T oodshed, there was no sound save that of chopping. Then Joe raised his head. "Say, Pa," he said, "what you reckon 's the matter with Ma?" Pa shook his head gloomily. "Dunno. Never seen 'er in sech a tantrum" and then the chopping went on. In the meanwhile, Ma Rodgers told Susan to set the table, and then she surreptitiously stuffed her own little pile of wood into the fire, and soon the dinner was merrily cooking. By the time Joe and his father entered with great armfuls of wood, everything was nearly done. She glanced at the wood as they put it down, and said, "Well, you were so long .about it, the fire started up of its own accord. Next time, see that the wood-box is filled be- fore you leave in the morning." It pretty nearly killed her to say this, she was naturally so grateful for anything done for her, but she knew it would never do to back down so soon, if she expected any lasting benefit. At the table, they all looked so subdued she could hardly keep her face straight. She looked at her plate to hide the mischievous look in her eyes, and then she said : "Susan, I want you should learn to make cake. Two Material for Interpretation 137 weeks from tomorrow is the church picnic. I 'm agoin', so we '11 need two cakes. I '11 make one, an ' you kin make the other." Three mouths hung wide open in amazement. For years, Ma Rodgers had made the good things for the rest of them to take to the picnic, but she had always stayed home. She had always said she had nothing to wear. Susan and Joe gasped out, "You goin' to the picnic!" And Pa Rodgers said, "Why, Ma, you ain't got nothin' to wear." "I said I was goin' to the picnic, an' I meant I was goin' to the picnic. As fer havin' nothin' to wear, Jim Rodgers, it 's about time I did have somethin' to wear, an' you kin have till tomorrow to get me ten dollars to buy somethin' with, an' then I '11 have two weeks to make it in. Jest be- cause I 've been a fool an' a fright all my life ain't any reason why I should always be a fool an' a fright. Now, then! An' fer goodness' sake, shet your mouths. You look like I dunno what, that way." For two weeks the dazed look never left the faces of Pa Rodgers and Joe and Susan. They were at the beck and call of Ma Rodgers, who scolded and complained and com- manded. Everything went like clockwork, and Ma Rodgers grew less and less tired, and sewed secretly on her new clothes with a feeling of lawlessness and wild abandon. The only thing that troubled her was a sensation of distress at the thought of how the others must feel, and what they must think of her. The day of the picnic arrived. With Susan's help the hampers had been packed with a delicious lunch, and Ma Rodgers had gone upstairs to dress. Somehow, she could not get rid of the feeling that the rest of the family would not enjoy the picnic — they seemed so depressed and meek 138 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation and quiet. However, -when she finally put on her new dress, she forgot everything else in the elation of that mo- ment. The dress was a soft, gray dimity, and Ma Rodgers, who was a born dressmaker, although she had hitherto used her art only to beautify Susan, had made it with skillful hands and had lightened it up with the tiniest, deftest touches of pale old rose. Her hair, which for years she had worn strained back into a tight little knot because it took less time from her work, she had brushed and brushed until it glinted with silver lights, and had then combed it loosely and heaped it rather high on her head. Then she donned a silver gray toque with a few crushed roses of pale old-rose color at the side, and the effect was such that she pinched herself to see if she was awake. Her cheeks were brilliant, and her eyes were surely never that blue ! With her gray silk gloves swinging in one hand, she al- most ran downstairs, and from the hall she could see Jim Rodgers sitting by the kitchen window. She stopped »and caught her breath, and then she raised her head high and entered the room with an air such as she always thought she would have if she ever had the clothes to bear it out. Jim looked up, and his paper went fluttering to the floor. For two weeks he had looked astonished, but now he looked transfixed. Then slowly he rose from his chair, never tak- ing his eyes from her. "Why, Janie," he said softly, breathlessly. "Why, Janie!" The color came and went in Ma Rodgers' face, and her lips trembled. "Well, Jim, how do I look!" Jim reached out both hands and took her gently by the shoulders. Material for Interpretation 139 "You look like a peach-blossom in the sun," he said wonderingly. Ma Rodgers swallowed hard several times, and then she gave a little giggle. "My! I do hope I ain't agoin' to mess myself all up crying but seems 's if I do feel terrible queer. There \s somethin' I 've got to git off my mind before this picnic. Here come the children, an' I '11 tell you all to onct." "Without giving them time to express their astonishment at her appearance, she started right in to tell them how somebody had opened her eyes to what she was doing to them, and how she had resolved to change tRings. Ever since, she had been scolding and ordering until she herself w r as in danger of becoming a tyrant, so she thought it was time to talk things over, and come to some sort of an agree- ment whereby they all might help one another and all be happy and pleasant. "Seem 's if I just couldn't go to this picnic with you all thinkin' me so disagreeable." They all looked at one another, and then they started to laugh. "Oh, Ma," said Susan, "I 'm so glad an' so relieved, an' I '11 just love to help you now." "Me, too," laughed Joe. "Yes," said Pa Rodgers; "we all will. It 's just that we didn't think, Janie, an' you didn't give us a chance." "Well, you '11 git all the chance you want now. No- body '11 ever say again that I spoil you. Now, who 's goin' to the picnic?" Chattering and laughing, they scrambled joyfully into the carriage, and off they went. It was one of those soft, breezy, idea*l days which belong 140 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation in early June, but which come at rare times in July, after a storm, when all the world looks new and the air is fresh and sweet. Ma Rodgers sat beside Susan on the back seat, and as she looked at the beautiful country and breathed in the rest- fulness of it all and felt the happiness of those around her, it seemed as if she could hardly bear the joy of it. She glanced at Susan and found her staring at her with a strange, intense expression. ' ' My land, Susan ! What are you lookin ' at ? ' ' "I 'in lookin' at you. You 're prettier 'n anything I ever saw," said Susan shyly. Tears rose to Ma Rodgers' eyes, and she grasped Susan's hand tightly in her own, realizing a companionship which had never been possible before. And so they sat until they arrived at the picnic grounds, when the first person to pass their way was Eliza Bonner. Pa Rodgers and Susan and Joe were on their way to greet some friends, and Ma Rodgers had stopped to tuck a snowy napkin a little more securely over a well filled hamper in the back of the carriage. Eliza nodded sourly to the three, and said to Susan : "How 's your Ma?" "Why, there she is, you kin ask her yourself." Eliza looked at the figure in gray and flushed darkly, thinking that Susan was joking. Then Ma Rodgers turned around. Eliza gasped. t ' Jane Rodgers ! ' ' she stuttered. ' i 'T ain 't never in the world you ! ' ' "Yes, 'tis, Eliza. I broke loose, like you told me to. Come on somewheres, an' I '11 tell you all about it." Hicks Bates Broderson. Arranged by Gertrude E. Johnson. Material for Interpretation 141 THE CONVERSION OF JOHNNY HARRINGTON The group of children on the school playground dis- integrated violently, as if under the force of some great shock. Then they drew together again, warily, yet yield- ing to a fascination that overcame every other considera- tion. The compelling force seemed indicated by the shrill voice of a small boy, raised in excited speech; above the heads of the gaping children flashed a pair of recl-mittened hands, with which their owner energetically sawed the air as enforcement of his argument. ' ' Oh-h-h ! Johnny Harrington ! ' ' squealed a horrified little girl, timidly skirting the circle. "How dast you say such things!" For reply, Johnny Harrington crowded on more daring. He -jeered at her. He was not more than eight, and, though very ragged as to clothing, he was whole and sturdy as to body. His blue toes cropped out shamelessly from the burst leather of his shoe-tips ; the cap on the back of his head was a mere symbol of what it had once been. But the authority of his manner and expression was surprising. He was a born fighter, a preacher of truth, a hater of shams, and a self-appointed Star of Bethlehem to his school-mates, squirming in a world of darkness. "Huh! You kids make me sick. Ain't I told you! Don't I know ! He 's just nothin' but a fat old man with a big belly and a false beard. " This was too much. Several of the circle shrank back in horror, and Evelyn Johnson, one of his most loyal admirers, uttering what was as near to a ladylike scream as her years permitted, wholly upset by the combined shock of Johnny's language and the grim skepticism of his conclu- sions, departed with ostentatious hauteur. Johnny sniffed 142 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation in lofty derision. "Huh! Evelyn's only a girl. Girls don't know no better. But we ought to ; we 're boys ! Let 'er go. Sissy ! Writin' to Santy Claus ! I ? d rather never git nothin' than be such a fool kid. My mother gits me all I want. She give me these mittens 'cos my hands was cold. Christmas she '11 fill my stockin'. It 's your mothers that does it, I tell yeh! An' yer fathers. It ain't no Santy Claus. 'Cos why? 'Cos there ain't no sech thing. He 's just a fake." The December wind whistled by Johnny's ears. The December cold bit Johnny's toes. There was an ominous and unsympathetic chill in the silence all about him. He thrust his mittened hands deep into his two pockets and bit his lip. Johnny was gaining his first knowledge of the world's attitude toward the bearer of unwelcome tidings. He was alone with his advanced views. During the days that followed, Johnny's position was a trying one. Boys and girls who used to play Johnny's games, take Johnny's orders, and generally await Johnny's pleasure, now spent their leisure hours comparing Christmas lists. Tiring of this enforced isolation, Johnny joined one of these groups the week before Christmas. "I got a list, too," he observed ingratiatingly. They looked up with brightening faces. Miss Evelyn Johnson uttered a shriek of welcome. "Oh, Johnny, then you do b 'lieve in Santy, after all ! I 'm just as glad ! ' ' "Santy nothin'," observed Johnny Harrington rudely. "I 've a list fer me mother. See! She '11 git the things. Miss Mayhew wrote it out for me to give her, so she won't forget nothin'." One pair of skates, One flying machine, Material for Interpretation 143 One pair boxing gloves, One ball and bat. "That 's all I want. Gee, I 'm glad I ain't countin' on no Santy Clans to git down the chimley with 'em. ' ' Miss Johnson rose. "I ain't goin' to stay here, then," she observed nippingly. "If Santy Glaus sees me talking to you, he '11 think I don't believe in him, either, and then p'raps I won't get nothing from him." She departed hurriedly, and her companions faded away with her, leaving Johnny alone. Johnny found himself practically ostracized during the remaining days before Christmas. Touched by his isolation, his teacher, Miss Mayhew, spoke of it to the superintendent of the Sunday- school that Johnny Harrington adorned on occasions when his duties permitted him to be present. "He 's having a sad time," she added, when she had told the story, "and I 'm afraid he 's going to be dreadfully dis- appointed at Christmas. Of course his poor mother can't buy those presents for him. She has all she can do to feed him." The superintendent nodded sympathetically. He remem- bered Johnny, and liked him. "Perhaps we can help you out. He 's a fine youngster, but he 's a bit too cocksure of things. He needs a lesson. We '11 have some fun with him. It will do him good. Just leave it to me." Miss Mayhew thankfully left it to him, and Mr. Henry Mason thereupon included in the plans for his Sunday- school Christmas celebration one or two features not orig- inally on his program. Christmas brought a grievous disappointment to Johnny Harrington. He had refused to debase his intellect by 144 Modem Literature for Oral Interpretation hanging up a stocking, but he had deigned to facilitate the convenience of his mother by putting at the head of his bed a large chair on which she might lay the packages con- taining his gifts. When he opened his eyes Christmas morning, they fell on objects whose bulk and shape were such that the shock brought Johnny upright. But, of course, he thought, there must be some mistake. Mrs. Harrington, who was already up and about, ap- peared at the door. "Get right up, Johnny. I want you to do some errands for me/' she said briskly. Man though he was, Johnny 's eight-year-old voice nearly broke. ' ' Say, Ma! Are those things for me?" "Yes, Johnny. Merry Christmas ! ' ' "Merry Christmas, Ma! Say — is those things all you got?" "All there is this year, Johnny. Mebbe next year we can get the air-ships an' autymobiles an' things. Now you get up." She departed, and for a sickening moment Johnny Har- rington buried his red head in his thin pillow. He remem- bered how often he had sworn that he would rather go without things than believe in i ' guff. ' ' Well, he was going without them ; there was no doubt of that. That afternoon Johnny graced the annual Christmas cele- bration given for the children of St. Giles' church. His modesty, as well as his ragged clothing and bare toes, prompted him to take an inconspicuous seat far in the rear of the big assembly room. Around him, and stretching row after row before him, sat boys and girls he knew — girls wearing pink and blue bows, and cuddling new dolls and Teddy bears; boys with clean collars, immaculate clothes, and hair flattened to their heads' by vigorous brushing. Clean, respectable believers in Santa Glaus, Johnny re- Material for Interpretation 145 membered this and regarded the backs of their heads with stolid scorn. On the stage stood a Christmas tree — a really wonderful Christmas tree. Johnny Harrington drew his breath sharply as he looked. Presents enough for every one. Pos- sibly some for him ! But he dared not hope. Already to- day be had experienced one grievous blow. He could not face the prospect of another. He was aware that Mr. Mason, the Sunday-school super- intendent, was saying a few words of welcome, and making a few mild jokes suited to fresh young minds. Then there was a stir, a great outburst of applause, and an awed silence. A huge, fat, red figure, with a red cap and a long white beard, flowing down his chest, was bowing to the children in response to Mr. Mason's introduction. "Santy Claus!" Johnny Harrington's lips curled. He shuffled in his seat and looked defiantly ahead. Santa Claus was speaking. "I ? m glad to be with you to-day, my dear children, be- cause Mr. Mason tells me that you Ve been a pretty good lot of boys and girls this year. I dropped into some of your houses last night, where my boys and girls live — those who believe in me, and were expecting me. I couldn't disap- point those boys and girls. Of course I did not go to the houses where children live who do not believe in me." A shudder ran through the assemblage. Were there in- deed such? Then every child who knew Johnny Harring- ton remembered him, and dozens of eyes turned slowly and regarded him with severe disapproval. As if they pointed the way, the eyes of Santa Claus turned upon him, too. Down the spine of Johnny Harrington there ran a long, icy shiver. Santa Claus resumed slowly, benign but awesome. "I 146 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation hear that there is one — boy — present — who does' not believe in me ! ' ' This was terrible. A great lump rose in the throat of Johnny Harrington. He resolutely swallowed it, and averted his eyes from the horror-struck face of Evelyn Johnson, turned palely upon him. "I want to meet that boy. If Johnny Harrington is present, I invite him to stand up ! " To this distinguished request, Johnny Harrington did not respond. It was not the stubborn pride of intellect. It was a strange weakness in his knees. His head swam. His tongue felt stiff in his mouth. Then, all at once the children near him became ostentatiously officious. They punched him and pushed him. For a moment Johnny be- lieved he was experiencing a dreadful nightmare. Finally, partly by his own efforts, partly with the help of others, he got on to his feet and stood awaiting his doom. His legs shook under him. His freckled face showed the freckles more than usual — it was so white. But he held his head high, and his eyes looked straight at the roly-poly red figure on the platform. "So that is Johnny Harrington. The boy who doesn't believe in me. Well, well! Now, Johnny, I want you to come right down here. ' ' This was like being summoned to the block. The other children stopped talking and pointing, and awaited further developments in awe-struck silence. No journey that Johnny Harrington ever made in later life seemed as end- less to him as that slow progress from the back to the front of the great hall. Never had he experienced before the feeling that the world was looking at him. His teeth chat- tered in his head. His eyes rolled widely. But he set his jaws pugnaciously, and somehow made his way, under the Material for Interpretation 147 eyes of his associates, down to the burly figure that awaited him. "I think this is positively cruel!" whispered Miss May- hew, anxiously. "I didn't know it would be as hard on him as that. Poor little fellow !" "Do him good," answered the superintendent, senten- tiously. "Look at the pluck of the chap! He 's scared to death, but he 's taking it gamely. I think I '11 keep an eye on that youngster, and do something for him. He 's worth it. ' ' Johnny Harrington, unaware of this rosy prospect, and with no conviction whatever that he was heroic, was shiver- ing under the keen eyes of Santa Claus. "Now, Johnny," said that gentleman, when the child finally stood before him, "I want to say this to you. You can think what you please. Nobody cares much what you think. But when you go about in school for weeks telling other boys and girls that there is no Santa Claus, and trying to destroy their faith in me and their happiness in Christ- mas, I don't like it. Do you understand?" "Ye-ye-yes, sir," said Johnny Harrington, humbly. "That 's all right. Remember that in future. Now I want you to come up here while I give away all these pres- ents. I want you to see me doing my work. Then you can make up your mind whether there is a Santa Claus or not," He motioned Johnny to a chair, and the pale child stum- bled forward and sank heavily into it, At first he was so dazed by the strangeness of his situation that he saw noth- ing but rows of heads and fluttering ribbon. Then, as Santa Claus now disregarded him wholly and set actively about the business of the day, he was able to realize his unique position, and even to grasp some of its advantages. 148 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation He was a little embarrassed hy the prominence of his feet in their torn shoes, but he soon discovered that he could effectively and unobtrusively tuck them out of sight behind several large packages. This manoeuver effected, he sat up, looked about, drew a deep breath, and began to enter into the spirit of the occasion. Santa was stout, and the room was warm. His make-up, moreover, did not facilitate his labors. He reached up for packages from the tree and down for packages from the floor with increasing difficulty. The quick eyes of Johnny Harrington saw this. "I kin pick up all the packages," he whispered help- fully, "if you '11 just call off the names. You must be tired after bein' up all night." Santa Claus grinned at him, almost lovingly. "Well, rather. And some of those chimneys were an awfully tight fit. for a fat man." Johnny's heart leaped. This was indeed close associa- tion with the great — and surely Santa Claus had forgiven him, or he wouldn't talk in that friendly way. Charac- teristically, Johnny Harrington fell to work, handing out packages, helping to unfasten strings, saving the star per- former in every way he could, and doing it all with entire good-will and utter lack of self -consciousness. He had for- gotten his ragged clothes and his torn shoes. He had wholly failed to realize that he himself was getting no presents at all. He was merely a busy, happy small boy, doing the work that lay before him with all his heart and soul. Suddenly Santa Claus uttered an ex- clamation. "Well, well! Here's a familiar name. ' Johnny Har- rington?' " he read at last. "Is Johnny Harrington pres — ? Why, yes. Of course he is. I must have brought Material for Interpretation 149 something for him, after all! I suppose I had forgotten that he didn't believe in me." He turned and handed the package to the small boy, and Johnny's heart leaped as he opened it. It had not sur- prised him to receive no gifts at all. It did not overcome him to receive one now. He was, in his way, a philosopher, and took life as he found it. But it was gratifying to dis- cover that this package held no candy cane ; no orange ; and no colored ball. Instead, it offered him one of his dearest dreams — a pair of skates. And^ attached to them, as if to make the gift wholly complete, was a pair of stout-soled new shoes. Johnny drew a long breath. Skates and shoes ! Shoes and skates ! And his small friends were applauding wildly as he stared at the gifts. His heart swelled almost painfully. Miss Mayhew, looking at the boy with a very soft light in her eyes, could have told something about the donor of these gifts, but Johnny, in his newborn faith, was not likely to glance that way. He was looking up at Santa Claus now with something in his eyes which touched that matter- of-fact gentleman. » "I 'm awfully sorry I said you was n't — there was n't — " Johnny began haltingly. Santa Claus waved a mittened hand. "Oh, that 's all right. Don't mention it. Why, I believe there 's something else here with your name on it, too." He produced another package, and Johnny opened it. A tool-box, full of tools! Johnny gasped. The room whirled about him. He turned to the stout figure in red to express his thanks, but Santa was already very busy with other packages, and Johnny, dropping his own concerns, plunged into his work again with renewed alacrity. As he lifted and pulled down and untied packages, he studied Santa Claus carefully. The back of his head had 150 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation an oddly familiar look, that puzzled him ; so did a ring on his left hand, since Santa Glaus had taken off his mittens. His voice, too, had a familiar sound — was even like one he had heard many times before. In dreams, or where? Santa Claus, tired and anxious to finish his task, was get- ting more hurried, more careless. His wig was slipping out of place. He became more tantalizingly familiar to Johnny. Johnny stared, and pondered. He received other gifts — a serviceable suit of clothes, a new cap, an overcoat, a muffler. His face shone as he took them, but he had assumed a new T expression, over which Miss Mayhew and the superintendent felt vaguely puzzled. "Well, I guess that \s about all, children," said Santa at last. "But before we separate" — he paused impressively — "there 's one thing more to be done. "You will remember/' he said, "that when we met to- day we had with us one little boy — just one little boy — who did not believe in Santa Claus. "I think that the little boy has now changed his mind. I think that now he does believe in Santa Claus. I think it would be very nice if, before we separate to-day, my young friend, Johnny Harrington, stood up and told us what he thinks of me now." A hush fell upon the schoolroom. Breathlessly, the chil- dren w'aited to see what Johnny would do, to hear what the erstwhile fiery rebel would say. Johnny rose modestly. "Course I would n't say nothin' 'less you ast me. But I know more 'n ever that the gentle- man here isn't really Santy Claus at all. I kin tell you jest who he is. I didn't know him myself at first, but pretty quick I did. Just as soon as I saw his ring an' the big black mole on the back of his neck I knew it was — " Material for Interpretation 151 But the situation was too much for the grown persons present. Santa Claus succumbed to what seemed an apo- plectic seizure. Mr. Mason hurriedly left the hall through a convenient side door, and Johnny Harrington was grasped by the seat of his small trousers and plucked from the stage, dimly conscious that there was something wrong about his speech. With color greatly heightened, Miss Mayhew swept him into the retreat behind the wings. There, leaning against the wall for support, she feebly endeavored to show Johnny the error of his ways. He was singularly obtuse. "But it ? s all right. I liked him. I thought he did it fine. An' he was awful good to me. An' I was goin' to explain all about it when you stopped me." He paused a moment, and the words of the superin- tendent, who had returned to his post and was now address- ing the children, came plainly in to them : "YTe have tried to show you all to-day, " he said, "that the spirit of Santa Claus was with us, and will always be. It is quite true that sometimes, as Johnny Harrington says, he is your* father, or your mother, or both. Sometimes he is a stout red gentleman, such as we have seen this after- noon. But I want every one of you to remember that how- ever he looks, whatever form he takes, Santa Claus is with us at Christmas time, when love and charity and generosity fill our hearts, with the memory of a little Child who came into the world to save us." Miss Mayhew looked at Johnny. There was a new look on his face. "Do you understand? Do you know what he means?" she asked gently. Johnny nodded. "Yes. Sure. And I ain't never goin' to say again that they ain't no Santy Claus. But it ain't jest because of what he says. It 's something else I know myself." 152 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation " D ' ye see that tool-box ? Nobody did n ? t know I wanted a tool-box. I did n't tell Mother, an' I didn't tell no one. But I wanted it just the same more 'n anything else. So I" — his face grew red. "So I took a chanct, the way the others did. I asked Santa Claus for it! See? An' he must 'a' told Mr. Boyee! How could Mr. Boyce know if he did n't? That 's what I was goin' to tell the kids, when you stopped me. They reely is a Santy Claus! But he can't be every place at once, so he makes others look jest like him an' help with the job!" Johnny's eyes were full of a strange light as he turned them on her, and his face was the face of a happy baby looking at a shining ball. Arranged by Gertrude E. Johnson. Elizabeth Jordan. OLD JABE'S MARITAL EXPERIMENTS 1 Old Jabe belonged to the Merriweathers, a fact which he never forgot or allowed anyone else to forget; and on this he traded as a capital, which paid him many dividends of one kind or another, among them a dividend in wives. How many wives he had had no one knew; and Jabe's own account was incredible. It eclipsed Henry VIII and Bluebeard. He had not been a specially good "hand" be- fore the war; the overseers used to say that he was a "slicktongued loafer," "the laziest nigger on the place." "When at the close of the war, the other negroes moved away, Jabez slick tongued and oily as ever "took up" a few acres on the far edge of the plantation, several miles i From "Bred in the Bone"; copyright, 1904, Charles Scribner's Sons. • By permission of the publishers. Material for Interpretation 153 from the house, and settled down to spend the rest of his days, on what he called his " place" in such ease as con- stant application to his old mistress for aid and a frequently renewed supply of wives could give. Jabe's idea of emancipation was somewhat onesided. He was free but his master's condition remained unchanged; he still had to support him, when Jabez chose to call on him, and Jabez chose to call often, saying "if I don' come to you, who is I got to go to?" This was admitted to be a valid argument, and Jabez lived, if not on the fat of the land, at i least on the fat of his former mistress's kitchen, with such aid as his temporary wife could furnish. He had had several wives before the war, and was reputed to be none too good to them, that he worked them to death. Certainly their terms did not last long. However his reputation did not interfere with his ability to procure new wives, and with Jabez the supply was always equal to the demand. He always took his wives from plantations at a distance from his home, where the women did not know him so well. He was known to say "it don't do to have your wife live too near to you, she '11 want to know too much about you, an' you can't get away from her," a bit of philosophy which must be left to married men. Mrs. Merriweather, his old mistress, was just talking of him one day, saying that his wife had been ill, but must be better, as her son the Dr. had been called but once, — when the name of Jabez was brought in by a maid. "Unc' Jabez, m'm." That was all, but the tone and manner told that Jabez was a person of note with the messenger. "That old — he is a nuisance! What does he want now? Is his wife worse, or is he after a new one ? ' ' "I 'dn! m'm would n' tell me. He ain't after me." "Well, tell him to go to the kitchen till I send for him, 154 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation or — wait; if his wife 's gone he '11 be courting the cook if I send him to the kitchen, I don't want to lose her just now. Tell him to come to the door." There was a slow heavy step without, and a knock at the hack door. On a call from his mistress, Jabez entered, bow- ing low, very pompous and serious. He was a curious mix- ture of assurance and conciliation as lie- stood there, hat in hand. He was tall and black and bald, with white side whiskers cut very short, and a rim of white wool around his head. He was dressed in an old black coat, and held in his hand an old beaver hat around which was a piece of rusty crape. "Well, Jabez," said his mistress, after the salutations were over, "how are you getting along?" "Well, mist 'is, not very well, not at all well, ma'am. Had mighty bad luck, 'bout my wife." I saw from Mrs. Merriweather's expression that she did not know what he considered "bad luck." She could not tell whether his wife were better or worse. "Is she — ah — what— oh, how is Amanda?" "Lord 'm Mandy was two back. She 's de one runned away with Tom Halleck, an' lef ' me. I don't know how she is. I never went ahter her. She was too expansive. Uat ooman want two -frocks a year. When dese women get to dressin' up so, you got to look out dey ain't always dressin'fer you! Dis one's najne was Sairey." "Oh, yes, true. I 'd forgotten that Mandy left you. But I thought the new one was named Susan?" "No 'm, not de newes' one. Susan — I had her las' Christ- mas, but she would n' stay with me. She was al'ays run- ning off to town, an' you know a man don' want a ooman on wheels. If de Lord had intended a ooman to have wheels, he 'd a g'in 'em to her, would n't he?" Material for Interpretation 155 "Well, I suppose he would. And this one is Sarah?" "Yes, 'm, dis one was Sairey." We just caught the past tense. "You get them so quickly, you see, you can't expect me to remember them." "Yes, 'm, dat 's so, I kin hardly remember 'em myself." "No, I suppose not. Well, how s Sarah?" "Well, m'm, I couldn't exactly say — Sairey, she 's done lef ' me, — yes 'm." "Left you! She has run off too? You must have treated her badly." "No, 'm, I didn'. I never had a wife I treated better. I let her had all she could eat ; an' when she was sick — " "I heard she was sick. Did you send for a doctor?" "Yes, 'm, dat I did — dat 's what I was gwine to tell you. I had a doctor to see her twice. I had two separate and in- different physicians, fust, Dr. Overall, an' den Mars Douglas." "My son told me a week ago that she was sick. Did she get well?" "No, 'm, but she went mighty easy. Mars Douglas eased her off. He is the bes' doctor I ever see to let 'em die easy. ' ' Mingled with her horror at his cold-blooded recital, a smile flickered about Mrs. Merriweather 's mouth at this shot at her son, the doctor; but the old man looked abso- lutely innocent. "Why didn't you send for the doctor again?" "Well, m'm, I gin her two chances. I think dat was 'nough. I declar' I 'd ruther lost Sairey than to broke." "You would ! Well, at least you have the expense of her funeral ; and I 'm glad of it." "Dat 's what I come over to see you 'bout. I 'm gwine 1&6 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation to give Sairey a fine fun'ral. I want you to let yo' cook cook me a cake an ' — one or two more little things. ' ' "Very well, I will tell her so. I will tell her to make you a good cake. When do you want it?" "Thank you, m'm. Yes 'in; ef you 11 gi' me a right good-sized cake — an' a loaf or two of flour-bread — an' a ham, I '11 be very much obleeged to you. I heah she 's a good cook?" "She is, the best I 've had in a long time." She had not caught the tone of interrogation in his voice, nor seen the shrewd look in his face, as I had done. " I 'm mighty glad to heah you give her sech a good char- acter; I heahed you 'd do it. I don' know her very well." Mrs. Merriweather looked up quickly enough to catch his glance this time. " Jabez— I know nothing about her character, I know she has a vile temper ; but she is an excellent cook, and so long as she is not impudent to me, that is all I want to know. ' ' "Yes 'm, dat 's right. Dat 's all 7 want t' know. I don' keer nothin ' 'bout de temper ; atter I git 'em, I kin manage 'em. I jist want t' know 'bout de char-acter, dat 's all. I didn' know her so well, an' I thought I 'd ax you. I tol' her ef you 'd,give her a good char-acter, she might suit me; but I 'd wait f er de cake — an ' de ham. ' ' ' l Jabez, do you mean that you have spoken to that woman already ? ' ' "Well, yes, 'm; not to say speak to her. I jes' kind o' mentioned it to her as I 'd inquire as to her char-acter. ' ' 1 ' And your wife has been dead — how long ? Two days ? ' ' "Well, mist 'is, she 's gone fer good, ain't she? She can 't be no mo ' gone. ' ' "You are a wicked, hardened old sinner!" ' ' Nor I ain 't, mist 'is ; I 'clar ' I ain 't. " Material for Interpretation 157 "You treat your wives dreadfully.'' "Nor I don't, mist 'is. You ax 'em ef I does. Ef I did, dee would n' be so many of 'em anxious t' git me. Now would dee? I can start in an' beat any one o' dese young bloods aroun' heah, now." "I believe that is so, and I cannot understand it. And before one of them is in her grave you are courting another. It is horrid — an old — Methuselah like you." ' ' Dat 's de reason I got t ' do things in a kind o ' hurry — I ain' no Methuselum. 1 got no time t' wait." \ ' Jabez, tell me how you manage to fool all these women ? ' ' The old man pondered for a moment. "Well, I declar ', mist 'is, I hardly knows how. Dee wants to be fooled. I think it is becuz dee wants t' see what de urrs marry me fer, an' why dee don' lef me. Women is mighty curisome folk, mist 'is, dee sho ' is. " Thomas Nelson Page. Arranged by Gertrude E. Johnson. THE MYSTERY OF NIGHT Every day two worlds lie at my door and invito me into mysteries as far apart as darkness and light. These two realms have nothing in common save a certain identity of form; colour, relation, distance, are lost or utterly changed. In the vast fields of heaven a still mo^e complete and sub- lime transformation is wrought. It is new hemisphere which hangs above me, with countless fires lighting the awful highways of the universe, and guidiug the daring and reverent thought as it falters in the highest empyrean. The mind that has come into fellowship with nature is subtly moved and penetrated by the decline of light and the on- 158 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation coming of darkness. As the sun is replaced by stars, so is the hot, restless, eager spirit of the day replaced by the infinite calm and peace of the night. The change does not come abruptly or with the suddenness of violent move- ment; no dial is delicate enough to register the moment when day gives place to night. "With that amplitude of power which accompanies every movement, with that sub- lime quietude of energy which pervades every action, Na- ture calls the day across the hills and summons the night that has been waiting at the eastern gates. And now that it has gone, with its numberless activities, and the heat and stress of their contentions, how gently and irresistibly Na- ture summons her children back to herself, and touches the brow, hot with the fever of work, with the hand of peace ! An infinite silence broods over the fields and upon the rest- less bosom of the sea. Insensibly there steals into the thought, spent and weary with many problems, a deep and sweet repose. Who shall despair while the fields of earth are sown with flowers and the fields of heaven blossom with stars ? ' In the silence of night how real and divine the universe becomes! Doubt and unbelief retreat before the awful voices that were silenced by the din of the day, but now that the little world of man is hushed, seem to have blended all sounds into themselves. Beyond the circle of trees, through which a broken vision of stars comes and goes with the evening wind, the broad earth lies hushed and hidden. Noiselessly, invisibly, the great world breathes new life into every part of its being, while the darkness curtains it from the fierce ardour of the day. In the night the fountains are open and flowing; a mar- velous freshness touches leaf and flower and grass, and re- builds their shattered loveliness. The atars look down from Material for Interpretation 159 their inaccessible heights on a new creation, and as the pro- cession of the hours passes noiselessly on, it leaves behind a dewy fragrance which shall exhale before the rising sun, like a universal incense. When one stands on the shores of night and looks off on that mighty sea of darkness in which a world lies engulfed, there is no thought but wor- ship and no speech but silence. Face to face with im- mensity and infinity, one travels in thought among the shin- ing islands that rise up out of the fathomless shadows, and feels everywhere the stir of a life which knows no weariness and makes no sound, which pervades the darkness no less than the light. And even as one waits, speechless and awe- struck, the morning star touches the edges of the hills, and a new day breaks resplendent in the eastern sky. Hamilton Wright Mabie. Arranged by Gertrude E. Johnson. " WHERE THERE 'S A WILL" 1 Never had Mrs. Sachs felt more blissfully content than this evening, as she sank into her big chair beside the centre table, and took her sewing in her hands. Outside, the wind was slapping the rain against the house like water thrown from a pail, with all the vehemence of an autumn storm, but in the parlor all was light and comfort. The four big electric bulbs on the chandelier blazed, and the electric table lamp glared. In the hall another electric b made a flood of light, and even in the dining-room the elec- trics were turned on. There was not a dark corner on the entire floor. Mrs. Sachs was well satisfied. i Copyrighted J. B. Lippincott Co., Aug., 1011. 