Transcriber’s Note:
The cover image was created by the transcriber and is placed in the public domain.
SANCTUARY
A BIRD MASQUE
“Herkneth these blisful briddes how they singe;
Ful is mine herte of revel and solas!”
ORNIS
(Miss Eleanor Wilson)
SANCTUARY
A Bird Masque
BY
PERCY MACKAYE
With a Prelude by
ARVIA MACKAYE
Illustrated with Photographs in Color and Monotone by
ARNOLD GENTHE
NEW YORK
FREDERICK A. STOKES COMPANY
PUBLISHERS
Copyright, 1913, 1914, by
Percy MacKaye
All rights reserved
THE·PLIMPTON·PRESS
NORWOOD·MASS·U·S·A
TO
ERNEST HAROLD BAYNES
‘WILD NATURE’S HUMAN SYMPATHIZER’
IN ADMIRATION OF HIS DAUNTLESS
SERVICE TO THE BIRDS
NOTE
REGARDING PERFORMANCE AND PUBLIC READING
Requests for permission to perform or read publicly this Bird Masque having been received from a great many quarters, the following information is here given for those desiring such permission:
The Masque is copyrighted in the United States and countries of the Copyright Union, and all rights are reserved.
The purpose of the Masque is to be of public use, so that all adequate presentations of it are welcome. To this end the special conditions of performance or public reading should in each case be communicated direct to the author, in care of the publisher.
No performances may be given without such direct communication, and permission thus first obtained.
As the publication of this text is designed to serve the definite cause for which it was written, performances must be, in some degree at least, for the benefit of Wild Bird Conservation.
Music for the lyrics “The Hermit Thrush” and the three songs of Quercus has been composed by Frederick S. Converse, and is published by the H. W. Gray Company, 2 West 45th Street, New York.
A bird bath, specially designed for use in bird sanctuaries and gardens, with plastic groupings of characters in the original cast of this Masque, has been executed by Mrs. Louis Saint-Gaudens, Cornish, New Hampshire, post office Windsor, Vermont.
The four photographs in color, as well as those in black and white, which illustrate this volume were taken by Dr. Arnold Genthe of enactors in the Masque, as first performed by members of the Cornish Colony and the Meriden Bird Club at Meriden, New Hampshire, September 12, 1913.
FOREWORD
This Masque was written for the dedication of the bird sanctuary of the Meriden Bird Club of Meriden, New Hampshire, where it was first performed on the night of September twelfth, 1913. The text was composed, the lyrics set to music, the masque rehearsed, costumed and acted, within the brief space of a month. Its production came about by a spontaneous and glad cooperation of artists, neighbors, lovers of nature, imbued with a deep feeling in common—concern for the welfare of wild birds. In this important concern its enactors were happily encouraged by the sympathetic presence of the President of the United States and the participation of his family.
Swift and spontaneous as its production was, however, the masque in its reasons for being was not unpremeditated. It took its origin from two important sources, rarely, if ever, associated—nature study, and the art of the theatre.
The union of these was its raison d’etre.
However tentative its realization, it stands none the less as a pioneering suggestion of real moment to those two potent influences upon our national life. As such it has seemed worth while to present to the public, and to make clear the suggestion which it illustrates, however sketchily.
From a recent volume by the writer on “The Civic Theatre, in Relation to the Redemption of Leisure,” I quote the following paragraphs upon “Nature Symbols,” as they apply directly to this subject:
“The relation of the theatre’s art to the naturalist’s vocation is probably not obvious to the man on the street. That is because the commercial theatre relates itself to so few of the pursuits of science outside of Broadway interests. The civic theatre would do otherwise.
“Aristophanes symbolized the birds for the purposes of Greek satire. The costuming of his play in Athens probably expressed no direct attribution to the science of ornithology. Yet its attribution to the Greek race’s intimate love of Nature was as spontaneous as the symbolizing of flowers in the capitals of their temple columns. The movement to-day for the conservation of our birds and their more intimate study might well take on significant, lovely forms of symbolic expression in pageants, festivals and the drama of the civic theatre.