160 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation As the storm, which had begun in the afternoon, increased in violence, Mrs. Sachs's feet had pained her more and more, and she had looked forward to the torture of shoes with dread ; but with the increasing storm Annie had wavered, and when night fell and Mr. Sachs came home, wet to the skin and saying he had never seen such weather, Annie set Mrs. Sachs's mind at rest by saying she would not go to any theatre that ever was, on such a night. "I 'm glad you got some sense yet, Annie. It ain't no use to go out nights like this. I like it better you should stay home with us, anyhow, the last night you be here. You don't go out to-night, no Henry?" ' ' Such a night, not much ! I ain 't used to being so cruel to myself." Annie walked to the window and pressed her face against it, looking out. She was small and dainty. ' ' Such weathers ! Well, I guess we can have a good time by ourselves yet, Aunt Tina. I guess Freddy won't come. Maybe you let the twins stay up awhile yet?" "Sure! But you bet Freddy comes! You bet he thinks you go to the theatre, too." She was about to say she would send Freddy home again if he came, but she decided she owed Annie something for not dragging her out in the storm. All summer she had watched Annie and had manoeuvred against the very evi- dent admiration Freddy had for her niece, for when the girl had come, in the early summer, her mother had written plainly. I hope you keep one eye on Annie (the letter ran), for Annie is just about so old when she falls in love quick with any feller you don 't know who. I feel like I want to have some say in it when she gets engaged, so she don't make Material for Interpretation 161 fools of us, like. Girls is so crazy anyways when a feller looks at them twict. So look out she don't get engaged. Mrs. Sachs, at first, had been a little piqued by this letter, but her big, good-natured self could not remember a pique long, and she frankly acknowledged the mother's right, and tried faithfully to carry out her wishes. She had chaperoned until her feet were a misery to her, and she feared Annie might consider her a nuisance. Particularly had she battled against Freddy Ruckert, as against an arch enemy; for Freddy, red-cheeked and yellow-haired, seemed to have fallen head over heeis in love with Annie from the first, and Annie frankly preferred Freddy's company. The wiles Mrs. Sachs had used would have done credit to a general. She contrived ambushes and surprises, all of which Freddy, bland and unsuspecting, walked into with the calm unconcern of a duck walking into a box. Now that the last evening had come and Annie had decided to spend it at home, Mrs. Sachs felt her work was done. Only, she meant to see there were no dark corners in the house that night, where there might be holding of hands or any such business. When Freddy arrived, laughing at the buffeting the storm had given him, the house was lighted as if for a party, and as he took off his rough top-coat he said, "Say, I guess you got the big electric light bill coming this month!" in a tone that included no disappointment. If the sweet process he would have called "fixing it up with Annie," was in his thoughts at all, he gave no sign, but walked into the parlor where the twins were having a grand time on the floor, rolling over and over with all the careless abandon of one-year-olds. Annie was exceedingly fond of the twins. The only 162 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation thing she regretted about her happy summer had been that the twins could not go with her wherever she had gone. She loved to sit on the floor "in the midst of the twins' 7 — as she said — talking to them, playing with them, and ad- miring them. For they were really delightful twins — healthy, happy, and handsome. With Freddy in the room, and the twins, Annie was ready to pass a delightful eve- ning. To Mr. Sachs, Freddy was the queer creature that the courting young man becomes to the man of the house, a sort of bugaboo that one does not know how to handle; to be treated sternly, yet kindly, like a pet wolf that must be fondled with one hand while the other hand is ready to crush. He stood up now to shake hands with Freddy, and Mrs. Sachs, with a mind to having a guard in each room, said, "Mebby if you should want to read, Heinrich, you should go into the dining-room. We ain't making so much noise there. ' ' But Mr. Sachs, manlike, did not catch the hidden meaning. "I ain't looked at the twins much to-day yet, Tine. I could get a good look at them in this light here." Then, turning to Freddy: "If you want, you could smoke in my house. I don't do it. I got so fat I got the asthma, and to smoke so much ain't no good for it. Annie, give Freddy one of them cigars. Maybe they ain't so awful dry yet." Annie looked in the drawer of the centre table and found one cigar with at least a part of the wrapper remaining, and handed it to Freddy. He spoke, appreciatively, after a glance at the gaily-colored band that encircled it. ' ' Say, that was a good cigar once. If I could get a-hold of a match, I could have a good smoke." Material for Interpretation 163 "I don't know have we any," said Mrs. Sachs. "When I read in the papers some time ago how some kids got burnt up by matches, I fired them out. So come, we got the elec- trics put in all over the house. I ain't taking no chances with the twins. Maybe they don't get afire with matches, but anyhow I guess it don 't do them no good to eat matches. Maybe you got a match in your pocket, Heinrich?" The evening, Mrs. Sachs felt, was beginning auspiciously. The conversation was general, and she meant to keep it so. * * It don 't do folks no good to be always smoking, I guess, ' ' she said, hoping to draw Freddy into an argument. Mr. Sachs was feeling in one pocket after another, without find- ing a match. "I make me sure I had a match, either in these clothes or somewhere, ' ' he said. He put his fingers in the change pocket of his coat and brought out, with three fingers, half a dozen small coins and a white stick. "Here is it! No, it is a toothpicker! Maybe I got — " The twins, sitting on the floor, w r atched him with eager eyes. Freddy, across the centre table, held the cigar poised in his hand, and Annie, demurely seated in a chair in a far corner, looked admiringly at the back of Freddy's head. Mrs. Sachs, her large form in a chair as massive as that which held Heinrich, smiled placidly at the twins. Suddenly two coins slid from between Mr. Sachs's plump fingers and rolled across the floor. He put out one big foot and planted it firmly on one of the coins, but the other, a glittering new cent, rolled in a great semicircle. It rounded the chair in which Mrs. Sachs sat, escaping the slippered foot she put out at it ; it rounded the base of the centre table; it ran past Freddy, and toppled over on the carpet directly in front of one of the twins ! Instantly one 164 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation little fat hand darted out and grasped the cent and lifted it toward a rosy mouth, "Mein Gott! Roschen! Stop it! Amalie! Nichts!" cried Mr. Sachs, rising bulkily from his chair. "Nein, Roschen! Nein, nein, Amalie!" and Mrs. Sachs got out of her chair with greater haste than seemed pos- sible. She might have reached the twin — whichever it was — or Mr. Sachs might have reached it, but as they sprang forward their heads came together with stunning force. It was a delay of but an instant. In that instant, however, the lights went out ! Not one light, or two, but every light in the house, and every light on the street. In the parlor the glare of light was instantly followed, by utter blackness, deep, fathomless, and impenetrable. Never is darkness so dark as when it follows glaring light. 1 ' Roschen ! Amalie ! ' ' wailed Mrs. Sachs, creeping wildly on her hands and knees. " Where you are?" "Amalie! Roschen!" shouted Mr. Sachs. His actions, had the twins been able to see him, would have filled them with joy. They would have thought he was playing "big bear coming to catch the baby." But now no answering gurgle of pleasure rewarded his heavy crawling across the room. The twins, wherever they were, seemed to have been made dumb by the darkness. "Quick! Annie, Freddy! Already maybe is a twin choked by the cent!" wailed Mrs. Sachs. "Ain't you got no sense?" With one accord, Annie and Freddy dropped to their knees. There was a dull blow, as of bone striking wood. "Blitzen wetter!" cried Freddy in anguish. His head had come in heavy contact with the sharp edge of the heavy leg of the centre table, and from Annie came a low moan. Material for Interpretation 165 "Please, Freddy, would you to take your knee off my fingers yet?" she begged. "I get them smashed else." "Ah, poor liebchen !" exclaimed Freddy, but Mrs. Sachs's voice wailed louder, broken by the noise of her skirts as she scrambled over the floor, and by the thumps as she bumped into the furniture. Never had the room seemed so over- furnished. It seemed to have become a veritable forest, in which the twins were lost forever. "Such ain't no time to be getting off of fingers," she cried angrily. "You could be finding twins now. Some- body could strike a match ! ' ' "Is no matches in the house, ' ' panted Mr. Sachs, feeling under the sofa. "A fool is a man that don't have matches! Amal— " * ' Here ! I got one ! ' ' cried Freddy. "Strike it, then, dumb-head!" said Mrs. Sachs angrily. "It is a twin I got, not a match. If you mean I should hit the kid—" ' ' Ach, no ! Give me the poor ! Where are you, Freddy?" "Under the piano maybe." 1 ' So stay ! ' ' said Mrs. Sachs. ' ' I come. ' ' Striking the centre table and two chairs on the way, Mrs. Sachs made for the piano corner. "Make her down side up, Freddy, and be shaking her some ! " The wail that followed told that Freddy had inverted the twin and was shaking it. "Hah!" exclaimed Mr. Sachs, flat on his stomach. "The other one I have got ! ' ' "You should to upside her quick! Shake her good, Heinrich ! ' ' The chords of the piano rang as she grasped the twin from 166 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation Freddy and, sitting up suddenly, hit the piano with her head. But it was no time to mind a knock or two. "Quick, Freddy! Telephone for the doctor yet. Make him come soon. Copper cents is so poisonous in babies. He should come right off, say, the telephone is by the top of the stairs." Both the twins were crying lustily now, being held up- side down and pounded on the back, but above the wail- ing of the storm and the wailing of the twins and the wailing of Mrs. Sachs, Freddy's voice soon resounded. In the parlor the ministrations to the twins went on with all the intensity that agonized parents can put into such a thing, Mrs. Sachs giving instructions to Mr. Sachs, and Mr. Sachs returning other instructions. It was impossible to know which twin had swallowed the copper cent, and both suffered alike. "Hello! Hello!" shouted Freddy into the telephone. He varied it by jogging the receiver-holder up and down violently. Central would not answer. He knocked down on the battery -box with the receiver. "Hello, why don't you ? Look ! I am in a hurry once ! Hello ! ' ' ' ' Dumb-head ! Not to know how yet to use a tele- phone! Take whichever is this twin, Tina. I go!" said Mr. Sachs. He went. Up the stairs he w r ent like a heavy hurricane, and pushed Freddy away with one wide sweep of his arm. "Hello, now!" he cried. "Give me Dr. Bardenhauer, and make quick!" But no answering "Give you information!" came back. The receiver offered nothing but blind, blank silence. Behind him there was a noise like a load of paving- stones falling on a plank walk. Mr. Sachs did not even Material for Interpretation 167 turn his head. It was only Freddy falling downstairs. Mr. Sachs was listening with tense senses to the silence in the telephone. " Hello! What good is such a telephone business yet? Central ! Give me — Central ! Hello ! To-morrow I re- port you good, I tell you! Hello!" His anger increased. He pounded on the battery-box until it cracked open like an oyster. The telephone was dumb. Mr. Sachs did not know it, but the same falling tree that had severed the electric light wires had carried down the telephone wires. There is nothing so madden- ing as a telephone that will not talk back. Mr. Sachs dashed down the stairs, threw open the front door and dashed out, hatless and coatless, into the raging wind and rain. To Mrs. Sachs, with the two screaming babies in her arms, it seemed hours before he returned, and when the front door opened and Dr. Bardenhauer's burly form ap- peared, dimly lighted by the single candle in his carriage lamp, which he held in his hand, she cried aloud for thankfulness. "Here is it I am, Doctor! here — " and at that instant all the lights in the house blazed forth. The light was dazzling. Even Mrs. Sachs, partially screened as she was by the piano under which she was sitting, closed her eyes an instant, and the big doctor blinked. His carriage lamp became a pale, sickly yellow. In a moment he was on his knees before the piano, gaz- ing at the twins through his water-dimmed spectacles. "Right side them up once," he said shortly. The moment they were right side up, the twins stopped howling, and the doctor, taking the pink fist of Ainalie — 168 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation Or Koschen — in his big hand, carefully pried the little fin- gers apart. The bright copper cent was there in the little pink palm! But Mrs. Sachs let her eye hold the look of relief but an instant, for, sitting on the floor of the hall with their backs against the coat-rack, were Freddy and Annie, and Freddy was holding Annie's knee-injured hand in his. " Annie! What mean you? Shame!" cried Mrs. Sachs. But Annie only looked up into Freddy's face blissfully. "Don't worry, Mrs. Sachs," said Freddy politely. "Things ain't like what they was. Since I tumble down- stairs, me and Annie has got engaged already. We got a right to hold hands." Ellis Parker Butler. HE KNEW LINCOLN * "Did I know Lincoln? Well, I should say. See that chair there ? Take it, set down. That 's right. Comfort- able, ain't it? Well, sir, Abraham Lincoln has set in that chair hours, him and Little 'Doug,' and Logan and Judge Davis, all of 'em, all the big men in this State, set in that chair. See them marks? Whittlin'. Judge Logan did it, all-firedest man to whittle. Always cuttin' away at some- thing. I just got that chair new, paid six dollars for it, and I be blamed if I did n 't come in this store and find him slashin' right into that arm. I picked up a stick and said: 'Here, Judge, s'posin' you cut this. He just looked at me and then flounced out, mad as a wet hen. Mr. Lin- coln was here, and you ought to heard him tee-hee. He i Reprinted, by permission of the publishers, from "He Knew Lincoln" by Ida M. Tarbell. Copyright by the Macmillan Co. Material for Interpretation 169 was always here. Come and set by the stove by the hour and tell stories and talk and argue. There wan't never no United States Senate that could beat just what I 've heard right here in this room with Lincoln settin' in that very chair where you are this minute. "Tell stories? Nobody ever could beat him at that, and how he 'd enjoy 'em, just slap his hands on his knees and jump up and turn around and then set down, laughin' to kill. Greatest man to git new yarns that ever lived, always askin', ' Heard any new stories, Billy?' And if I had I 'd trot 'em out, and how he 'd laugh. Often and often when I Ve told him something new and he 'd kin 'a forgit how it went, he 'd come in and say, ' Billy, how was that story you'se tell in' me?' and then I 'd tell it all over. "You know I felt kind of sorry for Lincoln when they began to talk about him for President. It seemed almost as if somebody was makin' fun of him. He didn't look like a president. I never had seen one, but we had pic- tures of 'em, all of 'em from George Washington down, and they looked somehow as if they were different kind of timber from us. I couldn't imagine George Washington or Thomas Jefferson settin' here in that chair you 're in tee-heein' over some blamed yarn of mine. None of us around town took much stock in his bein' elected at first — that is, none of the men, the women was different. They always believed in him, and used to say, 'You mark my word, Mr. Lincoln will be president. He 's just made for it, he 's good, he 's the best man ever lived and he ought to be president.' I didn't see no logic in that then, but I dunno but there was some after all. " 'Was there much talk about his bein' killed?' Well, there 's an awful lot of fools in this world and when they don't git what they want they 're always for killin' some- 170 Modem Literature for Oral Interpretation body. Mr. Lincoln never let on, but I reckon his mail was pretty lively readin' sometimes. "Of course he seemed pretty cheerful always. He wan't no man to show out all he felt. Lots of them little stuck-up chaps that came out here to talk to him said, solemn as owls, 'He don't realize the gravity of the situation.' Think of that, Mr. Lincoln not realizing. They ought to heard him talk to us the night he went away. I '11 never fergit that speech — nor any man who heard it. I can see him now just how he looked, standin' there on the end of his car. He 'd been shakin' hands with the crowd in the depot, laughing and talking, just like himself, but when he got onto that car he seemed suddint to be all changed. You never seen a face so sad in all the world. I tell you he had woe in his heart that minute, woe. He knew he was leavin' us for good, nuthin' else could explain the way he looked and what he said. He knew he never was comin' back to us alive. " 'Ever see him again?' Yes, once down in Washington, summer of '64. Things were looking purty blue that sum- mer. Did n't seem to be anybody who thought he 'd git re- elected. I kept hearin' about the trouble he was havin' with everybody, and I jest made up my mind I 'd go down and see him and swap yarns and tell him how we was all countin' on his gettin' home. So I jest picked up and went right off. "Well, when I got down there to Washington, I footed it right out to the Soldiers' Home where Mr. Lincoln was livin' then, right among the sick soldiers in their tents. There was lots of people settin ' around a little room, waitin fer him, but there wan't anybody there I knowed, and I was feelin' a little funny when a door popped open and out came Mr. Lincoln. He saw me almost at once, and Material for Interpretation 171 his face lit up, and he laid holt of me and jest shook my hands fit to kill. 'Billy,' he says, 'I am glad to see you. Come right in. You 're goin' to stay to supper with Mary and me. ' "Did n't I know it ? Think bein' president would change him — not a mite. Well, he had a right smart lot of people to see, but soon as he was through we went out on the back stoop and sat down and talked and talked. He asked me about pretty nigh everybody in Springfield. I just let loose and told him about the weddin's and births and the funerals and the buildin', and I guess there wan't a yarn I heard in the three years and a half he 'd been away that I didn't spin for him. Laugh — you ought to a heard him laugh — just did my heart good, for I could see what they 'd been doin' to him. Always was a thin man, but Lordy, he was thinner 'n ever now, and his face was kind a drawn and gmy — enough to make you cry. "Well, we had supper and then talked some more, and about ten o'clock I started down tow r n. Wanted me to stay all night, but I says to myself, 'Billy, don't you overdo it. You 've cheered him up, and you better light out and let him remember it when he 's tired.' So I said, 'Nope, Mr. Lincoln, can't, goin' back to Springfield to-morrow.' "Well, sir, I never was so astonished in my life. Mr. Lincoln just took my hand and shook it nearly off, and he says, 'Billy, you '11 never know w T hat good you done me. I 'm homesick, Billy, just plumb homesick, and it seems as if this war never would be over. Many a night I can see the boys a-dyin' on the fields and can hear their moth- ers cryin' for 'em at home, and I can't help 'em, Billy. I have to send them down there. We 've got to save the Union, Billy, we 've got to.' " 'Course we have, Mr. Lincoln,' I says, cheerful as I 172 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation could, 'course we have. Don't you worry. It 's most over. You 're goin' to be re-elected, and you and old Grant 's going to finish this war mighty quick then. Just keep a stiff upper lip, Mr. Lincoln, and don't forget them yarns I told you.' And I started out. But seems as if he couldn't let me go. 'Wait a minute, Billy,' he says, 'till I get my hat and I '11 walk a piece with you.' It was one of them still sweet-smellin' summer nights with no end of stars and you ain't no idee how pretty 'twas walkin' down the road. There was white tents showin' through the trees and every little way a tall soldier standin' stock still, a gun at his side. Made me feel mighty curious and solemn. By-and-by we come out of the trees to a sightly place where you could look all over Washington — see the Potomac and clean into Virginia. There was a bench there and we set down and after a while Mr. Lincoln he begun to talk. Well, sir, you or nobody ever heard any- thing like it. Tell you what he said? Nope, I can't. Can't talk about it somehow. He just opened up his heart if I do say it. Seemed as if he 'd come to a p 'int where he must let out. I dunno how long we set there — must have been nigh morning, fer the stars begun to go out before he got up to go. 'Good-by, Billy,' he says. 'You 're the first person I ever unloaded onto, and I hope you won't think I 'm a baby, ' and then we shook hands again, and I walked down to town and next day I come home. "Yes, that 's the last time I seen him — last time alive. "Wan 't long after that things began to look better. War began to move right smart, and, soon as it did, there wan't no use talkin' about anybody else for President. I see that plain enough, and just as I told him, he was re-elected, and him and Grant finished up the war in a hurry. I tell you it was a great day out here when we heard Lee had Material for Interpretation 173 surrendered. But somehow the only thing I could think of was how glad Mr. Lincoln would be. "We began right off to make plans about the reception we 'd give him — brass band — parade — speeches — fireworks — everything. Seems as if I couldn't think about any- thing else. I was comin' down to open the store one mornin' thinkin' how I 'd decorate the windows and how I 'd tie a flag on that old chair, when I see Hiram Jones comin' towards me. He looked so old and all bent over I did n't know what had happened. 'Hiram,' I says, 'what 's the matter? ' Be you sick?' " 'Billy,' he says, and he couldn't hardly say it, 'Billy, they Ve killed Mr. Lincoln.' "Well, I just turned cold all over, and then I flared up. 'Hiram Jones,' I sa~ T s, 'you 're lyin', you 're crazy. How dare you tell me that? It ain't so.' " 'Don't, Billy,' he says, 'don't go on so. I ain't lyin'. It 's so. He '11 never come back, Billy. He 's dead !' And he fell to sobbin' out loud right there in the street, and somehow I knew it was true. "For days and days 'twas awful here. Waitin' and waitin'. Seemed as if that funeral never would end. I couldn't bear to think of him bein' dragged around the country and havin' all that fuss made over him. He al- ways hated fussin' so. Still, I s'pose I 'd been mad if they hadn't done it. "Of course they got here at last, and I must say it was pretty grand. All sorts of big bugs. Senators and Con- gressmen, and officers in grand uniforms and music and flags and crape. They certainly didn't spare no pains givin' him a funeral. Only we didn't want 'em. We wanted to bury him ourselves, but they would n't let us. "Ma and me didn't go to the cemetery with 'em. I 174 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation couldn't stan' it. Didn't seem right to have sich goin's on here at home where he belonged for a man like him. But we go up often now, ma and me does, and talk about him. "Yes, I knowed Abraham Lincoln; knowed him well; and I tell you there wan't never a better man made. Leastwise, I don't want to know a better one. He just suited me — Abraham Lincoln did." Ida M. Tarbell. Arranged by Gertrude E. Johnson. A LITTLE CHANGE FOR EDWARD Good-evening, Mrs. Callender — good-evening, Mr. Cal- lender. You see I have my husband with me ! Edward has said, all through his illness, that the very first time he went out it would be over here to your house, so you see it 's quite an event. The doctor said this morning when he found Edward so depressed that if the weather continued to be mild it would be the very best thing in the world for him to have a little change of scene and thought — to be taken out of himself; that 's what he really needs now. He wanted to come over here alone, but I said to him: No, Edward, I don't dare let you go without me; I 'm so afraid you might do something imprudent. Of course he doesn't realize it, but he has to be watched every minute, especially now that he begins to seem all right. You have to be so careful about ptomaine poisoning. Mrs. Callender, would you mind moving your chair a little, so that Edward can move his out of the draught? — No, Edward, you don't feel it now, but you will feel it. Thank you, Mrs. Cal- lender, perhaps I shall be more at ease about him if the Material for Interpretation 175 window 's shut. It 's all very well for you to say you like the air, Edward; you don't realize now how dangerous air is, but if you wake up in the middle of the night with a pain in the back of your neck and I have to go down and get hot-water bottles for you, you '11 wish that you had been more careful. What do you think, Mr. Callender, I have heated one hundred and seventeen water bottles for him in the last three weeks! Edward dear, put your feet up on this ottoman — I know Mrs. Callender will excuse you. — I '11 throw my cape over them, in case they might get chilled. Edward, "How can you act like that; so perfectly silly." — Very well, then, never mind about the cape. Aren't men just like chil- dren? I 'm sure you wouldn't behave like this, Mr. Cal- lender, if your wife took you out after such a severe illness as he has had ! — Well, it 's very kind of you to speak that way. I 'm sure I have tried to do all that I could — nobody knows what I 've been through ; I 've had to keep every- thing to myself. He was so terribly ill that first week — he does n't realize how ill he was. If it was n't the dread- ful pain in his head it was the pain all over him. I put sixteen plasters on him a day, and when you consider what that means, Mrs. Callender, running up and down two pairs of stairs to the kitchen and back again to make each plaster, besides everything else that came on me — Oh, yes, I know that I ought to have had a trained nurse, but at the time I was so anxious about Edward — when it 's your hus- band you feel as if you must do everything yourself for him. Yes, that 's what uses you up so, standing on your feet. I said to Edward to-day: Edward, if you realized all I go through, standing on my feet — Yes, dear, I know you wanted me to send for your mother to help me, but — He doesn't understand, as you 176 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation would, Mrs. Callender, how much work it makes to have another person — and especially an older person, like your husband's mother — in the house during sickness. Mrs. Delancy is perfectly dear and considerate, but you can't treat her like anybody else — you wouldn't want to, of course, and besides, she 's one of those people who can only eat very simple things, and you know how much trou- ble that makes with the girl in the kitchen — it means something extra cooked for each meal, and we are always getting out of the right cereal, no matter how I try not to ! I always feel so ashamed about it. I really felt, just now, that with Edward as he is, I really couldn't stand anything inofe on my mind. He looks a great deal better, I know, but his color isn't quite right even yet — you can notice it around his nose and under his eyes. You ought to have seen him at first — he was actually green. Yes, you were, Edward; the doc- tor said — Why, Edward! — Very well, dear, it 's all right, we won't say any more about it. Just let me feel your hands a moment. You don't think you 're getting too tired? No, dear, I know you don't like me to ask you how you feel, but it 's necessary sometimes. Don't you think you 'd better have a glass of milk, dear? I know, Mrs. Callender, that you 'd just as lief get it for him. — Never mind, Mrs. Callender, when he speaks like that I just let him alone. Why don't you talk to Mr. Callender, dear? Is that a cigar? Now you don't want to smoke? Oh, Edward, I wish you wouldn't! Why can't you just enjoy seeing Mr. Callender do it? — Well, if you must! You 've no idea how irritable he gets, Mrs. Callender — he does n 't hear, he 's talking to your husband. It 's his nerves, of course; ptomaine poisoning upsets you all over — it seems to come out in a new place every day. Yester- Material for Interpretation 177 day I bought him some shirts at a sale in town — they were really beautiful quality — the only thing the matter with them was that they were a little tight in the neck, and he really became almost — uncontrolled — at the idea of wearing them. Even when I pointed out to him that as I bought them at a sale they couldn't be exchanged, it made no difference to him. Men have no idea of economy. What is that that you are telling Mr. Callender, Edward? It wasn't the latter part of May that Mr. Fales had the accident; it was the first of June. I remember about it particularly for I was washing my hair when it happened and I always washed it the first of the month because that woman I went to said it stimulated the growth if you had a regular time for it, although mine comes out in perfect handfuls. Well, dear, you always want me to be accurate. I assure you, Mr. Callender, I '11 never forget that morn- ing. I heard Mrs. Fales scream, and then I saw Edward rushing down the road with his hat off, and the first thing Mr. Fales said to him when he was regaining conscious- ness was, " Drive that fly away — drive that fly away!" and all Edward could say — he was so distracted — was, "Which one, which one?" And Mr. Fales gasped, "The one with the blue eyes !" Now I can't see anything amusing in that, can you? — Well, Edward, why didn't you tell it yourself then; I 'm sure nobody was preventing you. Well, dear, don't talk if you don't want to. — Was that your new maid who went through the hall just now, Mrs. Callender? She looks as if she had a cheerful disposition. Oh, yes, the one I have is neat, but she doesn't seem to get anything done. She cries all the time, the way they always do when they have a lover. We have done nothing but change all sum- mer. Edward says he is sick and tired of hearing about servants, but I tell him if the burden of it all fell on him. 178 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation as it does on me, he ? d find out the difference. The things they do pass belief; I had a cook the first Christmas after we were married, twelve years ago, and she — Yes, Edward dear, I know you Ve heard the story often before, but Mr. and Mrs. Callender have not, and I am telling it to them. "Well, dear, perhaps we had better go home. — You see, Mr. Callender, he ? s not had as much dissipation as this for a long time. Yv 7 hen I think of all those nights when I sat watching beside him, with the light turned down in the room so that I could only just see his face, and with all those queer, creepy noises around that you seem to hear in the house after midnight when everything else is still, it made it seem as if nothing was ever going to be the same any more — as if the children and I — Oh, when I think of that and look at him now, it makes me so happy! — Why, Edward dear, you mustn't help me down the steps; I ought to be doing it for you ! Mary Stewart Cutting. THE PRETENSIONS OF CHARLOTTE ' ' Charlotte Crandall, come here this very instant ! Let me speak to you again and you '11 know it." The speaker was a tall, thin, sour-appearing woman of middle age. Her hair, black without a single trace of gray, was parted in the center and drawn back into a small knot on top of her head, a knot so tightly wound that the woman's eyes seemed to be drawn into narrow slits in con- sequence. Her hands were long and bony, and attracted one by their restless activity; her general appearance was unkempt; a person who had known a long life of hard work was proven in every line of her face and figure, Material for Interpretation 179 every motion she made; she was always at work, and she expected everyone about her to follow her example. Her field of action just now was the kitchen, and she was engaged in the first preparations for dinner. "Charlotte Crandall!" To this second summons there was a faint answer of "Yes 'm" from the porch which opened off the kitchen, and, immediately following the response, a sad-faced child of eleven or twelve entered the room. She was not pretty, nor even good-looking, and her clothes were worn and un- tidy; there was nothing about her to attract one, except a pained expression that would have touched even a hard- ened heart. Her whole bearing suggested that she was overwhelmed with some great sorrow. ' k You was callin' me?" "Callin'! callin '! Well, I jest guess I was callin' ! For heaven's sake, Charlotte, whatever makes you look so meek and lowly?" "I ain't really meek and lowly. I 'm pretendin'." "Pretendin'! You jest quit your pretendin' and shell them peas. But what you could ever pretend that 'ud make you meek and lowly is beyond me ! " Well, you see, Mis' Epps, it ain't hard to pretend, if you jest know how. I began by thinkin' it was ever so long ago. My husband and six sons had all gone away with the Cru- saders, and every one of 'em was killed. I was jest over- come with grief when I got the news, which was brought back by the only man in the whole lot that wasn't killed. I simply sat down and wept and wept. And, as if that wasn't enough bad luck for one poor woman to bear, along come a band of marauding knights and besieged the castle, and my servants and slaves, and vassals, and pages, and every one, was all killed in trying to protect me from 180 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation harm. And when they was all dead, I jest went up to the very highest-up room in the very tallest tower, and sat down with Christian resignation to meet my fate. I could hear the heavy tramp of feet upon the stairs. It was jest awful, but I didn't shriek or make no noise; and jest as those fierce men was breakin' in the door to my room, you called, Mis' Bpps. You always do call jest when things is gettin' inter 'stin'. I was jest bravely wonderin' what they 'd do to me when you yelled and spoiled it all." ' l Here, that '11 do ! You 've done enough pretendin ' for one day — you jest naturally get in and work. What you think I sleep and feed you for, anyway ? ' ' Charlotte again mechanically took up her task. For some moments there was silence in the room. "Was you really wonderin' why you sleep and feed me, Mis' Epps? Well, you know I wouldn't amount to much if I didn't get some food and sleep. I couldn't work so very long without them." "Work! It 's precious little work you ever do!" "Yes 'm, but you see, Mis' Epps, it 's mighty little sleep I get, too, and I could eat more food 'n I get ! I wish I was a hog! Hogs ain't particular what they get, but they get all they want, and all they have to do is jest grow fat. No one ever tried to make me fat. They all try to see how very much I can work on a very little. You 're tryin' to see how much you kin git out of me, and I 'm tryin' to see how little. I 've made up my mind to work jest accordin' to the way you treat me. No, Mis' Epps, it won't do you any good to strike me, I 'm not afraid. If you hit me, I 11 pretend I 'm dead, and then you '11 git no work out of me at all. I '11 pretend you 're the maraudin' band that took me and killed me, and the more you beat me, the more I '11 look happy — I won't be here, you know; I '11 be in Para- Material for Interpretation 181 dise with my husband and six sons that was killed in the Crusades, and my joy will be so beautiful that it will shine forth on my earthly visage ! ' ' The woman's hand descended to her side without inflict- ing any harm. "That 's right. It 's a good thing to listen to reason sometimes and you know well enough that you or Mr. Epps never gained nothin' by beating me — and you won't ever, either! I 'm glad I 'm incorrigible and rebellious, and I 'm glad I ain't afraid of anyone — not even the minister, and I 11 answer him up jest as I did last time if he warns me any more about the everlasting torments of the here- after. He meant hell, but he dare n't say it, for fear folks 'ud think he was swearin'! I 'd answer him jest as I did then, and I 'd say I didn't expect to mind the change much, and I '11 bet you I 'd be shellin' peas down there for you jest the same as here ! ' ' "You say another word, Charlotte Crandall, and I '11 strike you, good or no good. I won't have such awful talk in my house ! ' ' "Well, I suppose it 's the potaters next. I like mine best with their jackets on — every one would if they had to do their own peelin'." She was silent for a while; then she broke out so sud- denly that Mrs. Epps jumped. "I wish they 'd have taken Donaldson and hung him! Any one with sense could see he done it even if they couldn't prove it." "What } r ou got against Donaldson?" "I 've got it against him because he done it." "Now, Charlotte, you mustn't say you know he done it, because you don't know nothin' of the kind — maybe he did and maybe he did n't," 182 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation "He done it. He used to beat his wife, and he was cruel to his baby, and they had to run away and leave him. I 'd like to see my husband try to beat me ! He 'd not do it more 'an once. I 'd fight back and I 'd make him afraid of me. If I was Donaldson's wife, I 'd — that 's silly to think about, for I would n 't ever have been fool enough to marry Donaldson — I know men too well. But, jest the samey, if I was a woman grown and owned my own farm, my very own farm, I 'd not let my husband come along and bend my will. No, siree. If I wanted the truck gar- den in the north field near the house, it wouldn't be put down at the far end of the south field, not for no reason. I 'd— " Mrs. Epps knew that this was meant as a personal at- tack, and whether it was made in the spirit of contempt or simply as an encouragement to open rebellion w r as all one and the same to her — it was, in either case, such fla- grant presumption as to be serving of a severe reprimand and at this point in the discourse she prepared to make a sudden descent on the culprit. She was anticipated in her designs, however ; for a large, muscular man of rough ap- pearance, somewhat Mrs. Epps' junior, stepped quickly into the room and took Charlotte roughly by the shoulder. i l See here, you. What you mean by letting her talk like that? I 'm master here — do you understand? Master!" Charlotte turned fearlessly on the man. "Epps, you 're a bully. I won't take it back, and I '11 think it, even if you do hit me." At this he gave her a stinging slap on the cheek, which she received with wonderful self-con- trol. "Jest talk that way some more," he said tauntingly, but his victim was silent, and refused even to look at him— she was pretending to herself that he was not there* He Material for Interpretation 183 left her alone after a moment or so, and went back to his work, showering the woman and girl with profanity and threats as he departed. Charlotte talked no more that clay. She worked on steadily at whatever task was before her, but by the look in her eyes it was clear that her mind was far away. That night she stole off to bed as early as she could, and the next morning she was gone. Work was neglected while they searched about the place, but Charlotte was nowhere to be found. Three days later, Mrs. Epps, busily engaged in her kitchen as usual, was startled, on turning round, to find Charlotte standing in the doorway leading from the porch. i ' Lord save us ! " "How-dy-do. Did I scare you? You see, I jest came back — I didn't have any place else to go. I guess you '11 let me stay; I'm handy to have about, you know." ' ' What made you run away? Was it because Epps slapped you?" "I 'm not quite sure. I think maybe that was what started me. You see, I began to pretend I was a beautiful slave girl, and my father had been whipped to death, while I stood by without being able to protect him one mite, and my mother had been sold to an awful cruel master 'way down South. Then I jest got so interested, I forgot all about you folks, and I really was jest that poor nigger girl, and there wasn't nothing else for me to do but to run away from my master and missus, who were very cruel and heartless. It was the easiest pretendin' I ever did in my life." ' ' Don't you think you need a good lickin'?" "You can lick me, if you want to. Tt 'd be a fine ending for the beautiful slave girl. I 'd pretend she was caught, 184 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation and of course then she would be brought back and licked. I ain't afraid. See what I 've got!" She drew from the folds of her dress a rusty revolver. She seemed pleased with her climax, for she laughed as Mrs. Epps drew back with a stifled exclamation. " There 's nothin' to be afraid of. It 's no good for shootin' now, but it 's Donaldson's gun. It 's the one he used, you know. I found it under a big rock by the creek where I was hidin'. He '11 git his, now. It 's evidence — it 's the evidence they couldn't find." Mrs. Epps swayed a little — there was a frightened catch in her voice as she spoke : "Give me the gun. You 're all pegged out; run along and git into bed. Epps 11 be pretty mad when he finds you 're back, but I won't let him touch you. I '11 show him, for once, that he ain't master all the time." "Don't you let no one git the gun. I am kind of tired and I guess a bed '11 feel pretty good. ' ' She moved wear- ily across the room and into the dark passage that opened on the back stairs. When she was gone, Mrs. Epps laid the revolver on the shelf and went on with her work. "Ain't it strange, though? And, Oh, Lord! Ain't it awful!" A few moments later Epps came in, and his wife turned on him sternly. "Epps, Charlotte Crandall 's back." The man swore horribly and asked where the child was now. Mrs. Epps made no reply until her husband had quite exhausted his abundant supply of appropriate pro- fanity ; then she said slowly : i ' Epps, you 've called your- self master here for a good many years. Well, here ? s one time when you ain't the master. You ain't goin' to touch that child. This ranch is mine — there 's six hundred acres, and they 're all mine ; and the money in the bank 's mine ; Material for Interpretation 185 and this house is mine; and all the stock 's mine, and the crops. I 've held out against you that far, and here 's once more when I 'm goin' to have my way — I ain't quite broken. You're not to strike that child. You needn't say a thing*. She 's all tired out and she 's gone up to bed. It was a game she was playin', and while she was hidin' she found Donaldson's gun, and she 's jest hopin' the evidence '11 hang him. Oh, Epps, ain't it awful — and to think Donaldson 's her father!" The woman pro- duced the weapon from the shelf. "It 's his. There 's no question. See the 'D' scratched in. I 've seen him carry it." "It won't do no good to hang Donaldson now. He got killed in a drunken row last night. Give it to me — I don't believe it 's Donaldson's gun anyhow. Even if it is, it can't do him no harm now." "But it can save Johnston." "They let Johnston go — they couldn't hold him on the proof they had. Give me the gun. It 's no good to any one now. ' ' "What makes you act so queer? What are you a-trem- blin' for? What 's the matter with you, anyway? The gun ? s no good to you, either." The man came a step forward. " *D' can stand for something besides Donaldson. It could stand for a Chris- tian name; it could stand for — David, or maybe Daniel — " His wife drew back. "Oh, I see. You — you done it — you ! I knew you hated him — but I never thought — nobody ever thought that — you would do a thing like that. Don't you come near me ! Jest you take a step, and I '11 scream — the men are near enough to hear me. You jest come near to me, and I '11 tell 'em what you said!" He reached out his hand again. "Give me that £un. 186 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation I 11 hide it this time so as nobody '11 ever find it again ; then nobody II ever know." "Only Charlotte. The best thing you can do, Epps, is to go away somewhere — somewhere good and far away; I don't care where. I can save you till you get a safe start; I can't promise to do more if it ever gets out. Per- haps I 'm wrong in doin' this much for you; but you 're my husband, even if you weren't ever very kind to me. I never had no romance in my life; I 've always had jest w r ork and trouble — and now this awful thing — this awful thing that 's got to be lived down." "You 're afraid of the kid. I 11 silence her for keeps." "I 'm not afraid of the kid, and you 11 not touch her. She 's the nearest thing to a romance that ever come into my life. You ain't ever goin' to hurt Charlotte again. I 've a strange feelin' here — it 's a dull sort of pain. I never had it before. I want you to go away — I w 7 ant you to clear out — I don't want to never see you again. I 11 keep Charlotte — I won't ever give her up. And as for you, if you ever dare to come back, I 11 tell all I know, and — I 11 keep the gun to prove it. I want you to go — don't think for a moment that I 'm foolin'." The woman faced the man almost fiercely. Their eyes met, and his fell under her steady gaze. His outstretched hand fell to his side ; he murmured something, and, mum- bling to himself, left the room. The woman watched him pass down the path outside, thru the gate, and away — whither she neither knew nor cared. The lines of her face seemed to deepen as she looked out on the man who for a dozen years or more had been her husband, looked out upon him and saw him passing from her life ; but her lip did not tremble, nor was there a trace of a tear in her eyes. Material for Interpretation 187 But, though she appeared so unmoved, she was uncon- scious of all that went on about her. She did not see a slender child come cautiously from the dark passageway. She thought, if she thought of the matter at all, that she was alone. The piteous voice of the child called her back to herself: "Mis' Epps!" Charlotte was at her side, her arms were around the woman's neck. "Oh, Mis' Epps, I 'm so sorry! I wouldn't have fetched it if I 'd V known. But I '11 try to make it up the best I kin. If you '11 jest pretend you 're my mother, I '11 pretend I 'm your little girl jest as hard as I know how." "There, there, Charlotte, never mind. Don't cry. I '11 pretend, if you '11 jest show me how. I never had no little girl, and you never really had no mother. ' ' Charlotte hid her face for a moment ; then she looked up. "Pretendin' is awful easy when you jest know how, and I '11 show you how." And they laughed softly together. Walter Beach Hay. Arranged by Gertrude E. Johnson. AN UNFINISHED STORY Mrs. Trevelyan, as she took her seat, shot a swift glance down the length of her table at the arrangement of her guests ; the wife of the Austrian minister who was her very dearest friend, saw and appreciated, and gave her a quick little nod over her fan, which said that the table was per- fect, the people most interesting, and that she could pos- sess her soul in peace. They all knew each other very well ; and if there was a guest of the evening, it was one of the two Americans — either Miss Egerton, the girl who was to marry Lord Arbuthnot, or young Gordon, the explorer. Miss 188 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation Egerton was a most strikingly beautiful girl, and was said to be intensely interested in her lover's career, and was as ambitious for his success in the House, as he was him- self. They were both very much in love. The others at the table were General Sir Henry Kent ; Philips, the novel- ist, the Austrian minister and his young wife, and Trevelyan. The dinner was well on its way toward its end, when Sir Henry Kent, who had been talking across to Philips, the novelist, leaned back in his place and said, as though to challenge the attention of every one, "I can't agree with you, Philips. I am sure no one else will." "Dear me," complained Mrs. Trevelyan, plaintively, "what have you been saying now, Mr. Philips? He always has such debatable theories," she explained. "On the contrary, Mrs. Trevelyan/' said Philips, "it is the other way. It is Sir Henry who is making all the trou- ble. He is attacking one of the oldest and dearest plati- tudes I know. He has just said that fiction is stranger than truth. He says that I — that people that write could never interest people who read if they wrote of things as they really are. He thinks that life is commonplace and uneventful." "And I am sure Mr. Gordon will agree with me," said the General. "He has seen more of the world than any of us, and he will tell you I am sure, that what happens only suggests the story : It is not complete in itself. ' ' Gordon had been turning the stem of his glass slowly be- tween his thumb and his finger, while the others were talk- ing, and looking down at it smiling. Now he said, "I am afraid, Sir Henry, that I don't agree with you at all. You have all seen sunsets sometimes that you knew would be laughed at if anyone tried to paint them. We all knew Material for Interpretation 189 such a story, something in our own lives, or in the lives of our friends. Not ghost stories, or stories of adventure, but of ambitions that come to nothing, of people who were rewarded or punished in this world instead of the next, and love stories. ' ' "Tell it, Gordon/' said Mr. Trevelyan. "Yes," said Gordon, "I was thinking of a particular story. It is as complete, I think, and as dramatic as any of those we read. It is about a man I met in Africa. It is not a long story, but it ends badly. "We were on our return march from Lake Tchad to Mobangi. We had been traveling over a month, some- times by water, and sometimes through the forest. In the middle of the jungle late one afternoon, I found this man lying at the foot of a tree. He had been cut and beaten and left for dead. We believed we were the only white men that had ever succeeded in getting that far South, and we could no more account for that man's presence than if he had been dropped from the clouds. Lieutenant Royce, my surgeon, went to work at him ; in about an hour the man said, ' Thank God ! ' — because we were white men, I suppose. He asked Royce in a whisper if he had long to live, Royce told him he did not think he could live for more than an hour or two. The man moved his head to show that he understood, and raised his hand to his throat and began pulling at his shirt, but the effort sent him off into a fainting fit again. I opened his collar for him as gently as I could, and found his fingers had clinched around a silver necklace that he wore about his neck, and from which there hung a gold locket shaped like a heart." Gordon raised his eyes slowly to those of the American girl who sat opposite. She had heard his story so far without any show of emotion. But now, at Gordon's last 190 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation words, she turned her eyes to him with a look of awful indignation, which was followed by one of fear and almost of entreaty. "When the man came to, he begged me to take the chain and locket to a girl whom he said I would find either in London or in New York. He gave me the address of her banker. He said: 'Take it off my neck before you bury me; tell her I wore it ever since she gave it to me. That it has been a charm and a loadstone to me. That when the locket rose and fell against my breast, it was as if her heart was pressing against mine and answering the beat- ing and throbbing of the blood in my veins.' "The man did not die. Royce brought him back into such form again that in about a week we were able to take him along with us on a litter. But he was very weak, and would lie for hours asleep when we rested, or mumbling or raving in a fever. "We learned from him, at odd times, that he had been trying to reach Lake Tchad, to do what we had done, without any means of doing it, and his men had turned on him and left him as we had found him. He had undertaken the expedition on a promise from the French government to make him governor of the territory he opened up if he succeeded, but he had no official help. If he failed he got nothing; if he succeeded, he did so at his own expense and by his own endeavors. It was only a wonder he had been able to get as far as he did. He did not seem to feel the failure of his expedition. All that was lost in the happiness of getting back alive to this woman with whom he was in love. I have read about men in love, I have seen it on the stage, I have seen it in real life, but I never saw a man so grateful to God and so happy and so insane over a woman as this man was. She must have been a very remarkable girl. He had met her first Material for Interpretation 191 the year before, on one of the Italian steamers that ply from New York to Gibraltar, and in that time the girl had fallen in love with him, and had promised to marry him if he would let her, for he was very proud. He had to be. He had absolutely nothing to offer her. She is very well known at home. I mean her family is ; they have lived in New York from its first days, and they are very rich. The girl had lived a life as different from his, as the life of a girl in society must be from that of a vagabond. He had been an engineer, a newspaper correspondent, an officer in a Chinese army, and had built bridges in South Amer- ica, had seen service on the desert in the French army of Algiers. He had no home or nationality even, for he had left America when he was sixteen. Yet you can see how such a man would attract a young impressionable girl, who had met only those men whose actions are bounded by the courts, or law, or Wall Street, or the younger set who drive coaches and who live the life of the clubs. He told her when they separated that if he succeeded — if he opened this unknown country, if he was rewarded as they had promised to reward him — he might dare to come to her ; and she called him her knight-errant, and gave him her chain and locket to wear, and told him whether he failed or suc- ceeded it meant nothing to her, and that her life was his while it lasted and her soul as well. I think that those were her words as he repeated them to me. ' ' He raised his eyes thoughtfully towards the face of the girl opposite and then glanced past her, as if trying to re- call the words the man had used. The fine beautiful face of the woman was white and drawn about the lips, and she gave a quick appealing glance at her hostess, as if she would beg to be allowed to go. But Mrs. Trevelyan and her guests were watching Gordon. 192 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation "You can imagine a man finding a cab slow when he is riding from the station to see the woman he loves; but imagine this man urging himself and the rest of us to hurry when we were in the heart of Africa, with six months' travel ahead of us before we could reach the first limits of civilization. That is what this man did, It used to frighten me to see how much he cared. Well, we got out of it at last and reached Alexandria. He became very quiet as soon as we were really under way. He would sit in silence in his steamer chair for hours, looking out at the sea and smiling to himself. I do not know whether it was that the excitement of the journey overland had kept him up or not, but as we went on he became much weaker and slept more, until Royce became anxious and alarmed about him. But he did not know it himself; he had grown so sure of his recovery then that he did not understand what the weakness meant. He fell off into long spells of sleep or unconsciousness, and woke only to be fed, and would then fall back to sleep again. And in one of these spells of un- consciousness he died. He died within two days of land. He left nothing behind him, for the very clothes he wore were those we had given him — nothing but the locket and the chain which he had told me to take from his neck when he died." He stopped and ran his fingers down into his pocket and pulled out a little leather bag. The people at the table watched him with silence as he opened it and took out a dull silver chain with a gold heart hanging from it. "This is it," he said gently. He leaned across the table, with his eyes fixed on those of the American girl, and dropped the chain in front of her. "Would you like to see it?" The rest moved curiously forward to look at the little Material for Interpretation 193 heap of gold and silver as it lay on the white cloth. But the girl, with her eyes half closed and her lips pressed together, pushed it on with her hand to the man who sat next to her, and bowed her head slightly, as though it was an effort for her to move at all. "Well," said General Kent, "if all true stories turn out as badly as that .one does, I will take back what I said against those the story writers tell. I call it a most un- pleasant story." "And it isn't finished yet," said Gordon. "There is still a little more." "But then," said the wife of the Austrian minister, "you cannot bring the man back to life." "No, but I can make it a little worse. The first day I reached London, I went to her banker's and got her ad- dress and I wrote saying I wanted to see her, but before I could get an answer I met her the next afternoon at a garden party. At least I did not meet her; she was pointed out to me. I saw a very beautiful girl surrounded by a lot of men, and asked who she was, and found out it was the woman I had written to, the owner of the chain and locket and T was also told that her engagement had been announced to a young Englishman of family and position, w r ho had known her only a few months, and with whom she was very much in love. So, you see, that it was better that he died, believing in her and in her love for him. Mr. Philips here would have let him live to return and find her married; but Nature is kinder than writers of fiction and quite as dramatic." Philips did not reply to this and the General only shook his head doubtfully and said nothing. So Mrs. Trevelyan looked at Lady Arbuthnot and the ladies rose and left the room. Miss Egerton, saying that it was warm, stepped out 194 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation through one of the high windows on to the little balcony that overhung the garden. She trembled slightly and the blood in her veins was hot and tingling. Then a figure blocked the light from the window and Gordon stepped out of it and stood in front of her with the chain and locket in his hand. He held it towards her and they faced one another for a moment in silence. "Will you take it now?" The girl raised her head, and drew herself up until she stood straight and tall before him. "Have you not pun- ished me enough?" she asked in a whisper. "Are you not satisfied? Was it brave? Was it manly? Is that what you have learned among your savages — to torture a woman ? ' ' Gordon observed her curiously, with cold consideration. "What of the sufferings of the man to whom you gave this? Why not consider him? What was your bad quar- ter of an hour at the table, with your friends around you, to the year he suffered danger and physical pain for you — for you, remember?" "They told me he was dead. Then it was denied, then the French papers told it again, and with horrible detail and how it happened. ' ' "And does your love come and go w r ith the editions of the daily papers? If they say tomorrow morning that Arbuthnot is false to the principles of his party, that he is a bribe-taker, a man who sells his vote, will you believe them and stop loving him? Is that the love, the soul, the life you promised the man — " The tall figure of young Arbuthnot appeared in the opening of the window. "Miss Egerton? Is she here? Oh! Is that you? I was sent to look for you. They were afraid something was wrong. It has been rather a Material for Interpretation . 195 hard week, and it has kept one pretty well on the go all the time, and I thought Miss Egerton looked tired at din- ner. I came to tell you Lady Arbuthnot is going. She is waiting for you. Good night, Gordon; thank you for your story and yet, I can't help thinking you were guilty of doing just what you accused Philips of doing. I some- . how thought you helped the true story out a little. Now didn't you? Was it all just as you told it? Or am I wrong ? ' ' "No, you are right. I did change it a little in one particular. ' ' "And what was that, may I ask?" said Arbuthnot. "The man did not die." ' ' Poor devil ! poor chap ! But then if he is not dead how did you get the chain?" The girl's arm within his own moved slightly, and her fingers tightened their hold. "Oh," said Gordon, indifferently, "it did not mean any- thing to him, you see, when he found he had lost her, and it could not mean anything to her. It is of no value. It means nothing to anyone — except, perhaps to me." Richard Harding Davis. Arranged by Gertrude E. Johnson. THE LOST JOY All day, where the simlight played on the sea-shore, Life sat. All day the soft wind played with her hair, and the young, young face looked out across the water. She was waiting; but she could not tell for what. All day the waves ran up and up on the sand, and ran 196 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation back again, and the pink shells rolled. Life sat waiting ; all day, with the sunlight in her eyes, she sat there, till, grown weary, she laid her head upon her knees and fell asleep, waiting still. Then a keel grated on the sand, and then a step was on the shore — Life awoke and heard it. A hand was laid upon her, and a great shudder passed through her. She looked up, and saw over her the strange, wide eyes of Love — and Life now knew for whom she had sat there waiting. And Love drew Life up to him. And of that meeting was born a thing rare and beautiful — Joy, First-Joy was it called. The sunlight when it shines upon the merry water is not so glad; the rosebuds, when they turn back their lips for the sun's first kiss, are not so ruddy. It never spoke, but it laughed and played in the sunshine; and Love and Life rejoiced exceedingly. Neither whispered it to the other, but deep in its own heart each said, "It shall be ours forever." Then there came a time — was it after weeks ? was it after months? (Love and Life do not measure time) — when the thing was not as it had been. Still it played ; still it laughed ; still it stained its mouth with purple berries; but sometimes the little hands hung weary, and the little eyes looked out heavily across the water. And Life and Love dared not look into each other's eyes, dared not say, "What ails our darling V 9 Each heart whispered to itself, "It is nothing, it is nothing, to-morrow it will laugh out clear." But to-morrow and to-morrow came. They journeyed on, and the child played beside them, but heavily, more heavily. One day Life and Love lay down to sleep ; and when they awoke, it was gone; only, near them, on the grass, sat a Material for Interpretation 197 little stranger with wide open eyes, very soft and sad. Neither noticed it; but they walked apart, weaping bit- terly. The little soft and sad-eyed stranger slipped a hand into one hand of each, and drew them closer, and Life and Love walked on with it between them. And when Life looked down in anguish, she saw her tears reflected in its soft eyes. And when Love, mad with pain, cried out, "I am weary, I am weary! I can journey no further. The light is all be- hind, the dark is all before," a little rosy finger pointed where the sunlight lay upon the hillsides. Always its large eyes were sad and thoughtful ; always the little brave mouth was smiling quietly. When on the sharp stones Life cut her feet, he wiped the blood upon his garments, and kissed the wounded feet with his little lips. When in the desert Love la} 7 down faint (for Love itself grows faint), he ran over the hot sand with his little naked feet, and even there in the desert found water in the holes in the rocks to moisten Love's lips. He was no burden — he never weighted them ; he only helped them forward on their journey. When they came to the dark ravine where the icicles hang from the rocks — for Love and Life must pass through strange drear places — there, where all is cold, and the snow lies thick, he took their freezing hands and held them against his beating little heart, and warmed them — and softly he drew them on and on through the dark lands and through the light. At last they came to where Reflection sits; that strange old woman, who has always one elbow on her knee, and her chin in her hand, and who steals light out of the past to shed it on the future. And Life and Love cried out, "0 wise one! tell us: when 198 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation first we met, a lovely radiant thing belonged to us — glad- ness without a tear, sunshine without a shade. How did we sin that we lost it? Where shall we go that we may find it?" And she, the wise old woman, answered, "To have it back, will you give up that which walks beside you now?" "Give up this!" said Life. "When the thorns have pierced me, who will suck the poison out ? When my head throbs, who will lay his tiny hands upon it and still the beating? In the cold and the dark, who will warm my freezing heart ? ' ' And Love cried out, "Better let me die! Without Joy I can live; without this I cannot." And the wise old woman answered, "0 fools and blind! What you once had is that which you have now! When Love and Life first meet, a radiant thing is born, without a shade. When the roads begin to roughen, when the shades begin to darken, when the days are hard, and the nights cold and long — then it begins to change. Love and Life will not see it, will not know it — till one day they start up suddenly, crying, 'We have lost it! Where is it?' They do not understand that they could not carry the laughing thing unchanged into the desert, and the frost, and the snow. They do not know that what walks beside them still is the Joy grown older. The grave, sweet, tender thing — warm in the coldest snows, brave in the dreariest deserts — its name is Sympathy; it is the Perfect Love." Olive Schreiner. Arranged by Gertrude E. Johnson. Material for Interpretation 199 EXTRA PAPER 1 "Look at me comin' over to your house, an' me with the lamps not filled, nor the chamber work done, nor the floor brushed up around. But you can know 't what I Ve come for hasn't got anybody dead in, because my dishes are washed up. My dishes are left standin' for nobody but the dead, an' them took off suddenly or else me expected over to help make the funeral nice. No, nobody 's dead, I 'm pleased to state — at least, nobody new. The new editor made that a local in the 'Evenin' Daily' the other night, gettin' just desperate because nothin' happened to anybody in the town — an' it was what come out of that while you was away that I come over to tell you about. "The editor didn't have a thing for his locals that day, so he just thought of all his friends, an' he run right down the news item column tellin' what there was n't. Like this : Supper Table Jottings Postmaster Silas Sykes is well. Timothy Toplady has not had a cold yet this winter. Prudent Timothy. Jimmy Sturgis has not broken his leg yet this winter, as he did last. Keep it up, Jimmy. Eppleby Holcomb has not been out of town for quite a while. None of the Friendship ladies has given a party all winter. The First Church is not burnt nor damaged nor repaired. Insurance, $750.00. i Reprinted, by permission of the publishers, from "Mothers To Men" by Zona Gale. Copyright by the Macmillan Co. 200 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation Nobody is dead here to-day except the usual ones. Nobody that 's got a telephone in has any company at the present writing. Where is the old-time hospitality? Subscriptions payable in advance. "It made quite some fun for us, two or three of us hap- penin' in the post-office store when the paper come out — Mis' Sykes an' Miss Toplady an' me. But we took it some to heart, too, because to live in a town where they ain't noth- in' active happenin' is a kind of runnin' account of every- body that 's in it. An' us ladies wa'n't that Jkind, but all them locals done to Silas Sykes, that keeps the post-office store, was to set him fussin' over nothin' ever happenin' to him. " 'My dum!' he says, 'that 's just the way with life in this town. If I thought I was goin' to get sold in my death like I 've been in my life, I swan I 'd lose my interest in dyin'.' "Mis' Timothy Toplady was over in behind the counter pickin' out her butter, an' she whirled around from samplin' the jars, an' she says to Mis' Sykes an' me: " 'Ladies,' she says, 'le's us propose it to the editor, that seems to have such a hard job, that us members of the Cemetery Improvement ^Sodality take hold of his paper for a day an' get it out for him an' put some news in it an' sell it to everybody, subscribers an' all, that one night, for ten cents. "Mis' Silas Sykes looks up an' stopped winkin' an' breathin', in a way she has when she sights some distant money for Sodality. " 'Land, Land!' she says. 'I bet it 'd take like a warm meal.' "Silas he snorts, scorchin': Material for Interpretation 201 " 'Will you ladies tell me/ he says, 'where you going to get your news to put in your paper? Onless you commit murder an' arson an' runaways, there won't be any more in your paper than they is in its editor's.' "That hit a tender town-point, an' I couldn't stand it no longer. I spoke right up. il 'Oh. I dunno, I dunno, Silas,' I says. 'They 's those in this town that 's doin' the murderin' fer us, neat an' nice, right along,' I told him. " 'Mean to say — ' snapped Silas. " 'Mean to say,' says I, ' 'most every grocery store in this town, an' 'most every milkman, an' the meat market as well, is doin' their best to drag the health out o' people's systems for 'em. Us ladies is more or less well read an' knowledgeable of what is goin' on in the world outside,' I says to Silas — that ain't, 'an' we know a thing or two about what ought to be clean.' " 'Pack o' women!' says Silas now, an' went off to find black molasses for somebody. "I remember how us three women looked at each other then, like our brain was experimentin' with our ideas. An' when Mis' Toplady got her butter, we slipped out, an' spoke together for a few minutes up past the Town Pump. An' it was there, the plan come to a head, an' we see that we had a way of pickin' purses right off of every day, so be the editor would leave us go ahead; an' of doin' other things. "The very next morning we three went to see the editor an' get his consent. He was new and from the city and real nervous. We explained our plan and he said he had been thinking about a trout stream, and he guessed he needed a day off. He said he was afraid we could n 't col- lect ten cents a copy — he had n 't been able to collect much 202 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation of anything. But when we mentioned news, he looked positively startled. 'News!' said he. 'Oh, I say now, you mustn't expect too much. I ought to warn you that run- ning a paper in this town is like trying to raise cream on a cistern. ' "Mis' Toplady smiled at him motherly. 'You ain't ever tried pouring the cream into the cistern, I guess, ' she says. "So we settled it into a bargain. Of course the Sodality hadn't voted on it yet, but there was n't much doubt what they 'd vote with $60.00 in sight, which we 'd make if everybody bought a paper. The members of the Sodality scraps among themselves personal, but when we pitch in to work for something, we sew rags an' scallop oysters in the same pan with our enemies. I tell you, it makes me feel sometimes that the way ain't too much to try to love each other — which other folks' peculiarities is awful in the way of —but for us all to pitch in an ' love somethin ' all together — your town, or your young folks, or your cemetery, or keepin' somethin' clean, or makin' somethin' look nice — an' before you know it you 're lovin' the folks you work with, no matter how peculiar. Don't it seem as if that must mean somethin'? Somethin' big? "Sodality voted to publish the paper, all right, and elected the officers for the day: Editor, Mis' Postmaster Sykes — 'count of her always expectin' to take the lead in everything; Assistant Editor, me, 'count of bein' well an' able to work like a dog; Business Manager an' circulation man, Mis' Holcomb-that-was Mame Bliss, 'count of no dime ever gettin' away from her unexpected. An' the reporters was to be most of the rest of the Sodality. "I guess we was all glad that we was to go down early in the mornin' that day, 'count o' not meetin' the men. Material for Interpretation 203 One an' all an' with one voice the Friendship men had railed at us hearty. "Only Eppleby Holcomb had kep' his silence. Eppleby is one of them men that ain't never wore blinkers. Now an' then it makes him some skittish, but oh, I tell you, Ep- pleby sees things that the run o' men don' see, and Eppleby was our friend. "So, though we went ahead, the men had ma.de us real anxious. An' when the day come, most of us slipped down to the office by half-past seven so 's not to meet too many. The editor had a column in the paper about what we was goin' to do — 'Loyal to our Local Dead,' he headed it, an' of course full half the town was kickin' at the extra ten cents, like full half of any town can an' will kick when it 's asked to pay out for its own good, dead or alive. "Extra paper mornin', when we all come in, Mis' Sykes she was sittin' at the editor's desk with her big apron on, an' a green shade to cover up her crimpin'-kids, an' her list that her an' Mis' Toplady an' I had made out, in front of her. " 'Now then let 's get right to work,' she says, brisk. 'We ain't aijy too much time, I can tell you. It ain't like bakin' bread or gettin' the vegetables ready. We 've all got to use muscles this day we ain't used to usin',' she says, 'an' we 'd best be spry.' "So then she begun givin' out who was to do what — 'assignments,' the editor named it when he told us what to do. " 'Mis' Toplady, you go out to Bob Henney's place, an' you go through his cow-sheds, from one end to the other an' take" down notes so 's he sees you doin' it. You go into his springhouse an' into his kitchen, an' don't you let a can 204 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation get by you. Open his churn. Rub your finger round the inside of his pans. Explain to him you 're goin' to give him a nice, full, printed description in to-night's "daily," just the way things are. If he wants it changed any, he can clean all up, an' we '11 write up the clean-up like a compliment. ' " 'Mis Uppers, you go down to Betts' meat-market. You poke right through into the back room. An' you tell Joe Betts that you 're going to do a write-up of that room an' the alley back of it for the paper to-night, showin' just what 's what. If so be he wants to turn in an' red it up this mornin', tell him you '11 wait till noon an' describe it then, providin' he agrees to keep it that way. An' you might let him know you 're goin' to run over to his slaughterhouse an' look around while you 're waitin', an' put that in your write-up, too.' iC 'Mis' Merriman, I '11 give you a real hard thing be- cause you do things so delicate. Will you take a walk along the residence part of town an' go into every house an' ask 'em to let you see their back doors an' their gar- bage pile? Tell 'em you 're goin' to write a couple of columns on how folks manage this. Ask 'em for their ideas on the best way. Give 'em to understand, if there 's a real good way they 're thinkin' of tryin', that you '11 put that in, providin ' they begin tryin ' right off. An ' tell 'em they can get their garbage carted off for ten cents a week if enough go in on it. An' you be most delicate, Mis' Fire Chief, for we don't want to offend a soul.' "Libby an' Viney Liberty Mis' Sykes sent round to take a straw vote in every business house in town to see how much they 'd give towards startin' a shelf library in the corner of the postoffice store, a full list to be printed in order with the amount, or el&e 'Not a cent' after each name. Material for Interpretation 205 An' the rest o' Sodality she give urrants similar, or even more so. " 'An' all o' you/ says Mis' Sykes, 'pick up what you can on the way. An' if anybody starts in to object, you tell 'em you have instructions to make an interview out of any of the intercom' things they say; You know what you 've got to do — do it to the bitter end.' "Well, sir, they started off — some scairt — but some real brave too. An' the way they went, we see every one of 'em meant business. "I made straight for Silas Sykes an' the post office store. Silas wa'n't in the store, it was so early; but he had the floor all sprinkled nice, an' the vegetables set out, all uncovered, close to the sidewalk; an' everything real tasty an' accordin' to grocery-store etiquette. An' Silas himself was in the back room, sortin' over prunes. ' ' ' Hello, Calliope ! ' s ' he. ' How 's liter '-choor ? ' " 'Honest as ever,' I says. 