“By the same art, the fascinating designs, embossings, colorings, of insect forms could be symbolized in spectacles of astonishing beauty, motivated dramatically to the real and tremendous human relation which that ignored but pestiferous race bears to human society and the state; as witness the movement, involving millions in taxes, for exterminating the gypsy moth and the boll weevil.
“Such implications for art may seem, at first, a far cry from actual possibilities of the theatre; yet thus may the civic theatre directly relate its activities not only to the enthusiasms of naturalists in the fields and woods, but to the inspiring studies of scholars in their laboratories: a cooperation which may soon stultify the popular notion that art and science are divorced in their special aims. The same relation of the theatre’s symbolic art to all the sciences—the discoveries of chemistry, the splendid imaginings of engineering—is implied in their common aim: the bringing of greater joy, beauty, understanding, to our fellow men and women, the people.
“Science represents idea, art its expression; theatrical art its expression in forms best adapted to convened numbers of the people. The forms of popular art, therefore, are limited only by the ideas of man.”
It is thus as an illustration of one of the multiform genres of the civic theatre’s potential art that this little masque has its main significance.
Before the actual establishment of the Civic Theatre among us, the opportunities of the working dramatist to make tangible contributions by his art to its repertory are, of course, very scant and at best groping and experimental. One such as the present may serve, however, to suggest certain immediate, practical possibilities.
If, for instance, every bird sanctuary were to possess its stage and auditorium for bird masques—if every Natural History Museum had its outdoor theatre, equipped to set forth the multitudinous human meanings of its nature exhibits to the crowds that frequent its doors in their hours of leisure—if the directors of every Zoölogical Park were to provide for it a scenic arena, and seek the civic cooperation of the dramatic poet and theatrical expert, to vivify by their art the tremendous life stories of wild nature to the receptive minds of the human thousands convened to listen and behold—by such means, would not the disciples of nature study not simply adopt for their own ends a means of education and publicity a thousandfold more dynamic, imaginative and popular than any of the static means of exhibits, lectures and published volumes on which they now rely: would they not also thereby splendidly assist in enlarging the civic scope of the theatre’s art, still cramped, as for generations, within the walls of speculation and commercialism?
These suggestions speak for themselves.
If this Bird Masque shall help, in the slightest degree, to illustrate them, it will do its ephemeral service in the only permanent sanctuary of men as of birds—imagination.
Percy MacKaye.
Cornish, New Hampshire,
October, 1913.
PERSONS OF THE MASQUE[[1]]
in the order of their appearance
QUERCUS, faun
ALWYN, poet
SHY, naturalist
TACITA, dryad
ORNIS, bird spirit
STARK, plume hunter
PARTICIPANTS IN PANTOMIME
Hunter Attendants of Stark
Many species of birds—in human form, garbed symbolically
SCENE
The sylvan glade of a bird sanctuary.
[1]. The complete programme of the original production of the masque, as first enacted at Meriden, New Hampshire, by members of the Cornish Colony and the Meriden Bird Club, is printed in the Afterword of this volume.
THE PRELUDE
THE LITTLE GIRL FALLS INTO REVERIE
THE PRELUDE
Wandering in the quiet of the bird sanctuary, a little girl hears the voice of a hermit thrush, and meditates this song:
THE SONG
While walking through a lonely wood
I heard a lovely voice:
A voice so fresh and true and good
It made my heart rejoice.
It sounded like a Sunday bell
Rung softly in a town,
Or like a stream that in a dell
Forever trickles down.
It seemed to be a voice of love
That always had loved me,
So softly it rang out above,
So wild and wanderingly.
O Voice, were you a golden dove,
Or just a plain gray bird?
O Voice, you are my wandering love
Lost, yet forever heard.
Passing on deeper into the wood, the little girl thinks dreamily of all wild birds and the wrongs done to them by their human brothers and sisters.