'Same with food?' " '"Who says I ain't honest?' says Silas, straightenin' up, an' holdin' all his fingers stiff 'count o' bein' sticky. " 'Why, I dunno who,' says I. 'Had anybody ought to? How 's business, Silas?' " 'Well,' says he, 'for us that keeps ourselves up with the modern business methods, it 's pretty good, I guess.' " 'Do you mean pretty good, Silas, or do you mean pretty payin'?' I ask' him. "Silas put on his best official manner. 'Look at here,' s'e, 'what can I do for you? Did you want to buy some- thin' or did you want your mail?' " 'Oh, neither,' I says. 'I want some help from you, Silas, about the paper today. ' ' ' My ! that give Silas a nice minute ! He fairly weltered in satisfaction. 206 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation M 'Huh!' he says, elegant, 'didn't I tell you you was bitin' off more 'n you could chew? Want some assistance from me, do you, in editin' this paper o' yours? Well, I suppose I can help you out a little. What is it you want me to do for you ? ' " 'We thought we 'd like to write you up,- I told him. "Silas just swelled. For a man not in public office, Silas Sykes feels about as presidential as anybody I ever see. If they was to come out from the city an' put him on the front page o' the mornin' paper, he 's the kind that would wonder why they had n 't done it before. "Sketch of my life?' s'e, genial. 'Little outline of my boyhood? Main points in my career?' 1 ' ' Well, ' I says, ' no. We thought the present 'd be about all we 'd hev room for. We want to write up your busi- ness, Silas,' I says, in an advertisin' way. ■i* 'Oh! You want me to pay to be wrote up, is that it?' " 'Well,' I says, 'no, not if you don't want to. Of course, everybody 11 be buried in the cemetery, whether they give anything towards the fund for keepin' it kep' up or not.' " 'Lord heavens!' says Silas. 'I 've had that Cemetery Fund rammed down my throat till I 'm sick o' the thought o' dyin'!' "That almost made me mad, seein' we was hevin' the disadvantages o ' doin ' the work an ' Silas was goin ' to get all the advantages o' burial. " 'Feel the same way about some o' the Ten Command- ments, don't you, Silas?' I says, before I knew it. ''Silas just roared. 'The Ten Commandments!' says he. 'The Ten Commandments! Who can show me one I ain't a-keepin ' like an old sheep ? Did n 't I honor my father an ' Material for Interpretation 207 mother as long as I had 'em? Did they ever buy anything of me at more than cost ? Did n't I give 'em new clothes an' send 'em boxes of oranges an' keep up their life insur- ance? Do I ever come down to the store on the Sabbath day? Do I ever distribute the mail then, even if I 'm ex- pectin' a letter myself? The Sabbath I locked the cat in, didn't I send the boy down to let it out for fear I 'd be misjudged if I done it ? Who do I ever bear false witness against unless I know they 've done what I say they 've done? I can't kill a fly — an' I 'm that fool tender-hearted that I make _ the boy take the mice out o' the trap because I can't bring myself to it. So you might go through the whole list an' just find me workin' at 'em an' a-keepin' 'em. What do you mean about the Ten Commandments?' he ends up, ready to burst. " ' Don't ask me,' I says. 'I ain't that familiar with 'em. I didn't know anybody was. Go on about 'em. Take stealin' — you hadn't got to that one.' cc l Stealin'!' says Silas, pompous, 'I don't know what it is.' "And with that I was up on my feet. 'I thought you didn't,' says I. 'Us ladies of the Sodality have all said it over an' over again — that you don't know stealin' when you see it. No, nor not even when you 've done it. Come here, Silas Sykes!' I says. "I whipped by him into the store, and he followed me, sheer through bein' dazed, an' keepin' still through bein' knocked dumb. "Look here, here 's your counter of bakery stuff. Where do you get it? What 's the bakery like where you buy it? It 's under a sidewalk and filthy dirty, and I happen to know you know it. And look at the bread — not a thing over it, flies keepin' house on the crust, an' you countin' 208 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation out change on an apple pie the other day — I see you do it. Look at your dates, all uncovered, and dirt from the street stickin' to 'em like a pattern. Look at your fly-paper, hugged up against your dried fruit box that 's standin' wide open. Look at you, keepin' fish an' preserved fruit an' canned stuff that you know is against the law — Goin' to start keepin' the law quick as you get these sold out, ain't you, Silas? Look at your stuff out there in front, full o' street dirt and flies an' ready to feed folks. An' you keepin' the Ten Commandments like an old sheep — an' bein' a Church elder, an' you -might better climb porches an' bust open safes. I s'pose you wonder what I 'hi sayin' all this to you for?' M 'No, rna'am,' says Silas, like the edge o' somethin', 'I don't wonder at your saying^anything to anybody.' " 'I 've got more to say,' I says, dry. 'I 've only give you a sample. An' the place I 'm goin' to say it is in the Friendship Village "Evening Daily" Extra, tonight, in a descriptive write-up of you and your store. I thought it might interest you to know.' " 'It 's libel — it ? s libel!' says Silas, arms wavin'. " 'Is there a word of it ain't true?' I says to him, liber- atin' a fly accident 'ly caught on a date. 'Who you goin' to sue? Your wife, that is the editor? An' everybody else 's wife, that 's doing the same thing to every behind-the- times dealer in town?' "Silas hung on to that straw. 'Be they doin' it to the others, too ? ' he asks. "Then I told him. 'Yes,' I says, 'Silas, only — they ain't going to start writin' up the descriptions till noon. An' if you — and they all — want to clean up the temples where you do business an' make 'em fit for the Lord to look down on an' a human bein' to come into, you Ve got your chance. Material for Interpretation 209 An' seein' your boy is gone today, if you '11 do it — I '11 stay an' help you with it. An' mebbe make room for some of the main points in your career as well,' says I sly. "Silas looked out the door, his arms folded, an' his beard almost pointin' up, he 'd made his chin so firm. And just in that minute, when I was feelin' that all the law an' the prophets, an' the health of Friendship Village, an' the life of people not born was hangin' around that man's neck — or the principle of 'em anyway — Silas' eye an' mine fell on a strange sight. Across the street from Joe Betts' meat- rket — come out Joe Betts, and behind him his boy. And Joe begun pointin' an' the boy begun takin' down quarters o' beef hung over the sidewalk. Joe pointed consid'able. An' then he clim' up on his meat-wagon that stood by the door, an' out of the shop I see Mis' Mayor Uppers come, lookin' ready to drop. An' she clim' up to the seat beside him — he reachin' down real gentlemanly to help her up. An' he headed his horse around on what I knew was a bee- line for the slaughter-house. "Well, sir, at that, Silas Sykes put his hands on his knees an' bent over an' begun laughin'. An' he laughed like I ain't seen him since he 's got old and begun to believe that life ain't cut after his own plan that he made. An' I laughed a little, too, out o' sheer bein' glad that a laugh can settle so many things right in the world. And when I sobered down a little, I says, gentle : " ' Silas, I '11 throw out the dates an' the dusty lettuce. An' you take down the unlawful canned goods. An' we '11 hev done in no time. T '11 be glad to get an early start on Ihe write-up. I don't compose very ready,' I told him. "Tie was awfully funny while we done the work. He was awful still, too. Once when I lit on a piece of salt nork that I knew, first look, was rusty, 'them folks down on 210 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation the flats buys it/ he says. 'They like it just as good as new-killed. ' " 'All right/ s'l, careless; 'I '11 make a note o' that to shine in my article. It needs humor some/ s' I. "Then Silas swore, soft an' under his breath, as an elder should, but quite vital. An' he took the pork out in the alley, an' I stomped it down in the dirt so 's he wouldn't slip out an' save it. "It was 'leven o'clock when we got done — me havin' swept out behind the counters myself. An' Silas he mopped his face an' stood haulin' at his collar. "When I got back to the office, Mis' Sykes at the main desk was still laborin' over her editorial, breathin' hard. ' ' ' How was he ? ' she asks, in a pale voice. " 'He was crusty/ says I, triumphant, 'but he \s beat.' "She never smiled. ' Calliope Marsh/ says she, cold, 'if you Ve sassed my husband I '11 never forgive you again.' ' ' I tell you, men may be some funny, and often are. But women is odd as Dick's hatband, an' I don't know but odder. Well, we 'd all had pretty good luck except Mis' Toplady. The tears was near streamin' down her face. " 'Bob Henney gimme to understand he 'd see me in — some place he had n't ought to 'a' spoke of to me, nor to no one — before I could get in his milk-sheds, and I t-told him, "that lookin' for me wouldn't be the only reason he 'd hev for goin' there." An' then he said some more. He said he 'd be in here this afternoon to stop his subscrip- tion. ' " 'So you didn't get a thing,' I says, grievin' for her; but Mis' Toplady, she bridled through her tears. " 'I got a column: I put in about the sheds, that the whole town knows anyway, an' I put in what he said to me. An' I 'm goin' to read it to him when he comes in. An' Material for Interpretation 211 after that he can take his choice about havin' it published, or else cleanin' up an' allowin' Sodality to inspect him reg'lar.' 11 Just before twelve o'clock we was all back in the office,. Mis' Fire Chief, from bein' delicate, Mis' Uppers, fresh from the slaughter-house, an' so on, all but Mame Hol- comb that was out seein' to the circulation. An' I tell you we set to work in earnest, some of us to the desks, an ' some of us workin' on their laps, an' everybody hurryin' hectic. " Ain't it strange how slow the writin' muscles an' such is, that you don't use often? Pittin' cherries, splittin' squash, peelin' potatoes, slicin' apples, makin" change at Church suppers — us ladies is lightnin' at 'em all. But set- tin' down ideas on paper — I declare if it ain't more like waitin' around for your bread to raise on a cold mornin'. Still, when you 're worried you can press forward more than normal, an' among us we got some material ready for the composing room — Riddy Styles had charge of that. "But four o'clock come racin' across the day like a run- away horse, an' us not out of its way. An' a few minutes past, when Riddy was waitin' in the door for Mis' Sykes's last page, somebody 'most knocked him over, an' there comes Mis' Holcomb, our circulation editor, purple an' white, like ghost. " 'Lock the door — lock it!' says she. 'I Ve bolted the one to the foot of the stairs. Lock both outside ones an' lay yourselves low!' "Riddy an' I done the lockin', me well knowin' Mis' Holcomb couldn't give a false alarm no more than a map could. " 'What is it?' we says, pressin' Mis' Holcomb to speak, that couldn't even breathe. ! ' ' Oh, ladies, they 've rejoined us, or whatever it is they 212 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation do. I mean they 're goin' to rejoin us from gettin' out to- night's paper. The sheriff 's comin' with injunctions — is that like handcuffs, do you know? An' it 's Bob Henney's doin'; Eppleby told me, and I run down the alley an' beat 'em. They 're most here. Let 's us slap into print what 's wrote an' be ready with the papers the livin' minute we can.' "Mis' Sykes had shoved her green shade on to the back of her head, an' her crimpin '-pins was all showin' forth. " 'What good '11 it do us to get the paper out? We can't distribute 'em around with the sheriff to the front door with them things to put on us. ' "Then Mis' Holcomb smiled, with her eyes shut, where she sat, breathin' so hard it showed through. "'I come in the coal door, at the alley, ' s ' she. ' They '11 never think o' that. Besides, the crowd '11 be in front an' the carrier boys too, an' they '11 want to show off out there. An' Eppleby knows — -he told me to — an' he '11 keep 'em interested out in front. Le's us each take the papers, an' out the coal door an ' distribute 'em around, ourselves, with- out the boys, an ' collect the money. ' "An' that was how we done. For when they come to the door an' found it locked, they pounded a little to show who was who an' who wa'n't, an' then they waited out there calm enough, thinkin' to stop us when the papers come down would be plenty time. They waited out there, calm an ' sure, while upstairs Bedlam went on, but noiseless. An ' after us ladies was done with our part, we sat huddled up in the office. "With the Sodality an' Riddy Styles an' the composing room men, we had above twenty carriers. Riddy an' the men helped us, one an' all, because of course the paper was a little theirs, too, an' they was interested, an' liked the lark. Material for Interpretation 213 Land, land! I ain't felt so young nor so wicked since school as I done gettin' out that alley door* Did you ever think that there 's just as much fun keepin' secret about somethin' that may be good as sneakin' for regular bad? The Sodality can tell they is, an' that slippin' up a back alley, luggin' what you hope may be a help to the kingdom of God on 3'our back, is every bit as joyous feelin' astearin' down high things an ' holy. "When we finally got outside, it was supper-time, an' summer-seemin ' an' the whole village was buried in its evenin' fried mush an' potatoes or else sprinklin' their front yards. Us that went west got clear the whole length of Daphne Street in the alley without nobody sensin' what we was doin', or else believin' that we was doin' it orderly an' legitimate. An' away out by the Pump Pasture, we started distributin', an' we come workin' down-town, hand- in' out papers to the residence part like mad an' takin' in dimes like wild. They was so many of us, an' the ' Eve- nin' Daily' office was so located, that by the time Mis' Toplady an' I come round the corner where the men an' Bob Henney an' the rejoiners an' the carriers w r as loafin', waitin', smokin' an' secure, we didn't have many papers left. An' we three was the first ones back. " ' Evenin' paper?' says Mis' Toplady, casual, ' Friend- ship Village "Evening Daily" Extra? All the news for a dime ! ' "Nerver hev I see a man so truly flabbergasted as Bob Henney, an' he did look like death. " 'You 're rejoined!' he yelled — or whatever it is they say — 'You 're rejoined by law from printin' your papers or from distributin' the same.' " 'Why, Bob Henney,' says Mis' Toplady, 'no call to show fight like that. Half the town is readin ' its paper by 214 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation now. They 've been out for three-quarters of an hour, ' she says. ' ' Then soft an ' faint an ' acrost the street, we heard some- body laugh, an' then kind o' spat hands; an' we all looked up an' there in the open upstairs window of the buildin' opposite, we see Eppleby Holcomb an' Timothy Toplady an' Silas Sykes leanin' out. An' when we crossed eyes, they all made a little cheer like a theatre; an' then they come clumpin' down-stairs an' acrost to us. " 'Won out, didn't you, by heck?' says Silas, that can only see so far. " 'Rlisterin' Benson:' says Timothy, gleeful. 'I say we ain't no cause to regret our wifes' brains.' "But Eppleby, he never said a word. He just smiled slow an' a-lookin' past us. An' we knew he did n't have no blinkers on an' that he see our whole plan, face to face. "Mis' Sykes an' Mis' Toplady an' me, seein' how Bob Henney stood mutterin' an' beat, an' seein' how the day had gone, an' seein' what was what in the world an' in all outside of it, we looked at each other, dead tired, an' real happy, an' then we just dragged along home to our kitchens an' went to cookin' supper. But oh, it wa'n't our same old kitchens, nor it wa'n't our same old Friend- ship Village. We was in places newer an' better an' up higher, where we see how things are, an' how life would get more particular about us, if we would get a little particular about some more of life." Zona Gale. Arranged by Gertrude E. Johnson. Material for Interpretation 215 FOR LOVE OF MARY ELLEN Susan Randolph Peyton Carter was an anomaly. Her blood, which should have been uncompromisingly, incor- rigibly blue, insisted upon a riotous preponderance of red corpuscles ; her manners showed no symptoms of developing a Vere de Vere finish ; and her tastes — Mrs. Carter refused to admit that a descendant of the first governor of Virginia could have low tastes, but she confessed to other members of the family that Susan's friendships and ideals were a trial to her. Even at six, a Carter who was also a Peyton and a Ran- dolph should have shown a nice discrimination in the matter of associates. Not that Susan did not discriminate. She did. Stead- fastly, unswervingly, she declined all intimacy with the nice, blue-blooded, pretty-mannered, neatly dressed little girls whose mothers were upon Mrs. Carter's visiting list. She was not rude to them — Susan was never actually rude. When confronted with situations or persons not to her taste, she simply retired within herself and gently but firmly closed the door behind her. Her material body might be haled forth to dancing-school, to church, to chil- dren's parties; might be whipped or locked in a closet or deprived of supper ; but somewhere within her spiritual fast- nesses the real Susan was of the same opinion still. That Susan's private stock of ideas was tinged with democracy might be inferred from her choice of a bosom friend. Mary Ellen, the enterprising and grubby little daughter of Mrs. Rafferty — Mrs. Rafferty who had been try- ing to run the news-stand and tobacco shop on the corner 216 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation since Mr. Rafferty had tired of the undertaking and dis- appeared. Mary Ellen was considerably older than Susan in years, and aeons older in experience; but she admitted that for a " swell kid" Susan was fairly intelligent and companion- able, and the ardent admiration of the smaller girl tickled her vanity. So Mary Ellen allowed herself to be adored, and, it must be noted to her credit, did not impart to her adorer, out of the fund of her worldly knowledge, any facts that a very small descendant of the first governor of Vir- ginia could not easily and safely digest. It was one day in April that the blow fell. Mary Ellen, her face smudged by application of grimy hands to tear- wet cheeks, announced that she was going away from Wash- ington, going to relatives up in Pennsylvania. Her mother could n 't pay the rent of the shop any longer, nor of their rooms either, and the doctor said he guessed Mrs. Rafferty would have to go to the hospital for an operation, and the Pennsylvania relatives seemed the only refuge for Mary Ellen — only maybe they wouldn't take her, and she didn't have any money to go with, anyway. But she did n't have any money to stay with, either, and her mother just cried and cried. All this and more she told to Susan while they sat on a bench in Dupont Circle, whither Susan had been convoyed by Jane, the parlor-maid, and where she had been left to play until called for. "Oh, Mary Ellen !— Oh— M-a-r-y E-1-l-e-n!" wailed small Susan, when the tale was told and she knew the worst. "Ain't it fierce?" groaned Mary Ellen. "If I jest had a little money, I could do somethin', maybe; but I dunno, and mom, she dunno, either. ' ' And just then, as luck would have it, Susan's grown-up Material for Interpretation 217 sister came walking through the Circle, with a perfectly proper associate in a frock coat and top hat and spats, and carried Susan off, with vigorous remarks about her being a disgrace to the family and playing with low children and catching awful diseases and ideas and things. But Susan did not hear. She had gone inside herself and shut the door; for she had things to think about and could not be distracted by foolish, grown-up talk. All through the rest of the day she was very quiet, and when evening came she went to bed willingly, even eagerly. She thought until sleep caught her unaware, and just on the Borderland of Sleep, she had her revelation. She must make money for Mary Ellen. That fact had been estab- lished from the first ; but how was she to make it ? That was the question. There was Maria, the charwoman — but Susan was n't big enough to do charwork, and for the same reason she couldn't take in washing; and it would take too long to learn to rub out face wrinkles like Miss Nelson; and she could n 't go round sewing, because she knew nothing but perforated cardboard work. And then came the illumina- tion. Didn't the blind woman down on M Street make money — boxfuls of it, just by sitting on the curbstone and holding out a tin cup? Hadn't Susan herself, with her mother's full permission, stopped and dropped pennies into the cup? And hadn't John, the coachman, said that he shouldn't wonder if she made more money than he did? Anybody could sit and hold out a tin cup. One didn't have to be big and strong for that. And then Sleep opened the door of the Castle of Dreams, and the small girl forgot about financial worries in the excitement of chasing a green kitten with a pink tail and a face strangely like Mary Ellen's round and round Dupont Circle. 218 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation But in the morning Susan went down to breakfast with purposeful determination in her eyes. The money-making idea looked as good to her by daylight as it had in the night- time. She would have to run away, and she would probably be caught and punished; but she wouldn't mind punish- ment, if only the evil day could be put off until after Mary Ellen had her money. She was eager to go to work at once, but, as usual, grown- ups were bothersome. Mrs. Carter was going shopping at ten o'clock and insisted upon taking her Youngest with her, although the Youngest objected in no uncertain voice. However, the expedition proved to be a blessing in disguise ; for Susan was left in the carriage for half an hour, just opposite the spot where the Blind Woman was carrying on a thriving business, so she had a chance to study her methods thoroughly and, besides, discovered something she had quite overlooked before. Fastened on the front of her waist, the woman wore a square of soiled cardboard on which was printed something that Susan could not read. She made an eager appeal to John, and he responded with : " l Pity a blind widow with six children. 7 That 's what it says, Miss." Susan leaned back in her seat and shut her eyes very tight and wrinkled her nose into funny creases. This new problem demanded thought. In fact, it was a staggerer. But the blood of the first governor of Virginia was up, and his small descendant refused to be staggered. If she must accept the responsibility of six children and widowhood in addition to blindness, then she must; and since a placard was necessary, she must have a placard. That afternoon, the grocer's boy, who was one of Susan's cherished friends, was seized upon as he went whistling past the side door. He was dragged up to the play-room on Material for Interpretation 219 the third floor, where, with Susan as prompter, he achieved a masterpiece on the bottom of an old cardboard box, but failed completely in getting any information about the game to which this stage property evidently belonged. The next morning, when Jane led Susan forth to Dupont Circle, where she was to spend the morning "playing like a little lady," she carried the masterpiece in her largest picture-book. Also, she took with her an empty tomato can. Jane was disagreeable about the tomato can. She considered a wax doll more seemly and more suited to the social atmosphere of the Circle; but Susan was adamant. She preferred to play with a tomato can, and, in the end, she had her way. Susan sat demurely upon a bench until Jane had become fully occupied with the other servants about the Circle, and then, swiftly, furtively, she slipped down from her bench, and five minutes later her sturdy little legs were twinkling down Q Street. She ran until she was quite out of breath, and her legs were very tired, and she felt very far from home. Then she sat down on the curbstone under a corner lamp-post and pinned to the front of her red coat a slightly damaged piece of white cardboard bearing the legend : Pitty A BlinD Widdy With SIX ChildReN. Hardly was the placard in place and the tomato can firmly gripped in an unmittened hand, when a young man bound office-ward stopped, read, grinned, and dropped a penny into the can. "You need help with those six chil- dren, ma'am," he said gravely; and Susan's twinkling little black eyes looked gratefully up at him out of a solemn face. This being a widow with six children was serious matter, and she intended to take it seriously. One by one, passers-by, chiefly men, stared, laughed, made •facetious remarks, and asked foolish questions, to which 220 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation the sad-eyed widow, looking more or less like a scared but defiant squirrel, made no answer beyond an eloquent rattle of the pennies in the tomato can. And, one by one, the jesters added pennies to the collection and went on their way laughing. Later, more women were abroad, and business was not so good. The older women showed a meddling propensity for asking questions; but the widow was apparently deaf and dumb as well as blind. Finally one of the women, meeting Policeman Kelly farther down town, told him that there was a well-dressed little girl begging up on Q Street, and that she ought to be taken home to her mother. So Kelly strolled up to investigate. Susan saw him coming, and, though her conscience was clear, her heart froze within her. As for Kelly, when his glance fell upon the widow he, like the other men, stopped and stared — but he did not laugh ; and that was not because he represented the solemn majesty of the law, but becaxise he had small children of his own at home. "It 's a foine day, mum," he said, in a genial, offhand way. " Doing well?" Susan looked into the tomato can, poked the contents with a fat forefinger, and held the can out for inspection. The policeman looked at the pile of pennies with friendly interest. "First-rate, whatcher goin' to do with all that money?" For a moment Susan hesitated, then, under the warming glow of a pair of friendly Irish eyes, she abandoned her policy of silence. "It 's for Mary Ellen," she explained. "Mary Ellen who, now?" "Mary Ellen Rafferty." " 'T is a good ould name." "They can't pay the rent." Material for Interpretation 221 1 ' There do be Raffertys that are that way — an ' Kellys too." "And the butcher won't trust them, an' there isn't any fire, an' Mary Ellen could do somethin' maybe, if she had some money. An' the woman wiv a teacup gets lots of money; an' so I thought — " "Just so, 'twas a good idea ye had, and a kind one — but I 'm thinkin' maybe your mother — " Susan was disappointed in him. She had n't expected an understanding person like this to drag her mother into the conversation; and when he was indelicate enough to do it, she lapsed into profound silence. Kelly realized that he had blundered, and was casting about in his mind for a tactful method of reopening diplomatic relations, when he was interrupted by an elderly man whom he saluted with manifest respect. "What 's wrong, officer?" asked the newcomer, looking down at the tiny figure on the curb. Kelly's eyes twinkled, but his voice was grave. "Well, there 's nothing what you might call wrong, your Honor, but here 's a poor widdy woman with six small kids of her own, is tryin' to raise money to pay Mary Ellen Rafferty's rent, and I was thinkin' to myself, ' What 's to be done about this new Charity Organization ? ' " The old gentleman settled his glasses more firmly on his nose and bent over to get a better view of the Charity Organization. He was very tall and very dignified, and his clothes were for some reason or other very impressive. Susan had a feeling that this old gentleman, too, would understand about things* "This Mary Ellen is a friend of yours?" he asked courte- ously. 222 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation "Yessir." ' ' And she is in trouble about her rent ? ' f Susan hesitated, but the sympathy of the eyes and the voice was too much for her scruples, and once more she plunged headlong into explanation — fervent, incoherent explanation that came out upside down and hind side be- fore and hopelessly entangled, but seemed to convey a per- fectly clear and lucid idea to the listener. He summed up the case concisely: "Mr. Rafferty has gone away, and Mrs. Rafferty can't pay the rent, and she 's had to give up her news-stand, and she has n 't any money to buy food or coal, and she has to go to the hospital, and there 's nobody to take care of Mary Ellen?" "Yes 'm— -yes 'm!" In her excitement, Susan rose su- perior to genders. "Well, now, I should say that all those pennies would go a long way toward straightening things out for Mary Ellen ; and if there are n 't quite enough I might put in enough more with them to make up what is needed. Do you happen to know where Mary Ellen lives, my dear?" Susan did know. Everything concerning Mary Ellen had always been too important to be forgotten. ' ' Suppose you and I go around there and see what we can do about paying the rent and the butcher bill and sending in some things to eat — I shouldn't wonder if you know exactly what Mary Ellen likes best to eat." ■ ' Chocolate 'clairs ! ' ' This was better than anything she had dreamed of. The old gentleman looked as if his pock- ets might be fairly bulging with pennies. "That 's right — chocolate eclairs, eh? Well, we will get some chocolate eclairs — and some beef and cabbage and po- tatoes on the side. Officers, will you be kind enough to call a cab for this lady and me?" Material for Interpretation 223 The cab came quickly, and the old gentleman put the widow and her tomato can into it, and installed himself beside her, and they talked — oh! how those two congenial people talked en route to Mary Ellen's ! At the end of the ride, the old gentleman knew all about Susan's family, in eluding Clowny, the cat, and Jack, the furnace man's fox- terrier — and all about Mary Ellen's charms and perfec- tions and all about Susan's secretest longings and beliefs. He was the kind of an old gentleman a blind widow of six can confide in. And Susan knew all about the old gentleman's grandsons and the little grand-daughter he wanted and did n 't have, and the little daughter he would have had if she hadn't gone and grown up into the mother of the little boys. It didn't really seem a minute from the time they got into the cab until they were sitting on the one chair that Mrs. Rafferty's bedroom offered — Susan on the old gentle- man's knee — and were explaining to Mrs. Rafferty, sick in bed, and to Mary Ellen, speechless with amazement, that the rent was going to be paid ; and that the grocer and baker and butcher and milkman would soon be leaving heaps of things at the door ; and that Mary Ellen was going to stay w T ith some nice Irish people the old gentleman knew, while her mother was in the hospital getting well. They had a beautiful time — all of them. Going home was n 't as much fun as going to Mary Ellen 's. Punishment loomed large before her, and though Susan was willing to take it, if need be, she wished most fervently that she could dodge it. Perhaps the old gentleman understood why she grew quieter and quieter, for his voice grew gentler and gentler, and the eyes that looked down at the small cul- prit had a tender little smile in them. When the cab stopped before Susan's home, the old gentleman lifted her 224 Modem Literature for Oral Interpretation out and walked up to the door, holding her hand. There was something very encouraging about the feel of that large, warm, competent hand, and she wished he didn't have to go away. He didn't seem to have any idea of going. When he had rung the bell, he still stood by Susan 's side ; and when the cook opened the door, he stepped into the hall and handed her a card. "Good-by, little woman," he said, dropping the small hand as he reached the drawing-room door. "Run along, that 's a dear. I want to have a talk with your mother — but I 'm coming to see you soon, if she will allow it." The small girl shot a look at him — a look so full of gratitude and love and confidence that he had to take off his spectacles and wipe them immediately, because of a mist that unexpectedly clouded them; and then she scampered off toward the play-roo n, just as Mrs. Carter came down the stairs looking surprised and puzzled but dis- tinctly pleased. Watching through the upper balusters a half -hour later, Susan saw her mother and the old gentleman come out from the drawing-room and walk down the hall in friendly fashion. A moment later Mrs. Carter called Susan, and the culprit went draggingly down the stairs, bracing herself for woe to come. She found a mother with a very loving face, who gathered her small sinner tenderly into her arms and kissed her. "Tell mother about your plans next time, dearie," she said — but that was all. Not even a word of reproof, and, remembering lesser offences, Susan marveled. She did not know that a justice of the Supreme Court of the United States had pleaded her cause with all the elo- quence he could muster and had won her case. Eleanor Hoyt Brainerd. Arranged by Gertrude E. Johnson. Material for Interpretation 225 MR. BUSH'S KINDERGARTEN CHRISTMAS "She hailed from around Boston somewheres, and she came out here and started one of these 'ere kindling- garters," said Mr. Milo Bush. "Roped in all the small children in town and begun to learn 'em to string straws, and map out beans, and wad wet clay and such other practical things which would be useful to 'em when they growed up. Showed 'em that they had thumbkins, and told 'em 'bout Jack Frost, and Old Man East Wind, and Uncle Feeble; and had 'em singing 'Hoppery, skippery, hop, flop, pop — summer 's the time to whop, whop, whop !' "Well, it seemed to be a good thing, though I don't reckon our folks would 'a' took much stock in it if it had n't 1 been for the girl herself. That there girl was the prettiest girl that ever struck the country. Such eyes as she had ! And that mouth of hers ! — well, I b'lieve if it could 'a' been done, that every man in tow r n would 'a' had himself reduced to eighteen inches high and gone to school to her, and strung his straw, and wadded his gob of cla}^ with thumbkins. "She was the most enthusiastic girl — and the prettiest! She just kept us parents on the jump. Doing what, do you think? Living for onr children! That was all, but it kept us busy. She used to call parents' meetings, and make little speeches, 'Come, let us live for our children,' she would say. So that 's wot we done — just lived for 'em. Rekerations of the past was abandoned, such as hoss-trots. Old Major Sudley killed his game-cock, and had him for Sunday dinner, though the Major said afterwards that the next old fighting rooster he et he would do it on a week- day, as the remarks necessary in carving the j'ints wa'n't no fit language for the Sabbath. 226 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation "Well, as I said, the girl was b'iling with enthusiasm. Every week she took the young uns on a picnic, or round to see a blacksmith, or a carpenter, or a cobbler, or somewheres. 'Ticky, tick, tack; tocky, whock, whoo — this is the way to half -sole a shoe!' Then when winter got here and Jack Frost come creeping, come creeping, there was new go- ings-on. Finally Christmas hove in sight, and the girl got more excited than ever. Called another mothers' meeting, and we fathers was on hand. The girl made another speech. Christmas was coming. Did n 't we know the little song about Christmas? And wot it said about Sandy Glaus? Though Sandy Claus was a miff, wot a bootiful miff! It was well that the little ones should believe in such miffs as long as they could ! Alars ! the stern realities of life would confront 'em but too soon! Let us make the Christmas of the little ones of the kindling-garter a glad one. Did we not want to live for our children ? The song told specially of Sandy Claus 's reindeers, and the children were much interested in the reindeers. Wot fond parent would volun- teer to show the children a team of reindeers ? "I sprung to my feet while the other parents was lean- ing for'ard to rise, and say I: 'Miss, if we can find a pair of reindeers in Bon Pierre County, or even one reindeer, or half a reindeer, or a critter that looks like a reindeer, I '11 drive him for the children.' 'Thank you,' says the girl, smiling at me; and if she 'd 'a' asked me to drive two lions tandem, with a hyener under the seat, I 'd 'a' done it. 'And you are on the right track, Mr. Bush,' she goes on; 'there are, of course, no reindeers here. We must stimulate some reindeers, Mr. Bush.' 'Wot,' says I, thumbkin be- hind my ear, letting on I hadn't heard. 'We must stimu- late some reindeers — counterfeit 'em, you know. Get some Material for Interpretation 227 other likely critters and fasten some horns on 'em, and make 'em look like reindeers.' Well, we all talked the matter over, and decided that the best we could do was to take a couple of mooley steers belonging to Zeb Woodbeck, and tie some horns on 'em, hitch 'em to a light sleigh, and let 'em sizzle, with me a-holding the reins, and mebby calling cheerily: 'On, Prancer! Whoa, Dancer!' "Well, there ain't much more to tell. I done it. 'Bout four o'clock in the afternoon so 's the little ones could go home and get to bed early. The plan was to have the chil- dren in front of the school-house, and I was to dash around the corner and swing round the house a couple or three time, and then leave the sleigh and crawl through a hole in the back of the building, and pop out behind the stove as the children come in the door, all frosty, and with flowing whiskers, and wearing pillers under my clothes, and with my nose red. It took a pile of fixing up, and when they got through with me my nose was the only thing which I could recognize as my own. "Then I got in the sleigh down by the livery -barn, and drove up around, the steers trotting off pretty free, and the bells on 'em ringing lively. Then I swung 'em round the corner, and says I: 'On, Prancer! On, Dancer!' and the children clapped their hands, and the others begun to yell, and somehow it excited them critters, and they hopped up into the air, and yanked round their heads, and their horns fetched loose and tipped back and took 'em on the shoulders, and Dancer let out an awful 'B-a-a-a-r ! ' and Prancer kicked sideways at a dog, and they lit out down the main street like a bloo streak, me a-sawing on the reins and a-yelling 'The Night Before Christmas' at 'em in chunks. As we tore through town, both reindeers b-a-a-a-r-ing and kicking, the 228 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation bells a-ringing, every dog in town close behind making use of their own language, and my own voice not idle, we was said to 'a ' presented a impressive spectacle. "We tore on. After passing over six miles of prehayrie in a few minutes, I was throwed out by the sleigh striking a rock. Them simulated reindeers went on. My knee was fractured, and I started to crawl back the six miles, singing cheerily, ' Clap, clap with glee ; for Christmas is coming and merry are we!' My whiskers impeded my crawl a good deal by getting under my knees, but I reached the house of a settler about dark. " 'Didn't you go by here a spell ago as if you was in a kind of a hurry ? ' says he. " 'No/ says I; 'that was Sandy Claus.' " 'It looked like you/ says he. " 'We are one and the same/ says I; 'e pluribus unum. I was stimulating Sandy Claus. Bring in some snow and thaw out my left earkin/ ' ' ' See yere, old man, ' says he ; ' before I stir a step tell me wot in all creation you are making such a Tom-twisted fool of yourself for. ' " 'I am living for a Boston kindling-garter teacher; fetch in that snow!' " Hayden Carruth. THE SPIRIT OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN (Many attempts have been made to frame "the perfect tribute" to Abraham Lincoln. Woodrow Wilson pictures him as the mysteri- ous but reassuring product of democracy. The spiritual quality of his portrait no less than the art displayed in the use of less than Material for Interpretation 229 fifteen hundred words to paint it make it memorable. By popular subscription the log-cabin birthplare of Lincoln on a farm near Hodgenville, Kentucky, has been enclosed in an imposing granite memorial building as a gift to the Nation. President Wilson, called upon to accept the memorial, September 4, gave this impres- sive interpretation of it.) No more significant memorial could have been presented to the Nation than this. It expresses so much of what is singular and noteworthy in the history of the country; it suggests so many of the things that we prize most highly in our lives and in our system of government. How eloquent this little house within this shrine is of the vigor of democracy ! Nature pays no tribute to aristocracy, subscribes to no creed or caste, renders fealty to no monarch or master of any name or kind. Genius is no snob. It does not run after titles or seek by preference the high cjrcles of society. It affects humble company as well as great. It pays no special tribute to universities or learned societies or conventional standards of greatness, but serenely chooses its own comrades, its own haunts, its own cradle even, and its own life of adventure and of training. This was the cradle of one of the great sons of men, a man of singular, delightful, vital genius who presently emerged upon the great stage of the Nation's history, gaunt, shy, ungainly, but dominant and majestic, a natural ruler of men, himself inevitably the central figure of the great plot. Whatever the vigor and vitality of the stock from which he sprang, its mere vigor and soundness do not explain where this man got his great heart that seemed to compre- hend all mankind in its catholic and benignant sympathy, the mind that sat enthroned behind those brooding, melan- 230 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation choly eyes, whose vision swept many a horizon which those about him dreamed not of — that mind that comprehended what it had never seen, and understood the language of affairs with the ready ease of one to the manner born — or that nature which seemed in its varied richness to be the familiar of men of every way of life. Many another man beside Lincoln has served the Nation in its highest places of council and of action whose origins were as humble as his. Tho the greatest example of the universal energy, richness, stimulation, and force of de- mocracy, he is only one example among many. The per- meating and all-pervasive virtue of the freedom which chal- lenges us in America to make the most of every gift and power he possesses, every page of our history serves to emjjhasize and illustrate. Standing here in this place, it seems almost the whole of the stirring story. Do you share with me the feeling, I wonder, that he was permanently at home nowhere ? It seems to me that in the case of a man — I would rather say of a spirit — like Lincoln the question where he was is of little significance ; that it is always what he was that really arrests our thought and takes hold of our imagination. It is the spirit always that is sovereign. Lincoln, like the rest of us, was put through the discipline of the world — a very rough and exacting discipline for him, an indispensa- ble discipline for every man who would know what he is about in the midst of the world's affairs; but this spirit got only its schooling there. It did not derive its character or its vision from the experiences which brought it to its full revelation. The test of every American must always be, not where he is, but what he is. That also is of the essence of democracy, Material for Interpretation 231 and is the moral of which this place is most gravely ex- pressive. I have read many biographies of Lincoln ; I have sought out with the greatest interest the many intimate stories that are told of him, the narratives of nearby friends, the sketches *&t close quarter in which those who had the privi- lege of being associated with him have tried to depict for us the very man himself "in his habit as he lived," but T have nowhere found a real intimate of Lincoln's. I nowhere get the impression in any narrative or reminiscence that the writer had in fact penetrated to the heart of his mystery, or that any man could penetrate to the heart of it. That brooding spirit has no real familiars. I get the impression that it never spoke out in complete self-revela- tion, and that it could not reveal itself completely to anyone. It was a very lonely spirit that looked out from underneath those shaggy brows and comprehended men without fully communing with them, as if, in spite of all its genial efforts at comradeship, it dwelt apart, saw its visions of duty where no man looked on. I have come here to-day not to utter a eulogy on Lincoln ; he stands in need of none, but to endeavor to interpret the meaning of this gift to the Nation of the place of his birth and origin. Is not this an altar upon which we may forever keep alive the vestal fire of democracy as upon a shrine at which some of the deepest and most sacred hopes of mankind may from age to age be rekindled? For these hopes must cer- tainly be rekindled, and only those who live can rekindle them. The only stuff that can retain the life-giving heat is the stuff of living hearts. We are not worthy to stand here unless we ourselves be in deed and in truth real democrats 232 Modem Literature for Oral Interpretation and servants of mankind, ready to give our very lives for the freedom and justice and spiritual exaltation of the great nation which shelters and nurtures us. Woodrow Wilson. Arranged by Gertrude E. Johnson. THE KING OF BOYVILLE 1 Boys who are born in a small town are born free and equal. In the big city it may be different ; there are doubt- less good little boys who disdain bad little boys, and poor little boys who are never to be noticed under any circum- stances. But in a small town, every boy, good or bad, rich or poor, stands among boys on his own merits, and is measured by what he can do, and not by what his father is. And so, Winfield Hancock Pennington, whose boy name was Piggy Pennington, was the King of Boyville. For Piggy could walk on his hands, curling one foot gracefully over his back, and pointing the other straight in the air ; lie could hang by his heels on a flying trapeze ; he could chin a pole so many times that no one could count the number ; he could turn a somersault in the air from the level ground, both backwards and forwards ; no one could come near him in the water or on the ice, and no one could beat him at a game of marbles. In the story books such a boy would be the son of a widowed mother, and turn out very good or very bad, but Piggy was not a story book boy, and his father kept a grocery store, from which Piggy used to steal so i Reprinted, by permission of the publishers, from "The Court of Boyville" by Wm. Allen White. Copyright by the Macmillan Co. Material for Interpretation 233 many dates that the boys said his father must have cut up the almanac to supply him. As he never gave the goodies to the other boys, but kept them for his own use, his name of "Piggy" was his by all the rights of Boyville. But there was one thing Piggy Pennington could not do and it was the one of all things which he most wished he could do; he could not under any circumstances say three consecutive and coherent words to any girl under fifteen and over nine. He was invited with nearly all of the boys of his age in town, to children's parties. And while any other boy, whose only accomplishment was turning a cart- wheel, or skinning the cat backwards," or, at most, hanging by one leg and turning a handspring, could boldly ask a girl if he could see her home, Piggy had to get his hat and sneak out of the house when the company broke up. Even after school, Piggy could not join the select coterie of boys who followed the girls down through town to the postoffice, nor could he tease the girls about absent boys at such times and make up rhymes like "First the cat and then her tail; Jimmy Sears and Maggie Hale/' and shout them out for the crowd to hear. Instead Piggy Pennington went off with the boys who really didn't care for such things, and fought or wrestled his way leisurely home in time to get in his " night wood." But his heart was not in these pastimes; it was with a red shawl of a peculiar shade, that was wending its way to the postoffice and back to a home in one of the few two-story houses in the little town. Time and again had Piggy tried to make some sign to let his feelings be known, but every time he 234 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation had failed. Lying in wait for her at corners, and suddenly breaking upon her with a glory of backward and forward somersaults did not convey the state of his heart. Hanging by his heels from an apple tree limb over the sidewalk in front of her, unexpectedly, did not tell the tender tale for which his lips could find no words. And the nearest he could come to an expression of the longing in his breast was to cut her initials in the ice beside his own when she came weaving and wobbling past on some other boy's arm. But she would not look at the initials, and the chirography of his skates was so indistinct that it required a key; and everything put together, poor Piggy was no nearer a decla- ration at the end of the winter than he had been at the be- ginning of autumn. So only one Heart beat with but a single thought, and the other took motto candy and valen- tines and red apples and picture cards and other tokens of esteem from other boys, and beat on with any number of thoughts. One morning in the late spring, he spent half an hour before breakfast among his mother's roses, which were just in first bloom. He had taken out there all the wire from an old broom, and all his kite string. His mother had to call three times before he would leave his work. He was the first to leave the table, and by eight o'clock he was at his task again. Before the first school bell had rung, Piggy Pennington was bound for the schoblhouse, with a strange- looking parcel under his arm. Just before school was called, Piggy Pennington was play- ing "scrub" with all his might, and a little girl — his Heart's Desire — was taking out of her desk a wreath of roses, tied to a shaky wire frame. There was a crowd of girls around her admiring it, and speculating about the possible author of the gift ; but to these she did not show the patent medi- Material for Interpretation 235 cine card, on which was scrawled, over the druggist's ad- vertisement : "Yours truly, W. H. P." Piggy was the last boy in, and he did not look toward the desk, where he had put the flowers until after the singing. Then he stole a sidewise glance that way, but his Heart 's Desire was deep in her geography. Once she squirmed in her place and looked toward him, but Piggy Pennington was head over heels in the "Iser rolling rapidly.' ' When their eyes did at last meet, just as Piggy was at the door to go out for recess, the thrill amounted to a shock that sent him whirling in a pinwheel of handsprings toward the ball ground, shouting "Scrub — first bat, first bat, first bat!" Piggy made four tallies that recess, and the other boys could n't have put him out, if they had used a hand-grenade or a Babcock fire extinguisher. He received four distinct shots that day from the eyes of his Heart's Desire, and the last one sent him home on the run, tripping up every primary urchin, and whooping at the top of his voice. But, alas, the course of true love never did run smooth, and the next day was a dark one. Piggy brought a big armful of red and yellow and pink and white roses to school, but though all the other girls crowded around him pleading for one, Heart's Desire never ap- proached. Instead, she stood near a window, talking to a freckle-faced boy, until the last rose, a beauty, had been given away. Oh, that was a dark day. It was almost four o'clock when Piggy Pennington walked to the master's desk to get him to work out a problem, and as he passed the desk of Heart's Desire he dropped a note in her lap. It read : 236 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation "Are you mad?" But he dared not look for the answer, as they marched out that night, so he contented himself with punching the boy ahead of him with a pin, and stepping on his heels, when they were in the back part of the room, where the teacher would not see him. The King of Boyville walked home alone that evening. The courtiers saw plainly that his majesty was troubled. At dusk, when the evening chores were done, Piggy Pen- nington walked past the home of his Heart's Desire and howled out a doleful ballad which began : "You ask what makes this darkey wee-eep, Why he like others am not gay." But a man on the sidewalk passing said, "Well, son, that 's pretty good, but wouldn't you just as lief sing as to make that noise." So the King went to bed with a heavy heart. He took that heart to school with him, the next morning, and dragged it over the school ground, playing crack the whip and "stink-base." But when he saw Heart's Desire wearing in her hair one of the white roses from his mother's garden — the Penningtons had the only white roses in the little town — he knew it was from the wreath which he had given her, and so light was his boyish heart that it was with an effort that he kept it out of his throat. There were smiles and smiles that day. During the singing they began, and every time she came past him from a class, and every time he could pry his eyes behind her geography, or her grammar, a flood of gladness swept over his soul. That night Piggy Pennington followed the girls from the school- house to the postofifice and in a burst of enthusiasm, he Material for Interpretation 237 walked on his hands in front of the crowd, for nearly half a block. When his Heart's Desire said: "Oh, ain't you afraid you '11 hurt yourself doing- that?" Piggy pretended not to hear her, and said to the boys : "Aw, that ain't nothin'; come down to my barn, an' I '11 do somepin that '11 make yer head swim." He was too exuberant to contain himself, and when he left the girls he started to run after a stray chicken that happened along, and ran till he was out of breath. He did not mean to run in the direction his Heart's Desire had taken, but he turned a corner, and came up with her sud- denly. Her eyes beamed upon him, and he could not run away, as he wished. She made room for him on the sidewalk, and he could do nothing but walk beside her. For a block they were so embarrassed that neither spoke. It was Piggy who broke the silence. His words came from his heart. He had not yet learned to speak other- wise. "Where 's your rose?" he asked, not seeing it. "What rose?" said the girl, as though she had never in her short life heard of such an absurd thing as a rose. "Oh, you know." There was another pause, during which Piggy picked up a pebble, and threw it at a bird in a tree. His heart w r as sinking rapidly. "Oh, that rose?" said his Heart's Desire, turning full upon him with the enchantment of her childish eyes. "Why, here it is in my grammar. I 'm taking it to keep with the others. Why?" "Oh, nuthin' much, I bet you can't do this," he added, as he glowed up into her eyes from an impulsive hand- spring. And thus the King of Boyville first set his light, little 238 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation foot upon the soil of an unknown country, a country old, yet ever new. William Allen White. Arranged by Gertrude E. Johnson. THE PRINCESS PORCELAIN He had always been interested in the frail little thing. They were in the same row — the outer one — of the same oval bed that was crowded with fellow-Pansies, and he was quick to notice that by the gardener's carelessness the space be- tween himself and his lefthand neighbor was wider than it should have been, a fact that annoyed him even then, and later became a source of real distress in his otherwise quiet life. This little left-hand neighbor seemed to attract by her very weakness and slowness of growth. He, himself, came of a Dutch strain and showed it in his sturdy growth of stem and the body and velvet of his blossom. King of the Blacks he was called, and really he deserved his name, though one intensely " dark purple fellow " who had been called " Black" the summer before, remarked, somewhat maliciously, that "the title of the King of the Blacks could never pay him for going thru life with a pinhead orange dot for an eye." The King used sometimes to fear the little maid at his side would never reach maturity. If the sun were very strong, she shrank beneath the heat. If the rain fell, she would sometimes lie prostrate, and those were the times when the distance between them distressed him, for, as he often told her, he could and would have supported her, and at least partly sheltered her with his broader leaves, but as V Material for Interpretation 239 it was he could only help her with his advice. And when she at last formed her flower buds and a shower was im- minent he would warn her to turn those delicate buds down- ward that the water might run off and so save the tenderly folded petals within from watery ruin. Up to that time his feeling for her had been simply the tender affection one is apt to feel for the creature we help or protect, and he had often looked back with a bold, admiring orange eye at the smiling little mottled, banded Pansies, who had not hesitated one moment to nod at him, — for they are a generally coquettish tribe. But one warm, still May morning all this was changed for the King of the Blacks, for there stood his slow-growing, frail neighbor holding up to his startled gaze the sweetest, tenderest, truest little face in all Panseydom. She was not brilliant nor velvet-blotched, nor yet banded, just a lovely porcelain blue of a perfectly even tint without markings of any kind, the pure color deepening into a violet eye with that speck of gold in the centre which, in a Pansy, answers to the pupil of a human eye. Looking upon this innocent beauty the King of the Blacks was suddenly shaken by a great passion of love and long- ing. He realized in that moment that she held all the sweetness of life for him. For one moment he enjoyed the unalloyed bliss of his discovery ; the next, alas ! brought to his knowledge some of the tortures that invariably accom- pany true love. Was he, then, jealous? Of course! Who could see that small, fierce, orange eye of his and doubt his jealousy — and goodness knows he had cause enough, but thru no fault of little Porcelain Blue's, mind yo\\\ She adored him: was aquiver with love from the edge of her topmost petal to the tips of her threadlike roots. 240 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation But think of the maddening space between them! Do what they would they could not bridge it over. They looked and longed, and longed and looked, but only their sighs sweetly mingled. They knew neither embrace nor kiss. The King of the Blacks was a sturdy fellow, and jealousy and disappointment made his temper prickly, and some- times he wished many things of an unpleasant nature upon the gardener, whose carelessness had caused so much suffer- ing. Often he cried out for a pest of mealy-bugs, or slugs, or snails to come upon his garden. Once he went so far as to wish moles to follow his footsteps beneath the lawn, but seeing how he had frightened Porcelain Blue he took that back, like the Dutch gentleman he really was. But it was hard to see all the winged marauders buzzing around his gentle little sweetheart, offering her the tattered compliments they had offered to each floral feminine they had met that day. To see a great ^bumble-bee" go blun- dering so heavily against her as to nearly knock her down ! But, oh! worst of all, to see that Butterfly — that royally striped, banded, powdered, idiotic flirt masculine — to see him impudently clinging to shy little Porcelain Blue's shoulder, while he stole the precious nectar from the sweet flower lips that cried vainly for the King to drive him away. No wonder he grew ill-tempered. He was so helpless. All he could do was to urge Porcelain Blue to call up her power of growing, and then to direct that growth toward him, while he cheered her up by calling her attention to the long arm he was forcing forward as rapidly as possible to- ward her, knowing well that the lady mistress of them all would much prefer his black, velvety blossoms to such a growth of leaf and stem. Material for Interpretation 241 Then, too, the King of the Blacks had much to endure from those about him. He had never concealed either his love or his distress, and there was much merriment at his expense among the flowers of his own bed and the insects that daily visited them. One perfect morning, when all the world seemed made for love, the King of the Blacks felt his heart was breaking, little Porcelain Blue dropped and hung her head so sadly, while all the others were fairly asw T ay with laughter. Just then, warm and sweet and strong, the West Wind came blowing. The romping, teasing, rowdy West Wind ! Many a time had he chucked the little one under her chin and set her petals into a wild, blue flutter, and now he paused a moment, disturbed at this sadness. Sadness in the path of the West Wind? Oh, no! he could not tolerate that. So back he drew a pace, gathered himself together, and then made a laughing rush upon the lovers, flinging with tender force young Porcelain Blue full upon the eager and cling- ing arms of the King of the Blacks. Then bumping their pretty faces together, he, rustling, fluttering, and waving, went on his merry way, leaving them to learn in peace the sweetness of the flower kiss. Porcelain Blue was so en- tangled in the strong arms of the King that she remained there, and if he found his Heaven in her sweet face she found hers in his gentle strength. And so happily they lived their little space and knew nothing but joy. One early summer day the following year the mistress stood looking down with puzzled eyes upon a stranger in her great bed of saucy, wide-eyed beauties, in all their satiny, velvety gorgeousness. She knew them all by name. They were " Kings This," and "Queens That," and "War- 242 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation rior So-and-So," and "French-Stained/' and "German Blotched, " and "Somebody's Royal Collection. ' ' But where did this stranger come from, here in the outer row of the big oval bed ? Down on his knees the gardener expatiated on the per- fection of form and the firmness of texture to be found in this beautiful nameless blossom that was upheld so firmly by its sturdy stem. "Pure porcelain blue, with markings that give it an al- most human smile ! ' ' murmured the lady. i ' The markings of blackest velvet, and that great red-orange eye ! Where have I seen that peculiar eye, and where that pure even tint of blue? Why — !" and at the same moment the gardener struck his earth-stained hands together, exclaiming, "The King of the Blacks, ma'am!" While his mistress cried, "Porcelain Blue!" and the gardener finished, "Hit 's the offspring of them two plants, ma'am, has sure has you are halive, and she 'as no name, poor thing." "Oh, yes, she has," smiled his mistress. She is of Royal parentage and beautiful, and she is called The Princess Porcelain. And to herself she whispered, "Ah, love never dies! That is amply proved by the existence here of Princess Porcelain. ' ' Clara Morris. THE PERFECT ONE Many ages ago there lived in Persia a certain teacher and philosopher named Sabbah who seemed as a shining light to all who looked on him. His courtesy and dignity, his wisdom and humility, his imperturbability of temper, and Material for Interpretation 243 his charity to all, won for him many followers ; and among these there grew toward him so great a devotion that they could see in him nothing amiss. This, they said, was the perfect man whom all the world had been looking for. And because they found no flaw in his character and per- ceived no limitation in his wisdom, so far as things human were concerned, they called him "the perfect one," and fixing upon him the blind eye of imitation, but shutting upon him the eye of understanding, they sat daily at his feet and hearkened to his sayings ; they spoke as he spoke and did as he did, hoping thereby to come in time to a like perfection. So when, in the contemplation of deep things, the perfect one combed his beard with his fingers, they (such as had them) combed theirs, and those who had not, made combings in the air where presently their beards would be. And when he ate they ate, and when he fasted they fasted, and when he spat they spat, so as to be at one with him in all things appertaining to conduct. And they were happy in these things, and thought by discipline to come presently to the perfection wherein he seemed perfect. So when, his hours of teaching being over (for he sat daily in the mosque and taught all that would hear him), he rose to return to his own house, those that doted on his example would rise and follow him ; and where he trod they trod, and if he stayed to look on a piece of merchandise, or to handle a fabric and ask the price of it, they also would stay and look and handle and inquire. And because of these things they were a nuisance to the merchants, and the pro- cession of the perfect one was imperfectly welcomed in the bazaars of that city. So presently the merchants would request the perfect one to go by other ways if he wished not to buy, but to go their way when buying was his intention ; 244 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation for when he bought then those that followed him bought also. Now, every day when the perfect one reached his house thus accompanied and attended, he went in and shut the door, and they saw no more of him ; and going sadly to their own homes, they wondered and questioned among them- selves what he did when the door was shut, so that they also might do likewise, and by that much be nearer to perfection. And this grew to be so great a debate among them that at last one, greatly daring, making himself spokesman for the rest, said: 1 ' Perfect One, when you go into your house and shut your door, so' that we see no more of you, what is it that you do then ? Let us know, that we also may do it and be perfect, as you are." And the perfect one answered : "I do many things. If I told you them all, you would not remember. " "Yet you may tell us the first thing," said he who spoke for the rest. ' ' The first thing ? ' ' said Sabbah ; and musingly he combed his beard with his fingers, while all the rest did likewise. 1 ' The first thing that I do is to stand on my head and stick out my tongue and twiddle my toes, for I find great joy in it." So that day when all his followers had parted from him and returned each to their own houses, they stood on their heads and stuck out their tongues and twiddled their toes, and found great joy in it. "Now we be growing perfect," said they. But the next day one of his followers said to him : "0 Perfect One, why do you do this thing? For though Material for Interpretation 24<5 we find joy in it, we know not the celestial reason or the correspondency which makes it seem good. " And Sabbah answered: "I will tell you first what I do, and I will tell you the reasons afterward." So they said to him : "0 Perfect One, what is the next thing that you do?" And Sabbah said : "The next thing that I do? I tell my wife to beat me till I cry out for mercy." So when his followers returned to their houses that day and had finished their first exercise in perfection, they told their wives to beat them till they cried out for mercy. And their wives did so. The next day, a little crestfallen and sad, his followers came back to him, and one of them said : "0 Perfect One, after your wife has begun beating you, when do you cry out for mercy? There is a difference of opinion among us, and truly it matters. ' ' Sabbah answered : "I do not cry out for mercy." At this answer they all looked much astonished and very sorry for themselves, and one who had come that day look- ing more crestfallen than the rest said : "But I, Perfect One, have ten wives!" Sabbah smiled on him. "I have none," said Sabbah. His followers sat and looked at him for awhile in silence, then said one : ' * Perfect One, why have you done this ? ' ' And the perfect one answered: "When I go into my house and shut my door, then it is for the relief of being alone and quit of the mockery where- 246 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation with you mock me, pretending that I am perfect. It is for that, and to realize the more fully my own imperfection, that I stand on my head and twiddle my toes and stick out my tongue. Then I know that I am a fool. And that is the celestial reason and the correspondency which make me find joy in it. "Then it is, because I know I am a fool, that I tell my wife to beat me until I cry out for mercy. And truly— and this shall be my last answer — the reason that I have no wife is because I am a wise man." Then the perfect one arose from his place and went home, according to his custom; nor did any of his fol- lowers that time bear him company. But they gazed after him with the open eye of understanding, and, plucking out the blind eye of imitation, cast it from them, and went home full of thought how best to solve the domestic prob- lem which there awaited them. "Now I am at peace,' ' said the perfect one, shutting his door. Laurence Housman. THE BATTLE OF PANKOW "Your Royal Highness," said General von Kampf in a loud, monotonous voice, as if addressing a large and dis- tant body of soldiery: "Your Royal Highness, the dis- position of your troops is most unwise and improper. Your left flank is entirely unprotected — is in the air, and unless your opponent be devoid of all military sense, he will at- tack immediately and your army will be decimated." General von Kampf — bald, wrinkled, bristly, rigid— fixed his royal highness, the crown prince, with a cold blue eye. Material for Interpretation 247 and bowed stiffly with much creaking of joints, belts, and buckles. Y ' Decimated ! ' ' ' breathed the crown prince, timidly, looking no higher than the toes of the general's martial boots. " ' Decimated V What does 'decimated' mean, if you please, your excellency?" "To decimate is to put out of action ten percent of your enemy's effectives. Such is its proper meaning; a good offi- cer knows no other. Had you been attentive to my teach- ings, you would have rested your left wing on this river. Then you would have been safe. As it is, you are utterly and irretrievably lost ! ' ' Lost! The crown prince cast one appealing glance at General von Kampf, the chief of his household, but saw nothing on the harsh face of that dignitary save a frown of disapproval. He was terrified. The word "Lost!" "Lost!" kept ringing mournfully in his ears. He strove to be brave. He sat very still and very erect in his chair, made higher by a tremendous book. He clenched his little hands together tightly and gazed straight in front of him, trying with all his might to look somewhere, anywhere, rather than at a certain picture hanging on the wall. But it was of no use. His glance wavered, strayed nearer and nearer to the picture, until finally a lump rose in his throat and tears filled his eyes. And that he might hide this last weakness from her who looked down at him with proud, cold face from out of the huge gilt frame, he cast his arms despairingly upon the table beside which he sat, and hid his twitching face in them. And that she might not hear, he choked back his sobs with all his remaining strength. By this impetuous movement on the part of the crown prince, the royal forces covering the table were thrown into the utmost confusion and disarray, from which they, 248 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation being quite as stiff and lacking in mobility as General von Kampf himself, were wholly unable to recover. The un- fortunate left wing — horse, foot and dragoons — already fore-doomed to disaster, was entirely swept off its feet, and perished miserably beneath the torrential overflow of the impassable river, represented in the foregoing maneuvers by a mammoth celery dish filled with water. u Be a man, Your Highness! He who would be a king and would control others, must first learn to control him- self. Be a man ! ' ' "I don't want to be a king. And I can't be a man just yet, for I 'm only a little boy ; and — and — your excellency, I want my mother. ' ' "Preposterous! Her Majesty left the capitol yesterday. By this time she is at the end of the kingdom. ' ' The end of the kingdom! Which end? wondered the crown prince, for he knew there must be two ends, since his father seemed always to be at one and his mother at the other. Over this and many other serious problems his royal highness pondered deeply, especially at night, when mili- tary discipline was somewhat relaxed and he was at peace. And, based upon his speculations, he framed quite a formid- able list of questions to be submitted to the chief of his household so soon as he should catch that grim warrior in just the proper humor. But before the list was half complete, his attention invariably wandered, and he watched with frightened eyes the night-light flickering on the hearth and the shadows dancing on the wall, until he fell asleep. In the hurry and bustle of the busy day, with its drills and warlike exercises and its endless procession of spec- tacled professors, the crown prince could not recall a tithe Material for Interpretation 249 of the questions formulated so carefully the night before. Or if he did, he could never screw up courage to ask them. In the late afternoons, during his "play hour" as the general called it, matters were even worse. Whenever the latter said, "Today, Your Highness, let us repeat the war- game of Pankow, in w 7 hich famous battle, you will remem- ber, I had the honor of being of some trifling service to your illustrious grandsire," the crown prince, hopelessly wearied and confused by all that had gone before, could remember nothing, not even the simplest principle of strategy or rules of tactics. In consequence, he drew down death and destruction upon his unfortunate troops, and upon his ow r n bewildered and terrified little head the fierce criticisms of the hero of that ever memorable day. Once, however, by a happy chance, all went well. The imperiled left w T ing found itself in some wholly unex- pected manner safely marshaled upon the very bank of the impassable river, and the enemy, completely out-maneu- vered, suffered an even more terrible defeat at the hands of the grandson than had in reality been inflicted by the grandfather. The effect upon General von Kampf was simply aston- ishing. His spurred heels cracked together ; his right hand, like a piece of rusty and complicated mechanism, came to the salute; and upon his face, after a good many abortive efforts, appeared an entirely new set of wrinkles, suggest- ing in some remote and phantasmal way the existence of a smile. His royal highness was too astounded to speak, but quickly divining that no opportunity better suited to his purpose could ever be found, he rapidly reviewed in his mind, so far as he was able, the problems calling most ur- 250 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation gently for solution. Among other things he desired to know if the general slept in his uniform with all his orders pinned on his breast. Again, he wished the general to let him look at his back, of which he never remembered having had a satisfactory view, and to inquire if his ex- cellency found it as easy to walk backward as forward, a mode of locomotion that he, the crown prince, had tried privily with but poor success. More important still, he longed to ask why his father did not give him a pile of sand in which to play. But upon consideration he aban- doned all these questions in favor of one that harassed him mightily. 4 'Why — why — " he looked up, saw that the general was regarding him attentively, flushed hotly, hesitated, and stopped. "Why — why — " but his voice failed him. He could not go on. First, there was the general, of whom he was still mortally afraid. And then, now that the time to speak had come, came with it a knowledge of his own incompetency to put into words a single one — even the simplest — of the manifold riddles that together formed the one big riddle he so ardently desired to have solved for him. Wearily, hopelessly, the crown prince closed his eyes and sank low in his chair, leaning his head against the great carved back that rose high above him. And thus he sat, thinking, while the mellow glow of sunset filled every nook and corner of the lofty chamber with warmth and light, flaming and pouring over the polished floor a flood of molten gold. On each side of the towering chimney- piece, in the full radiance of the dying day, hung a picture, a full-length portrait the size of life, surrounded by a massive frame — the young king and younger queen, each in royal robes, each crowned, and as if this were not Material for Interpretation 251 enough, surmounting each frame was yet another crown, huge in size and heavily gilded. Under the portrait of his mother the crown prince sat, thinking, resting his head, which was too large and heavy, and his body, which was too small and thin, in the hollow of his carved chair. Though the light was blinding, the shadows lay heavy under his tired eyes; though all about him seemed on fire, he shivered with cold — a pale, sickly child, stifled, weary, worn out already before he had well begun to live, and all the glory of the setting sun could make nothing else of him. As gaily dressed in his little uniform as any of the leaden soldiers drawn up before him, he seemed as empty of the breath of life as they, as frail, as helpless. The sun sank lower, its light crimsoned, and lay slug- gish on the floor, like pools of blood. But presently that, too, faded, the air grew gray, and shadows blended with one another, and floated upward, thickening, slowly thick- ening, until familiar objects took on quaint and fearful shades. And from the remoter corners of the room, where the gloom was deepest, issued mysterious whisperings and vague sounds like sighs. The crown prince shuddered and looked up. The pic- ture of his father had wholly disappeared. His father! Ah, here was' one of the questions that most perplexed him — did his father love him, and if not, why? why? Was it because he was always so muddied in his little head, so worried, so tired that he could do nothing right, could never satisfy the general, never please anybody? Or was it because so many things frightened him, because he cried, because — he knew the very word — because he was a cow- ard? Perhaps that was the reason no one loved him. And this brought him to the most terrible question of all — did his 252 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation mother love him ? If he only knew ! If he could only tell ! Quickly he turned a supplicating glance toward her por- trait. That, too, had vanished, the figure withdrawn into its frame as if departing through an open door. His mother had left him — alone in the coming darkness! Alone, for the general seemed to be asleep, and besides, he didn't count. But was this his mother? If it were, then in some in- comprehensible way he must have two mothers — one who looked as did she in the picture, too high up, too far away to notice little boys, a stranger, almost, to whom the gen- eral led him at long intervals that he might kiss her hand as she sat in the midst of a crowd of people. But surely there was another. How well he remembered one night long ago when he was ill — he must have been very ill, for the shadows pursued him and he started up panic-stricken from dreams that were full of shadows also, and found him- self alone, and cried aloud in his terror and desolation. But he was not alone. There beside him in all her starry loveliness was his other mother — his dream mother, he had since loved to call her — and she lifted him from his hot bed and laid his aching head on her breast, and crooned him to sleep just as if he had been a little baby. Oh, how happy he had been ! The crown prince could never guess how much of what took place that night was real, how much was part of shadow land and dream land. But whether real or no, he would have been willing to be ill a thousand times if only it might have happened just once more. It never did hap- pen. Why ? What was the trouble ? Where was the trou- ble? Why was he unlike other little boys? Why did not his father and mother love him as the fathers and mothers of other little boys loved him? And again he asked the Material for Interpretation 253 same old questions, until he returned inevitably to that one, the most haunting, the most dreadful of all — did his mother love him, and if she did, then why did she never come back in the dark nights when his head was hot and ached, and the dreams and shadows terrified him? He sat in his carved chair, thinking, as the day waned and the gloom deepened about him. And, as if in answer to his question, the huge gilded crown over the portrait of the young queen — dimly outlined in the expiring light — seemed to press heavily upon the proud woman and upon his own fragile figure as well, crushing them under an intolerable weight, thrusting them cruelly down, down, into the engulfing shadows. Suddenly, with a cry, the boy sprang to his feet. A blade of crimson light, the last gleam from the embers dying in the west, pierced the darkness, and the crown leaped into flame. For an instant the picture seemed to be alive — the face convulsed, the body writhing under the agony of that blazing coronet. But in the twinkling of an eye the fire was quenched, and it was night. Then out of the darkness rose a voice: "Oh, mother! mother! where are you? where are you? Oh, mother, I will try to be brave. Oh, come back from the end of the kingdom — come back to your little boy!" The general, dozing in a corner, rose abruptly and grop- ing in the darkness, he stumbled over the form of his royal master lying senseless on the floor at the foot of the queen 's picture. n The night light flickered on the hearth, and the shadows danced upon the wall as the crown prince, in the last stage of a tremendous journey that had been full of darkness, 254 Modem Literature for Oral Interpretation bewilderment, and peril, climbed slowly, painfully, breath- lessly up the toilsome path that leads from the Valley of Dreams to the Happy Country where real people live. One more effort, and he was near the top : another, and he reached the very edge, and knew he was there at last. For he could hear as plain as plain could be the familiar tread of the sentry marching back and forth, back and forth, in the courtyard beneath his window. But was it, after all, the sentry's step? No; it was the ticking of a watch — a big fat gold watch with a face the size of the moon, and behind the watch was a pair of shiny spectacles, also of gold, and above the shiny spectacles was a shiny dome fringed about with long, straight hair, not of gold but of silver. The crown prince watched Spectacles a long time, and Spectacles watched him, until at length Spectacles began to speak in a voice so kindly and so mellow that it seemed golden, too, or else of the finest quality of silver. "Go to sleep, Your Royal Highness, go to sleep, my little man. Do not worry, Your Majesties; he will get well. Only do as I advise, and he will live to be as old as I am, or older, maybe. ' ' At this, the crown prince, wondering about whom Spec- tacles was talking, peered a little way over the edge of the world and saw his father standing in the middle of the floor, his eyes red, his hair tumbled, and his hands buried deep in his pockets. He peeped a little farther still, and there was the general looking stiffer than ever and with so many orders pinned on his breast that he fairly shone; but his eyes were also red and he seemed all of a sudden to have grown very old, very old indeed, older perhaps than Spectacles himself. But stop ! Spectacles was talking again, now about some Material for Interpretation 255 wonderful place in the mountains — at the very end of the kingdom, the crown prince was glad to learn — where were to be found the most extraordinary butter and the richest milk and the freshest eggs and the best water — and air. It did not appear as if he would ever exhaust this topic, but presumably he did so, for after a while he bowed to everybody and backed out of the room. He had no sooner gone than the king cast one glance at the crown prince out of the corner of his eye, and straightway fell into a perfect frenzy. He commanded the general to get a piece of paper immediately, or, bet- ter, a ream, if he could find it, and every pen and pencil he could lay his hands on, and to write down forthwith cer- tain directions that would be given him, all with the ut- most care, so that the slightest chance of an omission or a mistake might be avoided. First, there was to be a sand pile made at this place in the mountains, a large pile, a monstrous pile. "Mind you!" said the king, noting with covert eye that the crown prince was watching him intently, and shaking his finger at the general as if he were a little boy; "mind you! the bigger the better, and of the whitest, cleanest, softest sand ; and to go with it a wheelbarrow, a bucket and a spade. And next — write precisely as I tell you — six white ponies, all exactly alike, with long white tails. Then, a dozen dogs, the most playful in the kennels, and a basketful — a big basketful — of puppies. Next, a fishing- rod, and a gun, and — let me see — and a swing, and a trunk- ful of games to be played out-of-doors on sunshiny days, and two trunkfuls of games to be played indoors on rainy days. And — go on — next—" But it was useless to go on. The poor general, writing like a madman, was miles behind already, so that the king, 256 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation until he could catch up, sent for one attendant after an- other, charging that boxes and trunks be packed with the greatest expedition. Finally, the general having caught up, or having abandoned his mission as hopeless, and being anxious to make a fresh start, asked : — "Your Majesty, shall the soldiers belonging to His High- ness be taken, or any of his books dealing with military matters? And to accompany him, what equerries and chamberlains — " "No! no!" said a voice almost in the crown prince's ear. He could not tell whence it came ; but surely it was the sweetest, the softest, the gentlest voice in the whole wide world. "No ! no ! We will forget all about being a soldier and a king until we are ever so much older— ever, ever so much older than we are now. We will forget all about it and be a little boy — just a little boy. And we will go away from this place and take with us no reminder of it. It is stifling. It has kept us apart. It has made me cold and heartless. It has made him lonely and miserable. It has almost killed him. Think of it ! I might have lost him — my little son ! ' ' The crown prince looked up and saw his beautiful dream mother gazing down at him with eyes full of love and pity. ' ' Mother, is it all real ? Is it you at last ? ' ' "Yes, yes, my darling, it is all real, every bit of it." "And you won't leave me again, will you? You will al- ways stay with me, mother, won't you? Say that you will go with me to this wonderful place where the sand pile is to be. ' ' "Yes, yes, my baby; yes, indeed, I will — you and I all alone to the place where the sand pile is to be. ' ' "And I won't have to sit on the big book and be deci- Material for Interpretation 257 mated? Nor think about the river, on which my — my — on which one of my flanks rest?" "No! no! You shall rest on a mother's love. That is best, that is safest for little boys." And the queen, smil- ing gently, laid her hand on his forehead, and the crown prince fell asleep. George Woodruff Johnston. Arranged by Gertrude E. Johnson. THE WHIRLIGIG OF LIFE Justice of the Peace, Benaja Widdup, sat in the door of his office, smoking his elder-stem pipe. Half way to the zenith, the Cumberland Range rose, blue-gray in the after- noon haze. A speckled hen swaggered down the main * street of the ' ' settlement, ' ' cackling foolishly. Up the road came a sound of creaking axles, and then a slow cloud of dust, and then a bull-cart bearing Ransie Bilbro and his wife. The cart stopped at the Justice's door, and the two climbed down. Ransie was a narrow six feet of sallow, brown skin and yellow hair. The im- perturbability of the mountains hung upon him like a cloak of armor. The woman was calicoed, angled, snuff- brushed, and weary with unknown desires. Through it all gleamed a faint protest of cheated youth unconscious of its loss. The Justice of the Peace slipped his feet into his shoes, for the sake of dignity, and moved to let them enter. "We-all wants a divo'ce." She looked at Ransie to see if he noted any flaw or ambiguity or evasion or par- tiality or self -partisanship in her statement of their busi- ness. 258 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation "A divo'ce. We-all can't git along together nohow. It 's lonesome enough fur to live in the mountains when a man and a woman keers fur one another. But when she 's a s-spittin' like a wildcat or a sullenin' like a hoot- owl in the cabin, a man ain't got no call to live with her." "When he 's a no-count varmint, a traipsin' along of scalawags and moonshiners, and a layin ' on his back pizin ' 'ith corn whiskey, and a pesterin' folks 'ith a pack of triflin' hounds to feed!" "When she keeps throwin' skillet lids, and slings bilin' water on the best coon dog in the Cumberlands, and sets herself agin cookin' a man's victuals, and keeps him awoke of nights accusin ' him of a sight of doin 's ! " "When he 's al'ays a fightin' the revenues, and gits a hard name in the mountins fur a mean man, who 's g'wine to be able fur to sleep of nights?" The Justice of the Peace stirred deliberately to his duties. He placed his one chair and a wooden stool for his petition- ers. He opened his book of statutes on the table and scanned the index. Presently he wiped his spectacles and shifted the inkstand. "The law and the statutes air silent on the subject of divo'ce as fur as jurisdiction of this co't air concerned. But accordin' to the equity and the Constitution and the Golden Rule it 's a bad bargain that can't run both ways. If a Justice can marry a couple it 's plain that he is bound to be able to divo'ce 'em. This here office will issue a de- cree of divo'ce and abide by the decision of the Supreme Co't to hold it good." Ransie Bilbro drew a small tobacco bag from his trou- sers pocket. Out of this he shook upon the table a five- dollar note. Material for Interpretation 259 "Sold a b'ar skin and two foxes for thet. It 's all the money we got. ' ' "The regular price of a divo'ce in this GVt air five dol- lars." He stuffed the bill into the pocket of his homespun vest with a deceptive air of indifference. With much bodily toil and mental travail he wrote the decree upon half a sheet of foolscap, and then copied it upon the other. Ran- sie Bilbro and his wife listened to his reading of the docu- ment that was to give them freedom : "Know all men by these presents, that Ransie Bilbro and his wife, Ariela Bilbro this day personally appeared before me and promises that hereinafter they will neither love, honor nor obey each other, neither for better nor for worse, being of sound mind and body, and accept summons for divo'ce according to the peace and dignity of the state. Herein fail not, so help you God. Benaja Widdup, Jus- tice of the Peace in and for the county of Piedmont, State of Tennessee." The Justice was about to hand one of the documents to Ransie. The voice of Ariela delayed the transfer. Both men looked at her. Their dull masculinity was confronted by something sudden and unexpected in the woman. "Judge, don't you give him that air paper yit. 'T ain't all settled, nohow. I got to have my alimoney. 'T ain't no kind of a way to do fur a man to divo'ce his wife 'thout her havin' a cent fur to do with. I 'm layin' off to be a-goin' up to brother Ed's, up on Hogback Mountin. I 'm bound fur to hev a pa'r of shoes and some snuff and things besides. Ef Ranse kin affo'd a divo'ce, let him pay me alimoney. ' ' Ransie Bilbro was stricken to dumb perplexity. There had been no previous hint of alimony. Women were al- ways bringing up startling and uncalled-for issues. 260 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation Justice Benaja Widdup felt that the point demanded judicial advice. The authorities were also silent on the subject of alimony. But the woman's feet were bare. The trail to Hogback mountain was steep and flinty. "Ariela Bilbro, how much did you 'low would be good and sufficient alimoney in the case befo' the co't?" ' ■ I 'lowed fur the shoes and all, to say five dollars. That ain't much fur alimoney, but I reckon that '11 git me up to brother Ed's." "The amount air not onreasonable. Ransie Bilbro, you air ordered by the co't to pay the plaintiff the sum of five dollars befo' the decree of divo'ce air issued." "I hain't no mo' money, I done paid you all I had, but I reckon if you gimme till tomorrow I mout be able to rake or scrape it up somewhars. I never looked for payin' no alimoney. ' ' "The case air adjourned till tomorrow, when you-all will present yo 'selves and obey the order of the co't. Fol- lo)vin' of which the decrees of divo'ce will be delivered," and he sat down in the door and began loosening a shoe- string. ' i We mout as well go down to Uncle Ziah 's for the night, ' ' decided Ransie. He climbed in the cart on one side and Ariela climbed in on the other. Obeying the flip of his rope, the little red bull came slowly around on a tack and the cart crawled away in the nimbus arising from its wheels. Justice of the Peace, Benaja "Widdup lived in the double log cabin on the slope near the girdled poplar. Going home to supper, he crossed a little branch darkened by a laurel thicket. The dark figure of a man stepped from the laurels and pointed a rifle at his breast. His hat was pulled down low, and something 1 covered most of his face. "I want yo' money 'thout any talk. I 'm a gettin' Material for Interpretation 261 nervous, and my finger 's a wabblin' on this here trigger.' ' "I 've got only f-f-five dollars," said the Justice, pro- ducing it from his vest pocket. "Roll it up/' and stick it in the end of this here gun- bar '1." The bill was crisp and new. Even fingers that were clumsy and trembling found little difficulty in making a spill of it and inserting it (this with less ease) into the muzzle of the rifle. "Now I reckon you kin be goin' along," and the Justice lingered not on his way. The next day came the little red bull drawing the cart to the office door. Justice Benaja Widdup had his shoes on, for he was expecting this visit. Ransie Bilbro handed his wife a five dollar bill. The official's eye viewed it sharply. It seemed to curl up as though it had been rolled and inserted into the end of a gun-barrel. But the Justice refrained from comment. It is true other bills might be inclined to curl. He handed each one a decree of divorce. Each stood awkwardly silent, slowly folding the guarantee of freedom. The woman cast a sly glance full of con- straint at Ransie. "I reckon you 11 be goin' back to the cabin, along 'ith the bull-cart. There 's bread in the tin box settin' on the shelf. I put the bacon in the b'ilin'-pot to keep the hounds from gittin' it. Don't forgit to wind the clock tonight." "You air a goin' to your brother Ed's — " "I was 'lowin' to get along up thar afore night, I ain't sayin' as they '11 pester theyselves any to make me wel- come, but I ain't nowhar else fur to go. It 's a right smart ways, and I reckon I better be goin'. I '11 be a sayin' good-by — Ranse — that is, if you keer fur to say so." "I don't know as anybody 's a hound dog fur to not 262 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation want to say good-by — 'less you air so anxious to git away that you don't want me to say it." Ariela was silent. She folded the five-dollar bill and her decree carefully, and placed them in the bosom of her dress. Benaja Widdup watched the money disappear with mournful eyes behind the spectacles. And then, with his next words, he achieved rank (as his thoughts ran) with either the great crowd of the world's sympathizers or the little crowd of the great financiers. "Be kind o' lonesome in the old cabin tonight, Ranse." Ransie Bilbro stared out at the Cumberlands, clear blue now in the sunlight. He did not look at Ariela. ( ' I 'low it might be lonesome, but when folks gits mad and wants a divo 'ce, you can 't make folks stay. ' ' "There 's others wanted a divo'ce," said Ariela, speak- ing to the wooden stool. "Besides, nobody don't want no- body to stay." "Nobody never said they didn't." "Nobody never said they did. I reckon I better start on now to brother Ed's." "Nobody can't wind that clock." "Want me to go back along 'ith you in the cart and wind it fur you, Ranse?" The mountaineer's countenance was proof against emo- tion. But he reached out a big hand and enclosed Ariela 's thin brown one. Her soul peeped out once through her impassive face, hallowing it. "Them hounds shan't pester you no more. I reckon I been mean and low down. You wind that clock, Ariela." "My heart hit 's in that cabin, Ranse," she whispered, "along 'ith you. I ain't a goin' to git mad no more. Le 's be startin', Ranse, so 's we kin get home by sundown." Material for Interpretation 263 Justice of the Peace, Benaja Widdup, interposed as they started for the door, forgetting his presence. "In the name of the State of Tennessee, I forbid you-all to be a-defying of its laws and statutes. This co't is mo' than willin' and full of joy to see the clouds of discord and misunderstandin ' rollin' away from two lovin' hearts, but it air the duty of the co't to p 'serve the morals and integrity of the State. The co't reminds you that you air no longer man and wife, but air divo'ced by regular de- cree, and as such air not entitled to the benefits and 'pur- tenances of the mattermonial estate. "But the co't air prepared fur to remove the disabilities set up by the decree of divo'ce. The co't air on hand to perform the solemn ceremony of marriage, thus fixin' things up and enablin' the parties in the case to resume the hon- or 'ble and elevatin' state of mattermony which they de- sires. The fee fur performin' said ceremony will be, in this case, to wit, five dollars." Ariela caught the gleam of promise in his words. Swiftly her hand went to her bosom. Freely as an alight- ing dove the bill fluttered to the Justice's table. Her sal- low cheek colored as she stood, hand in hand with Ransie, and listened to the re-uniting words. Ransie helped her into the cart and climbed in beside her. The little red bull turned once more, and they set out, hand-clasped, for the mountains. Justice of the Peace, Benaja Widdup sat in his door and took off his shoes. Once again he fingered the bill tucked down in his vest pocket. Once again he smoked his elder- stem pipe and once again the speckled hen swaggered down the main street of the "settlement," cackling foolishly. 0. Henry. Arranged by Gertrude E. Johnson. 264 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation THE LEGACY 1 Precisely as the five o'clock steamer passed the cottage, Mrs. McBean set the freshly-filled kettle on the fire. After a glance at the tea-table with its abundance of homely fare, she stepped across the kitchen to the window. Peter ought to be in sight immediately, and on this spring evening she was particularly anxious to catch a glimpse of his face ere he reached the cottage. Her right hand, browned and with- ered, was laid against the shutter as if for support ; her left was pressed to her breast, whence came, as she heaved a sigh, a faint rustle of paper. She hoped — she almost prayed — that her husband might return as cheerful of humor as he had left her that morn- ing, when he had taken the steamer to Glasgow in order to receive payment of a legacy of two hundred and fifty pounds bequeathed to him by a cousin who, having made a small fortune in Canada, had died there, remembering at the last his old home and sundry of his old friends. She had smiled happily on Peter as he set out to catch the early steamer, bidding him hasten home again to as- sure her that the much discussed legacy was really a fact ; and now she almost dreaded his return. The kettle began to "sing," and she started at the fa- miliar sound. Peter ought to have rounded the bend of the shore-road by now. Had he missed the steamer? Had he been stopped by some of the village gossips? It was not fair of him when he knew she was waiting to be assured that the money was real. . . . "Haste ye, Peter," she murmured, and then remem- bered the paper at her breast. How a bit of flimsy paper i Copyrighted J. B. Lippincott Co., Feb., 1910. Material for Interpretation 265 with a few lines of writing can blight one's whole world of satisfaction ! Mrs. McBean gave a shiver, and her sight became blurred. When she had wiped her eyes she saw her husband. He came along briskly, jauntily for an old man to whom rheu- matism was no stranger. He waved one hand and patted his chest significantly with the other. She waved also, and felt the paper in her bosom. She turned abruptly from the window. The kettle was boiling, and she was glad to have something to do. Peter entered the kitchen, chuckling, and banged the door behind him. "See what I was buyin', Marget!" he cried. "Ye '11 be upsides wi ' yer neebors noo ! ' ' "Oh, Peter!" she whispered, staring at the small packet he had pushed into her hand. "Oh, Peter, what 's this?" "Look an' see!" he returned, with a great hearty laugh. With awkward fingers she removed the white paper, un- covering a white box. "Oh, Peter!" she whispered once more, and opened the box. It contained, resting on cotton wool, a big gold brooch set with a single amethyst, an old-fashioned ornament, but dazzling to her eyes. She said never a word. "I was thinkin' it was time ye had a bit joolry forbye yer chain," said Peter pleasantly. "Hoo dae ye like it, auld wife?" "Oh, Peter, ye 're ower guid to me," she said, at last, striving to keep back the tears. "I wasna needin' — " "D'ye no' like it?" "Ay. I like it, but — but I dinna ken what to say to ye, Peter. I — I hope it didna cost an awfu' heap o' siller. But it — it 's rale bonny, Peter; it 's rale braw, an' — an' I 'm that prood to get it. . . . Did — did it cost an awfu' — M 266 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation 6 ' Tits, wife ! Never heed aboot that. If ye like it, that \s an end to the story. I Ve aye wanted ye to ha'e as braw a brooch as Mistress Macadam, an' I believe I 've got ye a brawer! An' I brocht the money to let ye see it afore it gangs to the bank. Ye can coont it yersel' efter we Ve had wur tea. Is 't near ready ? ' ' "Jist ready. The money was a' richt, Peter?" "Every penny. I Ve been blessin' puir Geordie a' the road hame." "Ay; I wish Geordie could ken what he 's done for us. . . . Sit down, Peter. Ye '11 be hungry." 1 ' Try on yer brooch, Marget. ' ' "Oh, na, na. I '11 keep it for the Sawbath." ' ' Try it on noo. Never heed yer auld claes. ' ' And she fastened it at her neck, to please him, the paper under her bodice rustled, and her wet eyes grew fearful. But Peter was looking at the brooch. "My! It suits ye fine! Keep it on till efter we 've had wur meat," he said, and began to cut bread, while she poured out the tea. A little later he noticed that she was eating noth- ing. "What ails ye, wife?" he demanded. "Are ye no' weel?" "I 'm fine, Peter, I 'm fine," she answered hurriedly. "Ye 're no' lookin' extra fine. Ye dinna look as if her man had come hame wi' twa hunner an' fifty pound in his pooch, eh? Are ye no' pleased wi' yer brooch?" "Aw, Peter, I 'm pleased — I 'm jist terrible pleased wi' ma brooch," she protested. "But, ye see, it was a — a ter- rible surprise to get it. Maybe that 's the reason I 'm no' hungry. ' ' 1 ' An ' ye 've never speirt what adventures I had the day, ' ' Material for Interpretation 267 he proceeded, after a long pull at his tea-cup. "A body wud think ye wasna heedin' aboot the siller." ' { Oh, but I 'm heedin ' aboot it. Tell me yer adventures. ' ' "I had nane," he said, with a hearty laugh. "It was a' as easy as A B C, an' the lawyer body parted wi' the cash as if it was dirt. I got it a' in five-pound notes, an' they '11 gang to the bank the morn's mornin'. But I 11 tell ye something that '11 gar ye sit up, auld wife. ' ' "What, Peter?" "IVe decided to retire frae business!" — this with an- other laugh. An inarticulate cry escaped the old woman. "Dinna speak till I 've tell 't ye a' aboot it," said Peter. "Ye see, I 've been thinkin' aboot retirin' since I first got word o' Geordie's legacy. I 've been workin' hard for fifty year. . . . An' when I got the cash in ma haun' the day, I thocht aboot retirin ' mair serious nor ever. An ' when I got near hame the nicht, an' seen auld Jake Munro sittin' at his door, in his carpet slippers, smokin' his pipe an' readin' his paper, as happy as a king, wi' naethin' to bother him — I made up ma mind to follow his guid example, an' retire frae business as sune as possible." "But Peter—" " "Whisht, wumman! I 'm no' feenished yet. As I was sayin',~I 've been thinkin' aboot it since I heard o' Geordie's legacy. Afore that I never had ony notion o' retirin' — till I couldna help it. But I Ve been calculating an' I see ma road clear. Wi' the siller we 've got pit by, an' the legacy, an' what I could get for the nursery an' the tomato-hooses, there wud be plenty to keep you an' me as weel as we are the noo, as lang as we 're spared. I wudna ha'e risked it wi'oot the legacy, but noo — weel, what think ye, Marget?" 268 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation She did not answer at once. She could not. Her simple mind was in a turmoil of warring thoughts. At last she managed to speak. "Are ye no' weel, Peter? Are ye feelin' no' fit for yer wark?" "I never felt better nor fitter. But I 've been workin' hard for fifty year, an' I Ve as muckle richt to tak' it easy as ony man — as muckle richt as Jake Munro. As I cam' by I speirt at him hoo he liket daein' naethin\ He said he hadna enjeyed hissel' sae weel since he was a laddie." With an effort the old woman said: "But Jake Munro has neither wife nor bairns to heed aboot. He 's — " "But did I no' tell ye there wud and is about ready to steal out and throw herself into the river when her stepmother presents her with a new coat and Judge Jordan invites her for a sleigh ride. Protesting, she goes. Barnaby 's anger is aroused by Juliet's actions in taking matters thus into her own hands. A quarrel ensues.) Barnaby. Now lookahere? Tillie "Weber's just been to the shop over and she says that when Emanuel and me was at Lebanon last Monday you had Emmy Haverstick doing the washing. That 's somepin T don't do, hire the washin ' yet when I have a wife and growed-up dauthter at home. I don't do that there. Juliet. Well, then, husband, we '11 say I hired Emmy Haverstick, and let it go at that. Barnaby. Well, whether you hired her or me — what 's the difference ? I say I won't have it, Jool-yet. Juliet. Not to argue with you, Barnaby, it is quite too absurd to imagine me as the laundress of this establishment. Barnaby. Well, Barnabetta kin do the tub part and you hang out on the line, if that 's more refined. Juliet. Barnabetta is quite as unfitted for that sort of work as I am. I will pay the laundress. Barnaby. Well, Juliet, I kin tell you you won't git a chanct to pay her again. Now then, what was Barnabetta 348 Modem Literature for Oral Interpretation doin' all Monday if you cooked dinner and Emmy Haver- stick done the washin', heh? Juliet. Barnaby, I may as well tell you first as last that the time has come when you must consider your daughter's educational pursuits. Barnaby. What ! She 's got education enough a 'ready. An' too much for her own good, I 'm thinkin'. Look at me — I was only educated with a Testament an' a spellin' book an' a slate. We had no such blackboards even to recite on. An' do I look as if I need to know any more 'n what I know a 'ready? Juliet. Far be it from me, Barnaby, to give complete expression to my inmost thoughts. Barnaby. (Picking up book from table.) What 's this here? Juliet. A book of synonyms. Barnaby. Of what ? Juliet. Synonyms. I want Barnabetta to enlarge her vocabulary. Barnaby. (Tossing book on table.) Say, she ain't to waste her time gettin ' the cinnemons. Juliet. (Begins softly to hum) "By the blue Alsatian Mountains, Dwelt a maiden wondrous fair. ' ' Barnaby. It 's well you got married, Jool-yet. Juliet. It 's well you did, husband dear, I 'm not so sure about myself. Barnaby. Fur the reason that you needed a man to manage your money. I was just countin' together how much you spent yet since you 're here a 'ready, an' it amounts to somepin awful. Material for Interpretation 349 Juliet. But, Barnaby, I 've always spent my income. Barnaby. What ! you spend two thousand a year all on yourself? I jest suspicioned as much. Yi, yi, yi! Juliet. Oh, you are so humorous, Barnaby. Don't you worry, honey, about my finances. Barnaby. Well, after this, when your interest money comes in, I invest it again. You ain 't to fling money around as if you was one of the Rockyf ellers, or who ever — Juliet. There, there, Barnaby. You seem to forget all about its being my money. Barnaby. I ain't so sure your money is tied up yet so that your mister has nothin' to say. Juliet. Fie fie, run back to your shop, dearie. ' ' Lost, the golden minutes Sixty diamond seconds. ' ' Jake. Say! What do you mean by somepin like this, anyhow, heh ? They tell me at the hotel that you druv my horse to Lebanon this afternoon — You leave my horse be. Juliet. But, son, I 'm about to buy a dear little buggy, and you may have the use of it in exchange for my use of your horse. That will save you fifty cents a ride. Jake. I tell you, you leave my horse be. You ain't got no right to her. Juliet. Jacob, dear boy. Jake. Don't "dear Jacob" me. {Throws whip on table.) You leave my horse be. Barnaby. (Rises.) What 's this, Jool-yet, you out ridin' this afternoon, a 'ready? I didn't give you leave. (Juliet roars.) Juliet. But, Barnaby, the work is not neglected, if that is what you mean. 350 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation Barnaby. Yes, when you pay out money to hire people yet, to do what you ought to do. Mind you, Jool-yet, if that ther Emmy Haverstick shows up here next Monday morning to do the washin' you 11 get a shamed face in front of her, fur I '11 chase her off. Juliet. ■ ' By the blue Alsatian Mountains — ' ' Barnaby. Fur thirteen years I paid Emmy Haverstick good money. But not any more. I figure that what I paid her in them thirteen years and the interest would amount to nigh $400 by now. Juliet. "By the blue Alsatian Mountains — " Barnaby. Say, Barnabetta she 's gettin' spoilt for me somepin fierce, but I 11 put a stop to that. Jacob. And about time, too, pop. Barnabetta 's always ironed my* Sunday pants fur me, and to-day she wouldn't. Juliet. But, my dear, I could n 't allow her to iron your pants. Take your pants to a tailor. It is not a woman's work to iron pants — don't call them pants. (Enter Emanuel, also angry.) Emanuel. Say, where 's Barnabetta? Jake. I kin tell you. Barnabetta 's out sleigh ridin' with the lawyer. Barnaby. Where did she get the dare ? Juliet. I gave her permission. Barnaby. You did, eh ? Well, I '11 show her onct when she gits home. Jake. Yes, leave pop to show her. Emanuel. Where 's my clean shirts ? Juliet. I explained to you all last Monday regarding the washing. Barnaby. Ain't it the wife's dooty to do the house- work? Juliet. Certainly, husband — or have it done. Material for Interpretation 351 Barnaby. {Turns to the two hoys.) This here ends it. Barnabetta keeps company and gits married. I ain't keepin' two idle wimmin. Emanuel. I want my shirts washed and ironed now. Jake. And I want my Sunday pants pressed. Juliet. Gentlemen, I have already informed you, we will not wash your shirts, and we will not iron your Sunday pants. Barnaby, you may not have suspected it, my dear, but when you married me, you led to Hymen's altar a woman of more or less resolution. {Dramatized by Marion DeForrest from the novel "Barna- betta" by Helen R. Martin.) THE RIVALS Act 3, Scene 3 (The scene is in Mrs. Malaprop 's lodgings. Mrs. Mala- prop enters with a letter in her hand, Captain Absolute following.) Mrs. Malaprop. Your being Sir Anthony's son, Cap- tain, would itself be a sufficient accommodation; but from the ingenuity of your appearance, I am convinced you de- serve the character here given of you. Captain Absolute. Permit me to say, madam, that as I have never yet had the pleasure of seeing Miss Languish, my principal inducement in this affair, at present, is the honor of being allied to Mrs. Malaprop, of whose intellec- tual accomplishments, elegant manners, and unaffected learning, no tongue is silent. Mrs. M. Sir, you do me infinite honor! I beg, Cap- 352 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation tain, you'll be seated — {Both sit.) — Ah! few gentlemen, nowadays, know how to value the ineffectual qualities in a woman ! Few think how a little knowledge becomes a gen- tlewoman! Men have no sense now but for the worthless flower of beauty. Capt. A. It is but too true, indeed, ma'am; yet I fear our ladies should share the blame ; they think our admira- tion of beauty so great, that knowledge, in them, would be superfluous. Thus, like garden trees, they seldom show fruit, till time has robbed them of the more specious blos- soms : few, like Mrs. Malaprop, and the orange tree, are rich in both at once. Mrs. M. Sir, you overpower me with good breeding. (Aside.) He is the very pine-apple of politeness! You are not ignorant, Captain, that this giddy girl has, some- how, contrived to fix her affections on a beggarly, strolling, eavesdropping ensign, whom none of us have seen, and no- body knows anything of. Capt. A. Oh ! I have heard the silly affair before. I 'm not at all prejudiced against her on that account. But it must be very distressing, indeed, to you, ma'am. Mrs. M. Oh, it gives me the hydrostatics to such a de- gree! — I thought she had persisted from corresponding with him : the fellow — I believe I have it in my pocket. Capt. A. Oh, the devil! my last note! (Aside.) Mrs. M. Ay, here it is. Capt. A. Ay, my note, indeed ! Oh, the little traitress Lucy! (Aside.) Mrs. M. There, perhaps you may know the writing. (Gives him the letter.) Capt. A. I think I have seen the hand before — yes, cer- tainly must have seen this hand before. Mrs. M. Nay, but read it, Captain. Material for Interpretation 353 Capt. A. (Reads.) "My soul's idol, my adored Lydia ! * 9 . . . Very tender, indeed ! Mrs. M. Tender! ay, and profane too, o' my conscience. Capt. A. "I am excessively alarmed at the intelligence you send me, the more so as my new rival — " Mrs. M. That 's you, sir. Capt. A. "Has universally the character of being an ac- complished gentleman, and a man of honor." — Well, that 's handsome enough. Mrs. M. Oh, the fellow has some design in writing so. Capt. A. That he had, I '11 answer for him, ma'am. Mrs. M. But go on, sir — you '11 see presently. Capt. A. "As for the old weather-beaten she-dragon, who guards you ' ' — Who can he mean by that ? Mrs. M. Me, sir — me — he means me there — what do you think of that ? — but go on a little further. Capt. A. Impudent scoundrel — "it shall go hard, but I will elude her vigilance! as I am told that the same ridiculous vanity which makes her dress up her coarse features, and deck her dull chat with hard words which she don't understand — " Mrs. M. There, sir, an attack upon my language ! what do you think of that? an aspersion upon my parts of speech ! was ever such a brute ! Sure, if I reprehend any- thing in this world, it is the use of my oracular tongue, and a nice derangement of epitaphs Capt. A. He deserves to be hanged and quartered! let me see — "some ridicule vanity" — Mrs. M. You need not read it again, sir ! Capt. A. I beg pardon, ma'am — "does also lay her open to the grossest deceptions from flattery and pretended ad- miration" — an impudent coxcomb — "so that I have a scheme to see you shortly, with the old harridan's consent, 354 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation and even to make her a go-between in our interview. ' ' — "Was ever such assurance ! Mrs. M. Did you ever hear anything like it? (They rise.) He '11 elude my vigilance, will he? — Yes, yes! ha! ha ! he 's very likely to enter these doors ! — we 11 try who comes out best! Capt. A. So we will, ma 'am — so we will. — Ha ! ha ! ha ! a conceited puppy ! ha ! ha ! ha ! "Well, but, Mrs. Malaprop, as the girl seems so infatuated by this fellow, suppose you were to wink at her corresponding with him for a little time — let her even plot an elopement with him — then do you connive at her escape — while I, just in the nick, will have the fellow laid by the heels, and fairly contrive to carry her off in his stead. Mrs. M. I am delighted with the scheme; never was anything better perpetrated. Capt. A. But pray, could I not see the lady for a few minutes now? — I should like to try her temper a little. Mrs. M. "Why, I don't know — I doubt she is not pre- pared for a visit of this kind — There is a decorum in these matters. Capt. A. Lord, she won't mind me! — only tell her, Beverley — Mrs. M. Sir! Capt. A. Gently, good tongue! (Aside.) Mrs. M. What did you say of Beverley ? Capt. A. Oh, I was going to propose that you should tell her, by way of jest, that it was Beverley who was below — she 'd come down fast enough then — ha ! ha ! ha ! Mrs. M. 'T would be a trick she well deserves — besides, you know, the fellow tells her he '11 get my consent to see her — ha! ha! — Let him, if he can, I say again. — Lydia, come down here ! (Calling.) He '11 make me a go-between Material for Interpretation S55 in their interviews! — ha! ha! ha! — Come down, I say, Lydia ! — I don't wonder at your laughing — ha ! ha ! ha ! his impudence is truly ridiculous. Capt. A. 'T is very ridiculous, upon my soul, ma 'am ! — ha ! ha ! ha ! Mrs. M. The little hussy won't hear.— Well, I '11 go and tell her at once who it is — she shall know that Captain Absolute is come to wait on her ; and I '11 make her behave as becomes a young woman. Capt. A. As you please, ma'am. Mrs. M. For the present, Captain, your servant — Ah, you 've not done laughing yet, I see — elude my vigilance! Yes, yes — Ha ! ha ! ha ! (Exit.) Richard B. Sheridan. THE RIVALS Act 4, Scene 1 (Acres and his servant David are present. Acres has been persuaded by the valorous Sir Lucius 'Trigger that he- should fight a duel, and defend his "honor." His serv- ant, very wisely argues against such a proceeding.) Dav. Then, by the mass, sir, I would do no such thing ! ne'er a Sir Lucius 'Trigger in the kingdom should make me fight, when I wasn't so minded! Oons! what will the old lady say when she hears o ' it ? Acres. But my honor, David, my honor! I must be very careful of my honor. Dav. Ay, by the mass, and I would be very careful of 356 Modem Literature for Oral Interpretation it ; and I think, in return, my honor could n 't do less than to be very careful of me. Acres. Odds blades! David, no gentleman will ever risk the loss of his honor ! Dav. I say, then, it would be but civil in honor never to risk the loss of a gentleman. — Lookye, "master, this honor seems to me to be marvellous false friend ; ay, truly, a very courtier-like servant. Put the case, I was a gentleman (which, thank heaven, no one can say of me) ; well — my honor makes me quarrel with another gentleman of my ac- quaintance. So — we fight. (Pleasant enough that.) Boh! I kill him — (the more ? s my luck). Now pray, who gets the profit of it? — why, my honor. But, put the case that he kills me ! by the mass ! I go to the worms, and my honor whips over to my enemy. Acres. No, David. In that case! — odds crowns and laurels ! your honor follows you to the grave ! Dav. Now, that 's just the place where I could make a shift to do without it. Acres. Zounds! David, you are a coward! It doesn't become my valor to listen to you. — What, shall I disgrace my ancestors ! — Think of that, David — think what it would be to disgrace my ancestors ! Dav. Under favor, the surest way of not disgracing them, is to keep as long as you can out of their company. Look ye, now, master, to go to them in such haste — with an ounce of lead in your brains — I should think it might as well be let alone. Our ancestors are very good kind of folks but they are the last people I should choose to have a visiting acquaintance with. Acres. But, David, now, you don't think there is such very, very — great danger, hey? — Odds life! people often fight without any mischief done ! Material for Interpretation 357 Dav. By the mass, I think 't is ten to one against you. Oons! here to meet some lion-headed fellow, I warrant, with his damned double-barrelled swords, and cut-and-thrust pistols ! Lord bless us ! it makes me tremble to think on 't — those be such desperate bloody-minded weapons ! Well, I never could abide them ! — from a child I never could fancy them ! — I suppose there an't been so merciless a beast in the world as your loaded pistol ! Acres. Zounds! I won't be afraid! — odds fire and fury! you shan't make me afraid. — Here is the challenge and I have sent for my dear friend, Jack Absolute, to carry it for me. Dav. Ay, i' the najne of mischief, let him be the mes- senger. — For my part, I would n't lend a hand to it, for the best horse in your stable. By the mass! it don't look like another letter! — it is, as I may say, a designing and mali- cious-looking letter ! — and I warrant smells of gun-powder, like a soldier 's pouch ! Oons ! I would n 't swear it may n 't go off! Acres. Out, you poltroon ! — you ha ' n 't the valor of a grasshopper. Dav. "Well, I say no more — 'twill be sad news, to be sure, at Clod Hall! but I ha' done. — How Phillis will howl when she hears of it ! — ay, poor bitch, she little thinks what shooting her master 's going after ! — and I warrant old Crop, who has carried your honor, field and road these ten years, will curse the hour he was born ! {Whimpering.) Acres. It won't do, David — I am determined to fight, so get along, you coward, while I 'm in the mind. Richard B. Sheridan. 358 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation TU QUOQUE Nellie If I were you, when ladies at the play, sir, Beckon and nod, a melodrama through, I would not turn abstractedly away, sir, If I were you ! Frank If I were you, when persons I affected, Wait for three hours to take me down to Kew, I would, at least, pretend I recollected, If I were you ! Nellie If I were you, when ladies are so lavish, Sir, as to keep me every waltz but two, I would not dance with odious Miss M'Tavish, If I were you ! Frank If I were you, who vow you cannot suffer Whiff of the best, — the mildest honey-dew, I would not dance with smoke-consuming Puffer, If I were you ! Nellie If I were you, I would not, sir, be bitter, Even to write the "Cynical Review"! Frank No, I should doubtless find flirtation fitter, If I were you ! Material for Interpretation 359 Nellie Really ! You would ? Why, Frank, you 're quite delight- ful- Hot as Othello, and as black of hue ; Borrow my fan. I would not look so frightful, If I were you ! Frank It is the cause. I mean your chaperone is Bringing some well-curled juvenile. Adieu ! I shall retire. I 'd spare that poor Adonis, If I were you ! Nellie Go, if you will. At once ! And by express, sir ; Where shall it be? To China— or Peru? Go ! I should leave inquirers my address, sir, If I were you ! Frank No, — I remain. To stay and fight a duel Seems, on the whole, the proper thing to do — Ah, you are strong, — I would not then be cruel, If I were you ! Nellie One does not like one 's feelings to be doubted, — Frank One does not like one 's friends to misconstrue. Nellie If I confess that I a wee-bit pouted? — 360 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation Frank I should admit that I was pique, too. # Nellie Ask me to dance. I '& say no more about it, If I were you ! Henry Austin Dobson. THE UNIVERSAL IMPULSE (The simple Simons, highbrows of the purest water, are receiving their friends upon their day at home. About five o'clock in the afternoon, Miss Maud Minerva, author of "The Soulmate of Matilda/' "Lightsome Lobelia/ 9 etc., bravely pushes her way through a thicket of elbows, palms and hat-snatching wall ornaments, ducks skillfully under gleaming hatpins, and finally receives a push from the mob behind which precipitates her into a drawing- room dimly lighted by red candles and crowded with people. As she pauses to take breath she is greeted by a gentleman highbrow acquaintance.) Miss Maud Minerva. Oh, how do you do, Mr. Gals- worthy Hewlett % I 'm afraid to move ; it is so dark and the furniture is so murderous — carved rosewood with razor- edged leaves and petals. Who is here today? Mr. Galsworthy Hewlett (with malicious joy). Not a soul but celebrities. Every man, woman, child and clergy- man here a highbrow. But now let me tell you about a play I am writing. It is — Miss Maud Minerva (in tones of consternation) . You Material for Interpretation 361 don't mean they 're all highbrows! And it 's my cook's day out. I would never, never have come here if I had n't hoped to find some dear old body who would take me home in her limousine, give me a nice hot dinner and suggest a play or the Opera afterwards. (Turning to the woman be- side her and speaking with icy asperity.) Will you very kindly take your elbow out of my ear? I think it has per- forated the drum. How do you do, Mr. Rodin Cezanne? Painting a wonderful new picture, I suppose ! Mr. Rodin Cezanne. How do you do, Miss Minerva? (In a husky whisper.) Don't touch the punch ; it 's poison. And the tea! Carbolic acid, I think. Sandwiches not so bad, considering the Simple Simon's alleged brains. But let me tell you my great new idea for a play Belasco — Miss Maud Minerva (hastily). So interesting! Who is that over there? Mr. Rodin Cezanne. Oh, that is the great woman pianist or composer or something — musical, you know. Interprets someone or other, or something or other. But about my new play. Lieblers— Miss Maud Minerva (more hastily). Charming! How do you do, Mr. Strauss Debussy? How is the new sym- phony coming on ? Mr. Strauss Debussy. Given it up. Am writing a play — Henry B. Harris crazy about the first act, and the Shu- berts offering any sum for it. The plot — Miss Maud Minerva (hurriedly) . So interesting ! Who are those two young women glaring at each other over there ? Mr. Strauss Debussy. Oh, that 's the young Russian girl who almost threw a bomb at the Czar and got a week in prison ; and the other one is an artificially-f ed-in-prison suffragette, who has thrown rocks at the Prime Minister. 362 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation Naturally the Russian girl is quite upset about it, so she is putting her experience into a play. And you would never think it, but they are all after mine — Frohman and Mrs. Fiske both clamoring for it. A new idea — fair young heir- ess, wicked guardian and a missing will. The first scene is — Miss Maud Minerva {turning with a cold stare to the woman beside her). Wha-t-t? Sorry, but how could I possibly know that my hatpin was in your eye? Oh, Miss Humphry Ward Glyn — so glad to see you ! Stunning short story of yours in — er — urn — m — m — 's this month; charac- terization, logical development, atmosphere and — er all en- chanting. Miss Humphry Ward Glyn. Thank you so much, dear, but I 'm not writing short stories now. I 'hi doing a play. In some mysterious way it got noised abroad, and every manager in New York is beseeching me for a sight of it. It is something quite new. The problem is, that a woman with a past wants to marry the heir of a great name and vast estates, and — Miss Maud Minerva (desperately). Fascinating! Who is that over there ? Miss Humphry Ward Glyn. That is the great Nor- wegian actress. She detests our food, and always carries garlic and onions about in her handbag. See, the dear thing has a head of cabbage now under her arm and is tearing off the leaves and eating them while she is telling every one that she can't get a play to suit her so she is writing one. Miss Maud Minerva (wildly). Good-bye, dear. Oh, Mr. Galsworthy Hewlett, would you kindly step off my feet ? I dare say I Ve got to say good-bye to the Simple Simons. (She moves forward, then stops abruptly and suppresses a Material for Interpretation 363 groan.) Oh, Mr. Rodin Cezanne, just give me your arm a moment? One of these rosewood chairs reached out and broke my kneecap. They are simply alive with malicious animal magnetism. Thank you; I think I can walk now, but I am faint with hunger. (She advances toward the hostess.) Dear Mrs. Simple Simon, I always look forward so eagerly to your days at home. It is such a comfort to know that one isn't going to meet any Philistines, just all of us dear highbrows, with the same intellectual sympathies, the same consuming love for Art, the same intense admiration for each other's work and — er — utter lack of jealousy. So lovely and harmonious. But really I must tell you my little secret. I am writing plays for every manager in New York. They stand in line under my window and snatch at the scenes and acts I throw out to them like hungry dogs after a bone. So interesting, is n't it? Good-bye. Mrs. Wilson Woodrow. MOONSHINE 1 (Characters) Luke Hazy, Moonshiner A Revenue Officer Scene: (Hut of a moonshiner in the mountain wilds of North Carolina. Door hack left. Window hack right center. Old deal table right center. Kitchen chair at either side of table, not close to it. Old cupboard in left corner. Rude stone fireplace left side. On back ivall i All rights reserved. 364 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation near door is a rough pencil sketch of a man hanging from a tree. At rise of curtain a commotion is heard outside of hut.) Luke. (Off stage.) It 's alright, boys. . . . Jist leave him to me. . . . Git in there, Mister Revenue. (Revenue, a Northerner in city attire, without hat, clothes dusty, is pushed through doorway. Luke, a lanky, ill-dressed Southerner, following closes door. Revenue's hands are tied behind him.) You must excuse the boys for makin' a demonstration over you, Mr. Revenue, but you see they don't come across you fellers very frequent, and they alias gits excited. Revenue. I appreciate that I 'm welcome. Luke. Deed you is, and I 'm just agoin' to untie your hands long nuff fer you to take a sociable drink. (Goes to stranger, feels in all pockets for weapons.) Reckon yer travelin ' peaceable. ( Unties hands. ) Won 't yer sit down ? Revenue. (Drawing over chair and sitting.) Thank you. (Rubs wrists to get back circulation.) Luke. (Going over to cupboard and taking out jug.) Yessa, Mister, the boys ain't seen one o' you fellers fer near two years. Began to think you wus goin ' to neglect us. I wus hopin' you might be Jim Dunn. Have a drink? Revenue. (Starts slightly at mention of Jim Dunn.) No, thank you, your make is too strong for me. Luke. It hain't no luck to drink alone when you git company. Better have some. Revenue. Very well, my friend, I suffer willingly. (Drinks a little and chokes.) Luke. (Draining cup.) I reckon ye all don't like the flavor of liquor that hain't been stamped. Revenue. It 's not so bad. Material for Interpretation 365 Luke. The last Revenue that sit in that chair got drunk on my make. Revenue. That would n 't be difficult. Luke. No, but it wuz awkward. Revenue. Why ? Luke. I had to wait till he sobered up before I give him his ticket. I did n't feel like sendin' him to Heaven drunk. He 'd a found it awkward climbin' that golden ladder. Revenue. Thoughtful executioner. Luke. So you see mebbe you kin delay things a little by dally in ' with the licker. Revenue. {Picking up cup, getting it as far as his lips, slowly puts it down. ) The price is too great. Luke. I 'm mighty sorry you ain't Jim Dunn. But I reckon you ain't. You don't answer his likeness. Revenue. Who 's Jim Dunn ? Luke. You ought to know who Jim Dunn is. He 's just about the worst one of your revenue critters that ever hit these parts. He 's got four of the boys in jail. We got a little reception all ready for him. See that? {Pointing to sketch on back wall.) Revenue. {Looking at sketch.) Yes. Luke. That 's Jim Dunn. Revenue. {Rising, examining picture.) Doesn't look much like anyone. Luke. Well, that 's what Jim Dunn '11 look like when we git 'im. I 'm mighty sorry you hain't Jim Dunn. Revenue. I 'm sorry to disappoint you. Luke. {Turning to cupboard and filling pipe.) Oh, it 's all right. I reckon one Revenue 's about as good as another, after all. Revenue. Are you sure I 'm a revenue officer? Luke. {Rising.) Well, since we ketched ye climbin' S66 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation trees an' snoopin' round the stills, I reckon we won't take no chances that yon hain't. Revenue. Oh. Luke. Say, mebbe you 'd like a seggar. Here 's one I been savin' fer quite a spell back, thinkin' mebbe I 'd have company some day. {Brings out dried-up cigar, hands it to him.) Revenue. No, thank you. Luke. It hain 't no luck to smoke alone when ye got com- pany. (Striking match and holding it to Revenue.) Ye better smoke. (Revenue bites off end and mouth is filled with dust, spits out dust. Luke holds match to cigar. ,With difficulty Revenue lights it.) That 's as good a five-cent cigar as ye can git in Henderson. Revenue. (After tw\o puffs, makes wry face, throws cigar on table.) You make death very easy, Mister. Luke. Luke 's my name. Yer kin call me Luke. Make you feel as though you had a friend near you at the end — Luke Hazy. Revenue. (Starting as though interested, rising.) Not the Luke Hazy that cleaned out the Crosby family ? Luke. (Startled.) How 'd you hear about it? Revenue. Hear about it ? Why, your name 's been in every newspaper in the United States. Every time you killed another Crosby the whole feud was told all over again. Why, I 've seen your picture in the papers twenty times. Luke. Hain't never had one took. Revenue. That don't stop them from printing it. Don't you ever read the newspapers? Luke. Me read? I hain't read nothin' fer thirty years. Reckon I could n 't read two lines in a hour. Material for Interpretation 367 Revenue. You Ve missed a lot of information about yourself. Luke. How many Crosbys did they say I killed ? Revenue. I think the last report said you had just re- moved the twelfth. Luke. It 's a lie ! I only killed six . . . that 's all they wuz — growed up. I 'm a-waitin' fer one now that 's only thirteen. Revenue. When '11 he be ripe ? Luke. Jes' as soon as he comes a-lookin' fer me. Revenue. Will he come? Luke. He '11 come if he 's a Crosby. Revenue. A brave family ? Luke. They don't make 'em any braver — they 'd be first-rate folks if they wuz n't Crosbys. Revenue. If you feel that way why did you start fight- ing them ? Luke. I never started no fight. My granddad had some misunderstandin' with their granddad. I don't know jes' what it wuz about, but I reckon my granddad wuz right, and I '11 see it through. Revenue. You must think a lot of your* grandfather. Luke. Never seen 'im, but it ain't no luck goin' agin yer own kin. Won't ye have a drink? Revenue. No — no — thank you. Luke. Well, Mr. Revenue, I reckon we might as well have this over. Revenue. What ? Luke. Well, you won't get drunk, and I can't be put to the trouble o' havin' somebody guard you. Revenue. That '11 not be necessary. Luke. Oh, I know yer like this yer place now, but this evenin' you might take it into yer head to walk out. 368 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation Revenue. I '11 not walk out unless you make me. Luke. 'T ain't like I 11 let yer, but I wouldn't blame yer none if yu tried. Revenue. But I '11 not. Luke. {Rising,) Say, Mistah Revenue, I wonder if you know what you 're up against ? Revenue. What do you mean ? Luke. I mean I gotta kill you. Revenue. {Rising, pauses,) Well, that lets me out. Luke. What do yu mean ? Revenue. I mean that I 've been trying to commit sui- cide for the last two months, but I have n 't had the nerve. Luke. {Startled.) Suicide? Revenue. Yes. Now that you 're willing to kill me, the problem is solved. Luke. Why, what d ' ye want to commit suicide f er ? Revenue. I just want to stop living, that 's all. Luke. Well, yu must have a reason. Revenue. No .special reason — I find life dull and I 'd like to get out of it. Luke. Dull? Revenue. Yes — I hate to go to bed — I hate to get up — I don't care for food — I can't drink liquor — I find people either malicious or dull — I see by the fate of my acquaint- ances, both men and women, that love is a farce. I have seen fame and preference come to those who least deserve them, while the whole world kicked and cuffed the worthy ones. The craftiest schemer gets the most money and glory, while the fair-minded dealer is humiliated in the bank- ruptcy court. In the name of the law every crime is com- mitted; in the name of religion every vice is indulged; in the name of education greatest ignorance is rampant. Material for Interpretation 369 Luke. I don 't git all of that, but I reckon you 're some put out. Revenue. I am. The world \s a failure . . . what 's more, it 's a farce. I don't like it but I can't change it, so I 'm just aching for a chance to get out of it. . . . {Approaching Luke.) And you, my dear friend, are going to present me the opportunity. Luke. Yes, I reckon you '11 get your wish now. Revenue. Good ... if you only knew how I 've tried to get killed. Luke. Well, why did n 't you kill yerself ? Revenue. I was afraid. Luke. Afreed o' what — hurtin' yourself? Revenue. No, afraid of the consequences. Luke. Whad d ' ye mean ? Revenue. Do you believe in another life after this one ? Luke. I kan't say ez I ever give it much thought. Revenue. Well, don't — because if you do you '11 never kill another Crosby . . . not even a revenue officer. Luke. 'T ain't that bad, is it ? Revenue. Worse. Twenty times I 've had a revolver to my head — crazy to die — and then as my finger pressed the trigger I 'd get a terrible dread — a dread that I was plung- ing into worse terrors than this world ever knew. If killing were the end it w 7 ould be easy, but what if it 's only the beginning of something worse? Luke. Well you gotta take some chances. Revenue. I '11 not take that one. You know, Mr. Luke, life was given to us by someone who probably never intended that we should take it, and that someone has something ready for people who destroy his property. That 's what frightens me. 370 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation Luke. You do too much worryin ' to be a regular suicide. Revenue. Yes I do. That 's why I changed my plan. Luke. What plan? * Revenue. My plan for dying. Luke. Oh, then you give up the idea? Revenue. No, indeed — I 'm still determined to die, but I 'm going to make someone else responsible. Luke. Oh — so you hain't willing to pay fer yer own funeral music ? Revenue. No, sir — I '11. furnish the passenger, but someone else must buy the ticket. You see when I finally decided I 'd be killed I immediately exposed myself to every danger I knew. Luke. How ? Revenue. In a thousand ways. . . . {Pause.) Did you ever see an automobile ? Luke. No. Revenue. They go faster than steam engines, and they don't stay on tracks. Did you ever hear of Fifth Avenue, New York? Luke. No. Revenue. Fifth Avenue is jammed with automobiles, eight deep all day long. People being killed every day. I crossed Fifth Avenue a thousand times a day, every day for weeks, never once trying to get out of the way, and always praying I 'd be hit. Luke. And could n 't yu git hit ? Revenue. {In disgust.) No. Automobiles only hit people who try to get out of the way. {Pause.) When that failed I frequented the lowest dives on the Bowery, flashing a roll of money and wearing diamonds, hoping they 'd kill me for them. They stole the money and dia- monds, but never touched me. Material for Interpretation 371 Luke. Could n't you pick a fight ? Revenue. I 'm coming to that. You know up North they believe that a man can be killed in the South for call- ing another man a liar. Luke. That 's right. Revenue. It is, is it ? Well, I 've called men liars from Washington to Atlanta, and I 'm here to tell you about it. Luke. They must a took pity en ye. Revenue. Do you know Two Gun Jake that keeps the dive down in Henderson? Luke. I should think I do. . . . Jake 's killed enough of 'em. Revenue. He 's a bad man, ain't he? Luke. He 's no trifler. Revenue. I wound up in Jake's place two nights ago, pretending to be drunk. Jake was cursing niggers. Luke. He 's alius doin' that. Revenue. So I elbowed my way up to the bar and an- nounced that I was an expert in the discovery of nigger blood . . . could tell a nigger who was 63-64ths white. Luke. Ye kin ? Revenue. No, I can't, but I made them believe it. I then offered to look them over and tell them if they had any nigger blood in them. A few of them sneaked away, but the rest stood for it. I passed them all until I got to Two Gun Jake. I examined his eyeballs, looked at his finger- nails, and said, "You 're a nigger." Luke. An' what did Jake do? Revenue. He turned pale, took me into the back room, he said: "Honest to God, Mister, can ye see nigger blood in me?" I said: "Yes." "There's no mistake about it ? " " Not a bit, " I answered. ' ' Good God, ' ' he said, ' ' I always suspected it." Then he pulled out his gun. . . . 372 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation Luke. Eh ... eh? Revenue. And shot himself. Luke. Jake shot hisself ! ... is he dead ? Revenue. I don't know — I was too disgusted to wait. I wandered around until I thought of you moonshiners . . . scrambled around in the mountains until I found your still. I sat on it and waited until you boys showed up, and here I am, and you 're going to kill me. Luke. {Pause.) Ah, so ye want us to do yer killin' fer ye, do ye ? Revenue. You 're my last hope. If I fail this time I may as well give it up. Luke. {Takes out revolver, turns sidewise and secretly removes cartridges from chamber. Rises.) What wuz that noise ? {Lays revolver on table and steps outside of door. Revenue looks at revolver apparently without in- terest.) (Luke cautiously enters doorway and expresses sur- prise at seeing Revenue making no attempt to secure revolver. Feigning excitement goes to table, picks up gun.) Luke. I reckon I 'm gettin' careless, leavin' a gun layin' around here that-a-way. Didn't you see it? Revenue. Yes. Luke. Well, why did n 't ye grab it ? Revenue. What for ? Luke. To git the drop on me. Revenue. Can't you understand what I 've been tell- ing you, Mister ? I don 't want the drop on you. Luke. Well, doggone if I don't believe yer tellin' me the truth. Thought I 'd just see what ye 'd do. Ye see I emptied it first. (Opens up gun.) Material for Interpretation $7S Revenue. That was n 't necessary. Luke. Well, I reckon ye better git along out o' here, Mister. Revenue. You don 't mean you 're weakening ? Luke. I ain't got no call to do your killin' fer you. If ye hain't sport enough to do it yerself, I reckon ye kin go on sufferin'. Revenue. But I told you why I don't want to do it. One murder more or less means nothing to you. You don't care anything about the hereafter. Luke. Mebbe I don't, but there ain't no use my takin' any more chances than I have to. And what 's more, Mister, from what you been tellin' me I reckon there 's a charm on you, and I ain't go in' to take no chances goin' agin charms. Revenue. So you 're going to go back on me? Luke. Yes sirree. Revenue. Well, maybe some of the other boys will be willing. I '11 wait till they come. Luke. The other boys ain't goin' to see you. You 're a-leavin ' this yer place right now — now ! It won 't do no good. You may as well go peaceable, ye ain't got no right to expect us to bear yer burdens. Revenue. Damn it all ! I 've spoiled it again. Luke. I reckon you better make up yer mind to go on livin'. Revenue. That looks like the only way out. Luke. Come on, I '11 let you ride my horse to town. It 's the only one we got, so yu can leave it at Two Gun Jake's, and one o' the boys '11 go git it, or I reckon I 11 go over myself and see if Jake made a job of it. Revenue. I suppose it 's no use arguing with you. Luke. Not a bit. Come on, you. 374* Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation Revenue. Well, I 'd like to leave my address so if you ever come to New York you can look me up. Luke. 'T ain't likely I '11 ever come to New York. Revenue. Well, I '11 leave it anyhow. Have you a piece of paper? Luke. Paper what you write on? Never had none, Mister. Revenue. (Looking about room, sees Jim Dunn's pic- ture on wall, goes to it, takes it down.) If you don't mind, I '11 put it on the back of Jim Dunn's picture. (Placing picture on table, begins to print.) I '11 print it for you, so it '11 be easy to read. My address is here, so if you change your mind you can send for me. Luke. 'T ain't likely — come on. (Both go to doorway — Luke extends hand, Revenue takes it.) Good-bye, Mister— cheer up . . . there 's the horse. Revenue. Good-bye. (Shaking Luke's hand.) Luke. Don't be so glum, Mister. Lemme hear you laff jist onct before yu go. (Revenue begins to laugh weakly.) Aw, come on, laff out with it hearty. (Revenue laughs louder.) Heartier yit. (Revenue is now shouting his laughter, and is heard laughing until hoof beats of his horse die down in the distance.) (Luke watches for a moment, then returns to table — takes a drink — picks up picture — turns it around several times before getting it right — then begins to study. In attempting to make out the name he slowly traces in the air with his index finger a capital "J" — then mutters "J-J-J," then describes a letter Material for Interpretation 375 "V— mutters "III," then a letter "M"— mutter- ing "M-M-M, J-I-M—J-I-M—JIM." In the same way describes and mutters D-U-N-N.) Luke. Jim Dunn! By God! (He rushes to corner, grabs shot-gun, runs to doorway, raises gun in direction stranger has gone — looks in- tently — then slowly lets gun fall to his side, and scans the distance with his hand shadowing his eyes — steps inside — slowly puts gun in corner — seats him- self at table.) Jim Dunn ! — and he begged me to kill 'im ! ! Arthur Hopkins. ^ MINUET 1 The Marquis The Marchioness The Gaoler The Marquis (Reading) "Is there an after-life, a deathless soul, A heaven, to which to aspire as to a goal ? Who shall decide what nobody shall know ? Science is dumb ; Faith has no proofs to show. Men will dispute, as autumn leaves will rustle: The soul is an idea ; the heart, a muscle. ' ' (He leaves off reading.) Well said, Voltaire ! This philosophic doubt Has ruled my life, and now shall lead me out ; 'T is this has helped me to a mind serene While I await the gentle guillotine. (He closes the book and lays it aside.) What 's to be hoped for, what is to be dreaded, i All rights reserved. 376 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation Whether I die in bed or be beheaded ? I Ve lived, I loved, enjoyed ; and here 's the end. I '11 meet my death as I should meet a friend ; Or, better, as a nobleman of France Salutes his mistress in a courtly dance. (He rises and walks to and fro, with his hands behind him.) I am alone;. no soul will sorrow for me; My enemies dread me ; and my friends — abhor me. For all I know, my wife — the ugly word — Is in Coblenz, attended by absurd Perfumed and mincing abbes. She and I, I 'm proud to say, lived as I mean to die. With never a trace of middle-class emotions, I went my way ; she followed her own notions. And when she hears I 'm dead, so fine her breed, She '11 arch her eyebrows, and exclaim, "Indeed?" (The door is flung open, and The Gaoler appears.) (Brutally.) Citizen ! (He sits.) The Gaoler The Marquis Joseph ? Is the tumbril here 1 The Gaoler Not yet, aristocat; but have no fear. The widow never missed — Material for Interpretation 377 The Marquis The widow? The Gaoler Aye, The guillotine. The Marquis (With a shrug.) The people 's wit ! The Gaoler I say, She never missed an assignation yet. One down, the other comes on ! She 11 not forget. The Marquis Yet she 's a woman ! Wonderful ! The Gaoler You seem As though you thought your doom was but a dream. (Roughly.) Aristocrat, you are to die ! The Marquis (Calmly.) How true ! And so are you, my friend, and so are you, Sooner or later. In your case, I think It will be sooner, owing to the drink. 378 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation The Gaoler {Coming at him threateningly.) You dare ! The Marquis {Warding him off with a delicate hand.) Oh, please, let 's have no vulgar quarrel : And I apologize for seeming moral. You Ve been so courteous as to lend your room In which to await my, as you call it, doom, {Handing him a coin.) Take my last louis, friend, and go away. The Gaoler I spit on it ! The Marquis And pocket it. Good day. The Gaoler {Pointing to the door.) I came to tell you that a woman 's there, Asking to see you. The Marquis What? The Gaoler She 's young and fair, And, judging by the richness of her dress, Some heretofore aristo, nothing less. The Marquis {With grave reproof.) All women are aristocrats by birth ; No old or ugly woman treads the earth. Material for Interpretation 379 The Gaoler Ho! You should see my wife! The Marquis I should be proud. The Gaoler Shall I admit her? The Marquis Yes. The Gaoler It 's not allowed. Nevertheless — The Marquis (Handing him a jeweled snuff-box.) My snuff-box. From (Handsprings to his feet and kisses it.) The King! The Gaoler I spit on it. The Marquis (Deprecatingty.) You spit on everything. That 's low. The Gaoler The widow will spit on your head. (He stumps out, leaving the door open.) The Marquis (With disgust.) And that 's my equal ! Pah ! $80 Modem Literature for Oral Interpretation (He picks up a hand-glass and arranges his habit, etc.) Why do I dread This meeting ? Who can be the fair Who ventures hither to this loathsome lair? The Duchess of Saint-Mair? A heart of ice. The Countess of Durance ? A cockatrice. The Marchioness of Beaurepaire? Alas! Her love and faith were brittle as this glass. The Lady of Bougency? (He laughs.) But she had Three other lovers, while she drove me mad. Not one would risk her head to say good-by To a discarded lover soon to die. (In the glass he is still holding he sees The Marchioness, who now appears in the doorway.) My wife ! (The Marchioness comes in, and the door swings to with a clang. She makes a magnificent and elaborate curtsy.) Marquis ! The Marchioness The Marquis (With an equally elaborate bow.) Ah ! Marchioness ! (Brightly.) Kindly escorted me The Marchioness Milord O'Connor Material for Interpretation 381 The Marquis Oh, too much honor ! The Marchioness (Looking round the room, with a dainty sigh,) Ah, what a world, where gentlemen are treated Like vulgar criminals! The Marquis Won't you be seated? The Marchioness (Ceremoniously taking her seat,) I greatly fear I must cut short my visit ; Time is so precious nowadays. The Marquis (With a whimsical smile,) Ah, is it ? How did you hear that I must soon — go hence? The Marchioness A charming abbe told me in Coblenz. The Marquis (Leading her on.) What did he say ? The Marchioness I scarce gave heed, 1 arched my brows, and exclaimed, " Indeed ? ,? The Marquis Ah, I y m distressed you chose to undertake A long and tiresome journey for my sake. 382 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation The Marchioness (Volubly.) Oh. I had charming company. Time passed away Quite quickly, thanks to ombre and piquet. (With a pretty pout.) I lost a deal of money. The Marquis My regrets. I Ve squandered my last coin. The Marchioness And then at Metz A charming man, an Irishman — such grace ! Such wit ! Such — The Marquis Never mind. The Marchioness Begged for a place Beside me in the coach. The Marquis His name? The Marchioness Milord O'Connor. The Marquis To be sure. He touched a chord? The Marchioness ( Enthusiastically. ) Oh, yes ! Material for Interpretation 383 The Marquis (Insiduously.) (Roguishly.) And you were kind ? The Marchioness To him or to you? The Marquis (With a polite protest.) Oh, dying men don 't count. The Marchioness (Thinking it over.) That 's very true. The Marquis No doubt he 's waiting for you now ? The Marchioness (Carelessly.) No doubt. The Marquis You must not strain his patience ! 't will wear out, (With great courtesy, but a dangerous gleam in his eyes.) And when you join him, tell him I regret I 'm not at liberty. We might have — met. The Marchioness You would have liked each other very much. Such conversation! Such high spirits! Such— The Marquis (Rises.) This prison is no place for you. Farewell ! 384 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation The Marchioness The room is ugly. I prefer my cell. The Marquis {Arrested as he is moving toward the door.) Your cell? The Marchioness (Matter of fact.) Of courset I am a prisoner, too. That 's what I came for. The Marquis What? The Marchioness (Very sirwgly.) To die with you. The Marquis To die with me ! The Marchioness (Rises.) A Beauelere could not fail. The Marquis But— The Marchioness Yes? The Marquis The guillotine! The Marchioness (Brushing it aside as of no consequence whatever.) A mere detail. Material for Interpretation S85 The Marquis (Recovering.) Pardon me, Marchioness, but I confess You also made me show surprise. The Marchioness What less Did you expect of me? The Marquis We Ve lived apart So long, I had forgotten — The Marchioness I'da heart ? You had forgotten many things beside — The happy bridegroom and the happy bride. And so had I. At court the life we lead Makes love a frivolous pastime. The Marquis And we need The shock of death to show us we are human. The Marchioness Marquis and Marchioness? No, man and woman. Once you were tender. The Marquis Once you were sincere. The Marchioness So long ago. 386 Modem Literature for Oral Interpretation The Marquis So short a time. The Marchioness Oh, dear! Our minds are like a potpourri at dusk, Breathing dead rosemary, lavender, and musk; Things half forgotten, silly things, sublime ; A faded ribbon, withered rose, a rhyme, A melody of old Provene, whose lilt Haunts us as in a dream, like amber, spilt God knows how long ago ! The Marquis Do you remember How first I wooed you by the glowing ember Of winter fires ? The Marchioness Ah, you were passionate then ! The Marquis I was the proudest, happiest of men. The Marchioness I, the most innocent of maids. The Marquis Alas! How the years change us as they come and pass ! The Marchioness {Very tenderly.) Do you remember, by the Rhone, Material for Interpretation 387 The gray old castle on the hill, The brambled pathway to the mill? You plucked a rose. We were alone ; For cousins need no chaperone. How hot the days were, which the shrill Cicala's chirping seemed to fill: A treble to the millwheel's drone. Ah, me ! what happy days were those ! The Marquis Gone, with the perfume of the rose. The Marchioness Marquis, might we not yet atone, For all our errors, if we chose ? The Marquis But — Doris, all the perfume 's gone. The Marchioness {Producing a withered rose from her hosom.) But — Amadis, I Ve kept the rose ! The Marquis You Ve kept the rose ! But will it bloom again ? The Marchioness Perhaps in heaven. The Marquis (With a shrug.) Is there a heaven 1 388 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation The Gaoler {Appearing at the door.) You twain Aristocrats, the tumbril waits! {He disappears.) The Marchioness {Swaying a moment.) Ah, me! The Marquis {Eagerly.) Is there a heaven, Doris ? The Marchioness {Recovering , smiles bravely, and holds out her hand.) Come and see. {As the Marquis takes her hand and they move to go out.) The curtain falls. Louis N. Parker. PAET III DECLAMATOKY CONTESTS SECTION VII PROBLEMS IN THE PRESENT CONDUCT OF DECLAMATORY CONTESTS SECTION VII PROBLEMS IN THE PRESENT CONDUCT OF DECLAMATORY CONTESTS PROFESSOR DOWDEN'S remarks in his"New Studies in Literature, ' ' as to what may constitute desirable ex- pressive reading, though well known will bear repeating. He says: "Few persons nowadays seem to feel how pow- erful an instrument of culture may be found in modest, intelligent, and sympathetic reading aloud. A mongrel something which, at least with the inferior adepts, is neither good reading nor veritable acting, but which sets agape the half-educated with the wonder of its airs and attitudiniz- ings, its pseudo-heroics and pseudo-pathos, has usurped the place of the true art of reading aloud, and has made the word recitation a terror to quiet folk who are content with intelligence and refinement. The reading which we should desire to cultivate is intelligent reading, that is, it should express the meaning of each passage clearly; sympathetic reading, that is, it should convey the feeling delicately (namely suggestively) ; musical reading, that is, it should move in accord with the melody and harmony of what is read be it verse or prose/' With the regular advent of the speaking contest, in inter- pretative form, we are faced each year with many of the evils which Professor Dowden enumerates. While the ac- tivity will no doubt be bettered in many places, there will 391 392 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation be far too many schools still engaged in the old artificial trivialities. I am sure that many a teacher of English, as well as other teachers, who are called upon to " train" the contestants, rebels, inwardly at least, at much if not all included in the entire process. They should. It is time that all educators took into careful consideration the entire matter of ' ' declamatory contests. ' ' If the following discussion and suggestions serve to assist, in any way, the betterment of these contests, the end for which the author has written will be served. The work being done in many schools under the name of expression is done almost entirely for the contests in which the trained and coached declaimers are to appear. Such training and coaching addressed to a selected few, pre- sumably already gifted with a special ' ' talent, ' ' constitutes practically all that is being done in the field of develop- ment through personal expression for the pupils committed to the care of the schools. Declamation-contest seems to be a one idea. Possibly some of the faults of declamation might be obviated if it could be separated from the con- test. This seems unlikely to occur. Yet, here is a medium of speech activity big with educational possibilities, given over almost entirely to an extra-curricular sphere, a coached sphere, and handled, to an alarming extent, with apparently no pedagogical consideration. We are told that the declaimers, a selected few, gain self- confidence, ease, and poise, sometimes even grace is added to the list. Great stress is given to the fact that the mem- ory is trained. This point will bear long and careful con- sideration. To forget is a crime, punishable with loss of place or points. Few do forget, a word, a gesture, an in- flection, a position, a pause, a turn of the head or even eyes, or any other minute detail which they have been crammed Declamatory Contests 393 to remember. One cannot but be impressed, upon the appearance of the declaimers, with the fact that they are full of remembrances. The skill with which they deliver themselves of these memories, endeavoring faithfully to act as if the rendition were not memorized, viewed as an educa- tional activity, is one of the most astounding things about the whole performance. Perhaps the spirit of "win at any cost" too often allowed, sometimes even encouraged, giving rise to certain methods of training or coaching, is largely to blame for results seen. In any case, I believe there can be little argument but that the qualities, estimable indeed, alleged to result from declaiming, need, in every case, to have spontaneous activity and self-expression if they are to become truly operative in the individual. Spontaneous activity of mind, feeling, imagination, voice, action, or even memory, cannot come through the present coached perform- ance of the declaimer. As for the advantage of memory training urged for declamation, it is, as I have already indi- cated, of the most mechanical type. Even at its best there is doubt in my own mind as to the exact amount of value received. Educational psychologists now assure us that there is no proof that memory power trained in one depart- ment can be made available in another. To my mind one of the elements in our work, as teachers in the field of speech, which needs careful consideration and discussion is the place, importance, and amount, of memory work we should require. The entire educational curriculum calls for far too much memory work. Initial mental activity, training in concentration, and quick responses to sequence of thought and emotion, elements vitally necessary to the development of the individual, are not developed and trained as they should be. Extemporaneous speaking and expressive or in- terpretative oral reading have possibilities in these direc- 394 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation tions, declamation few if any. An excellent article, "The Curse of Memory," by W. A. Neilson, President of Smith College, appeared in the "English Journal' ' for February, 1917. It offers many valuable suggestions. Before discussing declamatory contests it will be neces- sary to define the word ' ' declamatory. ' ' As generally used in the present contest system, it indicates a contest in which only girls participate. It is almost unheard of that any boy should declaim anything but material in speech form, hence there is another contest termed the "orator- ical." Mr. Shurter, of the University of Texas, has the following to say : A declamation is a set speech of a more or less serious nature intended for delivery from memory in public. Usage has virtually made the word declamation to connote a cutting from an oration written and spoken originally by some person other than the one who is declaiming the selection. It is impossible to' mark the exact dividing lines between an oration, a declamation, and a reading. You cannot place your finger on a geometric line and say, "This marks the end of declamation and the beginning of reading and beyond this point is oration" Many selections lie in that twilight zone where characteristic marks are imaginary. Whether a selec- tion is a reading or a declamation, then, depends on the manner of the delivery and the spirit of the piece. Selections that are chosen for purposes of mere entertainment, "funny" pieces, dramatic read- ings, dialogue, impersonations, etc., are not considered declamations. Keep in mind that a declamation should be prevailingly serious in tone and delivered for the purpose of convincing or persuading an audience of certain ideas or truths. The dictionary definitions of the words "declaim," "de- clamatory," and "declamation" are extremely clear. To declaim is "to recite a speech, poem, etc., in public as an elocutionary exercise." This then becomes a "declama- tion." To recite is "to repeat before an audience some- thing prepared and committed to memory." Prom these definitions there would seem no conceivable reason for two Declamatory Contests 395 contests captioned as above. All material in both, as at present conducted, is recited in public as an elocutionary exercise. Something prepared and committed to memory is repeated before an audience. The only differences then, between the two would seem to be arbitrary ones: the nature of the material declaimed, speeches for the one and gen- eral literature for the other, and the limiting of the con- testants, very largely, girls to the general literature and boys to the speeches. In general the " oratorical' ' contest gives the better re- sults. There are reasons for this which have nothing to do with the abilities of the contestants. There is more agreement among teachers of public speaking with regard to an acceptable form of delivery for speeches than for in- terpretative work. There are more people capable of giv- ing approximately wise suggestion on the choice of speech material, and upon the delivery of the same. There is a better choice of material in this form, though this should not be true as the body of literature capable of interpreta- tion is vast in comparison. It is upon the contest which makes use of general litera- ture outside speech forms that I shall offer suggestions, but what follows applies in many cases equally well to the con- test using speech material. In the speeches chosen the con- tent should be largely in the experience of the speakers and of as timely a nature as possible. Great speeches of the long ago are not necessarily wise choices. The delivery should be direct, conversational in form, and as sincere as possible. In passing I may say I do not approve of either contest, as too many elements of artificiality are in- troduced in any case. I would have reading contests and extemporaneous speech or discussion contests. Boys and girls should participate as inclined or encouraged to take 396 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation up the line most to their advantage as individuals. I would abolish the "coaching" and replace it with constructive teaching. I am repeatedly asked to make suggestions upon material for these contests, but before doing so, some discussion of the problems involved in the present conduct of declama- tory contests is necessary. These problems may be\stated as follows: (1) The aims of the contest; (2) The methods of choosing the contestants; (3) The methods of preparing the contestants; (4) The methods of judging the contests. Of the aims, let it be said that they are as a whole en- tirely too low to take advantage of the larger opportunities which the contest might and should offer. One of the most pernicious things is the "win at any cost" spirit which is far too prevalent in principal, "coach," and pupil. This very definitely affects the other three points mentioned above. i The methods of choosing contestants are too haphazard. Pupils who have acquired prominence through "private lessons in elocution" are chosen because of their "ability," while real ability goes undiscovered. One girl is devel- oped from year to year, sent into contest after contest, often with the same selection, until at last the school she represents is the proud winner of the state contest. That during her preparation, thus covering two or more years possibly, she is in a most impressionable period ; that she is dealing in her material with more or less extreme emo- tional states ; that these states too often coincide with some element in herself from which she were better freed; and that they may register to her absolute detriment are matters which seem never to enter the minds of instructors other- wise well informed in psychology, pedagogy, and mental de- velopment. Frequently we have a wistful girl "fitted" Declamatory Contests 397 with a pathetic "piece" because she can do it, or a girl with certain aggressive tendencies has a chance to become a Shylock — with the result that for an indefinite period there- after certain abnormal qualities of voice are noticeable and must be eradicated if more extended work in expression is to be done. That a large part of the preparation is mere " coaching" — imitating the coach's interpretation of the subject-matter — and that the contestant reveals little orig- inality in mental, vocal, or bodily activity is too often the observation of any trained auditor. Much improvement could be made in all the points men- tioned and the entire results set at naught by incompetent judging. Indeed those who have realized the necessity for such reforms and have labored to establish them have been disheartened by the decisions rendered by incompetent judges. Until contests shall be judged by people who have some accurate knowledge of what constitutes good work in interpretative vocal expression, and are clearly instructed as to the method of procedure for the given contest, little can be hoped for in a constructive way in the conduct of declamatory contests. The following suggestions are offered in the hope that they may be of assistance in judging reading and declama- tion: I. In reading and declamation there are three distinct types of material which may be used, and the reader or the speaker should be judged upon the basis of his effectiveness in handling the kind of material with which he is dealing. These types are : A. Subject-matter which the reader or speaker may properly address directly to the audience; e.g., orations 398 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation B. Subject-matter which is to be interpreted for the audience ; e.g., dramatic readings C. Subject-matter which is a combination of types A and B; e.g., stories in prose or verse When the reader or speaker is dealing with material of type A, he is under the supreme obligation to give the audience unmistakable evidences through his action and his voice of his lively sense of communication with them as he reads or speaks. He should be reading or speaking to the audience and not before them, at them, or over their heads. The ideal here is conversational directness. When the material is of type B, the reader or speaker reaches his audience indirectly. He is reading or speaking for the audience rather than to them, and his paramount object in this case should be to place all of his powers of expression at the service of his subject-matter in such a way as to interpret it as completely as possible for them. When the material is of type C, the reader or speaker, in the delivery of those portions which may properly be ad- dressed to the audience, should employ the mode of con- versational directness ; and in all other portions, he should employ the mode of type B, interpreting the material for the audience. II. The judge of a reading or declamation contest should analyze his impressions of each reader or speaker for evi- dences of the two underlying essentials of good reading and declamation which are: A. Grasp of subject-matter. — This implies that the reader or the speaker understands the thought-con- tent of his selection, and that he appreciates its emo- tional values ; that he is thinking clearly and feeling genuinely and spontaneously as he reads or speaks. Declamatory Contests 399 B. Effective expression of subject-matter. — This im- plies a proper attitude toward the audience and a proficiency in the use of the bodily agents of expression. The foregoing essentials of satisfactory performance in reading and speaking manifest themselves to the critic in what he sees and in what he hears. The judge's task is to determine the contestant's relative merit in the two above- mentioned particulars upon the basis of inferences drawn from his visual and auditory impression of the several contestants. Every visual and auditory impression for which the contestants are responsible has some relevancy. The following are suggested as being of especial signifi- cance. VISUAL IMPRESSIONS 1. Personal appearance 2. Physical attitude and hearing Do carriage and position on the platform indicate proper consciousness of and consideration for, the audience? (In reading does he look at the audience as much as he should, unhampered by the text?) 3. Facial expression Does it reveal thought and feeling in keeping with what the accompanying words denote and connote ? 4. Other bodily movements Are they in harmony with and an aid to the vocal expres- sion, i.e., spontaneous, significant, not studied, awkward, and empty ? AUDITORY IMPRESSIONS 1. Volume of voice Is it sufficient to assure audibility throughout! Does it change with the thought and feeling of the selection ? 400 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation 2. Enunciation and pronunciation Are the syllables and the words uttered with precision and distinctness? Are all words correctly pronounced? 3. Rate of utterance Is it unpleasantly rapid or tiresomely slow? Does it vary with the character of the material uttered ? 4. Pitch and inflection Is the average pitch too high or too slow ? Is the voice a monotone? Are the changes in pitch produced by, and in harmony with, variations in thought and feeling ? 5. Quality of voice Is the voice, as sound dissociated from words, pleasing or irritating ? Is it rich, clear, mellow, full, and resonant, or is it poor, muffled, harsh, thin, and dull? Are the changes in quality produced by, and in harmony with, the variations in emotion ? 6. Pausing and phrasing Do the length and frequency of the pauses reveal appre- ciation of the emotional content of the selection? Does the grouping of the words reveal clear thinking and a satisfactory grasp of the subject-matter, or does it betray lack of comprehension, and muddled mental processes ? Besides poor choice of material, improper spirit and training, and incompetent judging, certain other faults should be noted, such as the non-appearance of authors' names on the programs. Frequently the pupils do not know them. Frequently, it must be granted, they are not worth knowing, but that should be remedied. One princi- pal told me they were not printed for fear of undue influ- ence upon the judges! Again, the repeated use of the same selections from year Declamatory Contests 4*01 to year cannot but be detrimental to the whole situation, especially as the chief cause for this reappearance is that the selections have "won" somewhere. Of course it is nearly always the case that the work is in the hands of an instructor who has neither the time nor the knowledge necessary to provide appropriate material. The situation will be bettered only when the work of public speaking, in all its forms, is placed in the hands of persons trained to understand and administer its educa- tional values. It may then be hoped that the work will be looked upon, not as an anomaly, but as a highly important part of the pupil's development. Most of these glaring evils would then be done away. CERTAIN REFORMS WHICH THE CONTEST SYSTEM DEMANDS 1. That the work of public speaking as a whole be placed in the hands of a teacher properly trained to conduct the same. (Not usually one graduated from a special school of expression, often with no other preparation than high- school graduation, and frequently not that.) 2. That material impossible in content, mental and spiritual as well as physical, be avoided. 3. That a centralized board pass upon a list of material for each year 's use, avoiding duplication from year to year in a cycle of four years. 4. That there be less "coaching" and more constructive suggestion. 5. That material used be from standard, or at least re- putable, authors. 6. That as a desirable part of the training, selection and arrangement of material be made, in some part, by the pupil. (Of course under suggestion of teacher.) 7. That more attention should be given to the spirit of 402 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation the selection, and less to the manner of the delivery, to the end that more naturalness and less artificiality may result. MATERIAL TO BE AVOIDED AS FAR AS POSSIBLE 1. Broad comedy that degenerates into low comedy or burlesque. (A Half Hour on the Beach.) 2. Selections demanding impersonative elements entirely beyond the attainments of the pupil. (Shylock.) 3. Selections where the tragic element is utterly beyond the experience, comprehension, or imagination of the pupil, and where this element is sustained to too great length with- out transitions in mood which might offer relief and bal- ance. (Hagar, The Sign of the Cross.) 4. Selections where the pathos is mere bathos. (The Soul of the Violin, Bobby Shaftoe.) 5. Selections where death must be impersonated (Can it be?) and last words of dying person spoken. (The Swan Song.) 6. "Cute" child pieces where the speaker attempts per- formances, vocal and physical, unlike any human prototype. (My Sister's Beau.) 7. A large group of material utterly untrue in its theme, situation, psychology, or other elements which make its main appeal. (Inja.) Unless there be in the knowledge of those directing these contests and training the contestants some well-grounded understanding of the ends and aims of vocal expression as an educative matter, some definite appreciation of the im- portance to the individual of that individual's develop- ment through the medium of interpretative expression, and some concern as to the nature of the material which shall be used by the contestants during their formative periods, Declamatory Contests 403 there can be little hope that any list of selections will be of even slight assistance. But to those who will grant some, if not all, of the fore- going contentions, and who desire reforms, a list of authors whose material offers helpful suggestions might be of real assistance. Books might be obtained in the town or school library, and pupils be encouraged to read them as a whole while deciding on a portion for use. The larger and de- sirable end so reached, as a part of the work of prepara- tion, surely no one can question. The list which is given is of course suggestive, not com- plete nor final. The points in favor of the material of these authors as usable for interpretative purposes are in part: (1) The English is good; (2) the themes are sane; (3) the emotions are normal; (4) the psychology is true; (5) the style is colloquial, often in dialogue form, and so the stories or chapters or scenes are easy of arrangement. From this list may be chosen all shades of emotions, and no program need be dull or uninteresting when material from these authors is used. It is of course obvious that time must be given to arrangement of material — and that, it must be reiterated, is most to be desired in the whole scheme. It is true also that a person especially prepared to administer the work of interpretation will be more com- petent to choose the most desirable portions of the books or stories, and better able to arrange the abridgment. Until such persons are available, however, the work should be done as well as may be by others. Better material is the least that may be asked by way of reform. Self-expression, the development of the individual, of his personality, is the trend of our education today. In this pedagogy and psychology are agreed. The acquiring of 404 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation facts will no longer suffice. No greater opportunity is offered the student for development of personality than through the medium of his vocal expression. "Of the va- rious forms of expression, verbal expression is the most important," says Professor Parker. In still a broader sense is this true, and I would substitute the word vocal for verbal, thus covering the various activities of person- ality possible through the revelation of the voice and body. But it will be appreciated at once that these activities must be spontaneous to be of true educational value, and no coached performance, with memorized instruction, fully digested, will ever be able to claim place in this field- Jane Addams says, "The person of the highest culture is the one who is able to put himself in the place of the great- est number of other persons." The activity of the sym- pathetic rendering of literature makes possible this culture. It may also claim as truly educational a wider knowledge of better literature and the spontaneous re-creation, partici- pation, and revelation of the same. To me, it seems impos- sible that any truly educational claims can be advanced for a very large proportion of the declaiming which is done every year in our contests. If this is true, is it not time that all -those who have any connection with the matter take council together, to the end that the most glaring evils may be done away with for all time ? SECTION VIII CONTEST BIBLIOGRAPHY SECTION VIII CONTEST BIBLIOGRAPHY LIST OF AUTHORS FOR CONTEST MATERIAL Eleanor Hallowell Abbott Thos. B. Aldrich James Lane Allen Mary R. S. Andrews Irving Bacheller Josephine Dodge Daskam Bacon James M. Barrie Kate Bosher Charles Townsend Brady Eleanor Hoyt Brainerd Alice Brown Henry C. Bunner Prances Hodgson Burnett Ellis Parker Butler George W. Cable Richard W. Child Winston Churchill Samuel L. Clemens Ralph Connor Marion Crawford Mary Stuart Cutting Richard Harding Davis Charles Dickens Thomas C. Dixon 407 Annie Hamilton Donnell Norman Duncan Edna Ferber George Pitch Sewell Ford John Fox, Jr. Mary E. Wilkins Freeman Zona Gale Roy Rolf e Gilson Sally P. McL. Greene Zane Grey Henry Sydnor Harrison Bret Harte Nathaniel Hawthorne Marion Hill Anthony Hope Washington Irving Sara Orne Jewett Owen Johnson Annie Fellows Johnston Mary Johnston Elizabeth Jordan Myra Kelly Rudyard Kipling Joseph C. Lincoln 408 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation Julie Lippman Frances Little Jack London John Luther Long Charles Battell Loomis George Madden Martin Ellen Montgomery L. M. Montgomery Thomas Nelson Page Gilbert Parker Elizabeth Stuart Phelps Ernest Poole Gene Stratton-Porter Sydney Porter (0. Henry) Alice Hegan Rice Grace Richmond Edwin L. Sab in Annie Trumbull Slosson F. Hopkinson Smith Robert L. Stevenson Frank R. Stockton Booth Tarkington Juliet Wilbur Tompkins Henry van Dyke Marie Van Slyke Mary Heaton Vorse Anne Warner Anoto Watanna Jean Webster Edith Wharton William Allen White Kate Douglas Wiggin Leon Wilson Owen Wister DESCRIPTIVE LIST OF FOREGOING AUTHORS The following suggestions are made in the hope that they may still further assist in the choice of material from the list given. Authors below have been chosen more or less at random, and only one book is mentioned in many cases. This is not necessarily the best of that author's work, but serves to show what sort of material may be found in his work. AUTHOR Barrie, J. M. BOOKS Brady, C. T, NATURE OF MATERIAL OBTAINABLE "Sentimental Tommy" Humorous Child Imper- sonation "A Window in Humorous Thrums" "The Little Minister" Dramatic and Impersona- tions "Phroso" Drama Declamatory Contests 409 AUTHOR Brainerd, E. H. Butler, Ellis P. Churchill, Winston Connor, Ralph Duncan, Norman Fitch, George Fox. John, Jr. Freeman, Mary E. W. Hill, Marion Lincoln, J. C. Little, Frances London, Jack Loomis, Charles B. Tarkington, Booth Warner, Anne Watanna, Onoto Wister, Owen van Dyke, Henry BOOKS "Misdemeanors of Nancy" "Short Stories" "Bichard Carvel" "The Crossing" "The Crisis" "Coniston" "The Sky Pilot" "The Way of the Sea" "Dr. Luke of the Lab- rador*' "The Cruise of the Shining Light" "Siwash Stories" "The Trail of the Lonesome Pine" "The Little Shepherd of Kingdom Come" "A New England Nun" "The Pettison Twins" "Captain Eri" "Little Sister Snow" "The Lady of the Decoration" "The Call of the Wild" "Cheerful Americans" "Mishaps of Minerva" "Monsieur Beaucaire" "The Turmoil" "The Two Van Revels" "Mrs. Clegg" "A Japanese Nightin- gale" "The Virginian" "The Ruling Passion" NATURE OF MATERIAL OBTAINABLE Humorous Impersona- tions Humorous Child Imper- sonations Drama Drama Drama and Pathos Dramatic Impersonation Drama and Pathos All of Mr. Duncan's stories are full of dra- matic interest and pathos Humorous Impersonation Dramatic and Impersona- tion Dramatic and Impersona- tion Dramatic and Pathos Humorous Child Imper- sonations Humorous, Pathos, and Impersonation Humorous and Pathos Pathos and Impersona- tion Dramatic Humorous and Imperson- ation Humorous and Imperson- ation Dramatic Impersonation Dramatic, Pathos, Imper- sonation Dramatic Impersonation Humorous Impersonation Dramatic, Pathos, Imper- sonation Dramatic, Pathos, Imper- sonation, Humorous Dramatic Impersonation 410 Modern Literature for Oral Interpretation AUTHOR BOOKS van Dyke, Henry "The Unknown Quan- tity" NATURE OF MATERIAL OBTAINABLE Humorous, Pathos, Dra- matic The complete works of 0. Henry, Twain, Gilbert Parker, and Alice Brown would furnish all shades of emotion, and material sufficient for a considerable time. BOOKS OF MATERIAL FOR INTERPRETATION There are few books containing desirable material for interpretation. Among the best may be named the fol- lowing : author Cumnock Morgan BOOKS 1. "Choice Readings'' 2. "Selected Readings" 3. "Handbook of Best Read- ings" 4. "The Humorous Speaker" 5. "Readings from Litera- ture" 6. "Prose Literature for Secondary Schools" 7. "Winning Declamations" 8. Modern American Prose Selections Clark Ha Heck and Barbour Ashmun Shurter Rees PUBLISHES McClurg McClurg Chas. Scribner Sons Hinds, Noble & Eldredge American Book Co. Houghton Mifflin Co. Lloyd Adams Noble Harcourt, Brace & Howe, New York BOOKS CONTAINING ORATORICAL MATERIAL ONLY The following books contain oratorical material only, and are of recent date. The selections are new. BOOKS 1. "The Forum of De- mocracy" 2. "American Ideals" 3. "Democracy Today" 4. "Patriotic Selections" AUTHOR PUBLISHER Watkins Allyn & Bacon, Boston Foerster Houghton Mifflin Co., Boston Gauss Scott, Foresman, Chicago Shurter Lloyd Adams Noble, New York ADDRESSES FOR TYPED MATERIAL FOR CONTEST USE Frances Walker, 2020 Sherman Ave., Evanaton, 111. Declamatory Contest 411 H. S. Hollopeter, Westminster College, New Wilming- ton, Del. Irma W. Walker, Librarian, Biwabik, Minn. Edward P. Elliott, Needham, Mass. Ivan B. Hardin Co., 3806 Cottage Grove Ave., Des Moines, la. Columbia College of Expression, 3358 Michigan Ave., Chicago, 111. Univ. Wis. Extension Div. Depart., Debate and Public Discussion. Suggestive List of Addresses and Readings for Declamatory Contests. CONTEST REFERENCES READINGS IN THE QUARTERLY JOURNAL OF SPEECH EDUCATION Faculty Help in Intercollegiate Contests. Lane. Vol. 1. p. 9 State Organization for Contests. Shurter. Vol. 1. p. 59 The Oratorical Contest, A Shot in the Dark. Dennis. Vol. 2. p. 1 Interschool Forensic Contests. Weaver. Vol. 2. p. 141 Interschool Contests and Public Opinion. Highsaw. Vol. 2. p. 365 Practical High School Speaking Contest. Vol. 3. p. 178 Methods Used in Computing Scores. West. Vol. 5. p. 319 READINGS IN THE ENGLISH JOURNAL The Function of the Speaking Contest. Davis. Vol. 4. p. 299 TEXTS ON VOICE AND INTERPRETATION The following texts are among the best dealing with mat- ters of voice, bearing, reading, and interpretation : 1. Interpretation of the Clark Row, Peterson & Co. Printed Page 2. Handbook of Oral Read- Basset Houghton Mifflin Co. ing 3. Mind and Voice Curry Expression Co., Boston 4. American Speech Lewis Scott, Foresman Co. 5. Natural Method of Muckey Chas. Scribner Sons Voice Production 412 Modem Literature for Oral Interpretation 6. How to Read Kerfoot Houghton Mifflin Co. 7. Imagination and Dra- Curry Expression Co., Boston matic Instinct SUGGESTIONS FOR PROGRAMS (7 am well aware that the following list is an obvious one, and I would not offer it were it not that I have been urged to do so by many who have found it useful,) Recital under Any Author Old Ballad Recital Lyrics and Child Rhymes Stories of Western Life Klondike Stories Labrador Stories Southern Stories An Hour of Lyrics Scenes from Plays — Modern Scenes from Plays — Classic Nonsense Rhymes and Stories Irish Lyrics Irish Folk Poems and Stories Arrangements of Entire Books Arrangements of Entire Plays — Classic Arrangements of Entire Plays — Modern Kentucky Stories and Scenes Lecture Recitals from Any Author Miscellaneous Short Stories — Humor Miscellaneous Short Stories — Pathos Miscellaneous Short Stories — Drama Four of Shakespeare's Heroines— Viola, Rosalind, Juliet, Katherine Childhood Types (varied) Declamatory Contest 413 Syrian Children Children of the Ghetto The Child Without a Childhood Our Alien Children The Heart of Childhood The World of Make Believe When the Heart Beats Young Southern Lights and Shadows Quaint Courtships Under the Sunset Different Girls The Mother Memory Fairy Lore, Myths and Legends Northern Skies The Simple Life (nature stories) Prose Allegories Commonplace Stories Pioneers Kindergarten Sketches Nature Beautiful Let 's Go Fishing Shakespeare's Fools Japanese Sketches (prose and poetry) College Stories Indian Lore Old Maidenhood The Man and His Dog The Heart of Pathos Husbands and Wives War (poetry and prose) War Plays (1 acts) THE END INDEX POETRY Angler's Reveille, The .... Henry VanDyke .... 23 Apollo Troubadour Witter Bynner ... 58 Ambition Berton Braley . . .61 Birches Robert Frost 26 Ballad of the Road, A . . . . Constance Mackay ... 78 Ballad of Soulful Sam, The . . Robert Service .... 34 Cat, the Raven, and the Public, The William Ellery Leonard . Duck and the Nightingale, The . William Ellery Leonard . Geese of Athabasca, The . ' . . William Ellery Leonard . Give Us Men J. G. Holland .... Gypsie's Road, The Dora Sigerson Greetings for Two . . . , . J. W. Foley .... Hill Fantasy Fannie Stearns Davis . House of Clouds, The .... Elizabeth Barret Browning Harbour, The ...... W. M. Letts .... If We Had the Time . . . . Richard Burton . In Blossom Time Ina Coolbrith . Indian Summer . . . . . . William Ellery Leonard Joy of the Hills, The .... Edwin Markham . Kids Witter Bynner 56 57 44 107 99 96 80 bl 111 86 86 76 70 30 Little Room of Dreams, The . . Robert Underwood Johnson 41 Ladies of Saint James's, The . . Austin Dobson Lincoln, the Man of the People . Edwin Markham . Little Land, Ihe Robert Louis Stevenson . Law of the Yukon, The . . . Robert W. Service Merman, The Alfred Tennyson . Mermaid, The Alfred Tennyson . Musical Instrument, A Elizabeth Barret Browning Mystic, The . Cale Young Rice . Monastery, The Marjorie Kinman 415 90 92 28 62 72 74 47 94 83 416 Index Mysterious Doings Eugene Field Party at Crogan's, The .... Florence Boyce Path to the Woods ..... Madison Cawein . Pebble Song and Waterfall . . Alfred Kreymborg Questions Cale Young Rice . Quentin Roosevelt Leon Huhner . Symbol, The . v Richard Burton . Stoves and Sunshine .... Eugene Field . Souls Fannie Stearns Davis Sea Fairies, The Alfred Tennyson ' . Song Sparrow, The Henry VanDyke . Soft Day, A W. M. Letts . . Scared ........ W. M. Letts . . Theodore Roosevelt . Tipperary in the Spring Tim, an Irish Terrier . Leon Huhner . Dennis A. McCarthy W. M. Letts . . Winter Ride, A Amy Lowell . When the Train Comes In . . . Nixon W^aterman When Summer Boarders Come . Nixon Waterman Welcome to Alexandria . . . Alfred Tennyson . Water Fantasy Fannie Stearns Davis Wanderer's Litany, The . . . Arthur Stringer . With the Tide Edith Wharton . 101 106 21 49 79 104 39 91 71 37 98 103 87 69 100 98 88 32 67 102 66 109 Artist's Secret, The Battle of Pankow, The PROSE Olive Schreiner . George W. Johnston Conversion of Johnny Harrington, The Elizabeth Jordan . . Extra Paper Zona Gale .... For Love of Mary Ellen . . . Eleanor JI. Brainerd . George Meredith J. M. Barrie . He Knew Lincoln Ida M. Tarbell 307 246 141 199 215 305 168 His Place in the Line . King of Boyville, The . Kirby Wedding, The . Marion Hill 119 William Allen White . . 232 Hayden Carruth .... 273 Index 417 Legacy, The Lost Joy, The Little Change for Edward, A . Mystery of Night, The . Mr. Bush's Kindergarten Christ mas Nightingale and the Rose, The Old Jabe's Marital Experiments Princess Porcelain, The . Part Panther or Something . Pretensions of Charlotte, The Perfect One, The .... Spirit of Abraham Lincoln, The Selfish Giant, The ... . Unfinished Story, An . Underneath the High-Cut Vest J. J. Bell .... Olive Schreiner . Mary Stewart Cutting Hamilton Wright Mabie Hayden Carruth . Oscar Wilde . Thomas Nelson Page Clara Morris *. Booth Tarkington Walter Beach Hay . Laurence Housman . Woodrow Wilson . Oscar Wilde . Richard Harding Davis Edna Ferber . World's Sublimest Spectacle, The John Temple Graves . When Ma Rogers Broke Loose . Hicks Bates Broderson Whirligig of Life, The .... 0. Henry .... Where There 's a Will .... Ellis Parker Butler . 264 195 174 157 225 288 152 238 278 178 242 228 115 187 295 128 129 257 159 SPEECHES FROM SHAKESPEARE As You Like It (Jaques) Henry the Fourth (Hotspur) Henry the Fifth (King Henry) Julius Caesar (Brutus) . Much Ado About Nothing . . . (Benedick) Richard the Third (Queen Margaret) Romeo and Juliet (Mercutio) Winter's Tale, The (Hermione) 316 319 311 317 318 314 315 312 SCENES AND ONE-ACT PLAYS Cyrano de Bergerac .... Edmund Rostand David Copperfield Charles Dickens . Erstwhile Susan Martin — DeForrest Minuet, A Louis N. Parker . Moonshine ... ... Arthur Hopkins . Rivals, The (Bob Acres and David) Richard B. Sheridan 334 337 340 375 363 35o 418 Index Rivals, The (Mrs. Malaprop and Captain Absolute) . Secrets of the Heart . School for Scandal, The Tu Quoque .... Universal Impulse, The Richard B. Sheridan . . 351 Austin Dobson . 331 Richard B. Sheridan . . 323 Austin Dobson . 358 Mrs. Wilson Woodrow . 360 APPENDIX Problems in the Present Conduct of Declamatory Contests . .391 Including Lists of Material Book Lists Texts Suggestions for Judging Contest Reference Bibliography Program Suggestions 412 V- k o <~ /\ "*

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