Out of her reverie grows the Masque which follows.
THE MASQUE
THE MASQUE
I
Dawn.
The woods are silent, save for bird pipings.
In the background, verdure of young pines and ancient boles of oaks form the dim-pillared entrance to a forest shrine.
Artfully placed on tree trunk and bough are nest boxes of bark.
On one side stands a low weathercock food-house; on the other, a tall martin-house pole.
In the shade of a great oak glimmers the shallow pool of a bird bath.
Peeping at this from behind the oak, appears, vanishes and appears again the horned head of Quercus, a faun.
Stealing forth, Quercus approaches the pool, bearing in one hand an enormous pitcher plant.
Peering upward among the boughs, he raises his voice in quaint falsetto, and sings.
QUERCUS
Veery, veery!—vireo!
Waxwing wild!—warbler wary!
Ori-ori-oriole!
Seek our sanctuary!
Robin rath,
Little tail-twitcher,
Drink from my pitcher,
Dip in my bath!
Dew’s in my bath,
Rain’s in my pitcher,
Dawn’s in the greenwood eerie:
Hither, highhole!
Redpoll!
Oriole!
Vireo!—veery!
[From his pitcher plant Quercus pours into the bird bath. Skipping then to a little swinging bird-house, he sprinkles its shelf with seed from a pouch. Here he pauses dreamily; furtively takes out and fingers a pipe; blows a few notes, pauses, starts, puts it quickly away, stoops his ear to the ground, springs away to the oak, and snatches an ivied staff which stands against the trunk. The staff is designed like a martin-house pole in miniature. Placing himself on guard where a foot-path enters the glade, he calls:]
Stand yonder! Hold! who treads beneath my trees?
A VOICE
[Outside.]
A friend.
QUERCUS
A friend to what?
THE VOICE
To Song, and Song’s melodious silences.
QUERCUS
Still enter not.
The race of wings reigns in this solitude.
No foot may here intrude
Without fair passport. Tell me first your name
And cause of coming here.
II
Quercus. Alwyn.
[A Young Man enters, pausing in the path.]
THE MAN
From hence even now a piping filled mine ear
With quaintish memory: familiar,
Yet old, it seemed. Long since, I heard the same
Lulling to paleness the white morning star
Among Sicilian oaks. So here I came
To spy upon the piper. Now, methinks,
I know him, by those horns and merry winks.
—Good morrow, Quercus, the faun!
QUERCUS
Now, by Lord Pan!
The poet’s ear and eye still spy me out.—
Alwyn, maker of songs—hail to you, master!
You!—Can it really be?
ALWYN
It can,
And is—by Pan, our ancient pastor!
But you, slant shanks, what make you here at dawn?
QUERCUS
Newfangleness! The classic gout
Still crooks my knees with the old lyric wine,
But now they run new errands.
[Flourishing his staff.]
Lo, the sign
Of my new office!
ALWYN
New! What may that be?
QUERCUS
Wood warden of the wild birds’ sanctuary:
Janitor of their sylvan temple!—See,
My staff acclaims me. Poor Mercutius!
Old mythologic nature-faker,
He’s out of date with his caduceus.
Behold in me
A modern science-tutored fairy
And practical care-taker—
Grand marshal of the martin-house!
ALWYN
[Pointing at Quercus’ staff.]
Of that?
QUERCUS
Nay, this, my bard, is but the breviat
And little pattern.
[Pointing toward a tall martin-house pole.]
Yonder, you behold
The real palace. Through those portals
We lure the feathered broods to fold
Their wings above the world of thievish mortals.
ALWYN
We—say you? Who are we?
QUERCUS
Myself and my lord master.
ALWYN
And what’s he?
QUERCUS
Nay, if I knew, I should be wiser.
He is the fellow of all friendless things,
Wild nature’s human sympathizer:
In form a man, yet footed so with silence
The deer mistake him for their brother; so
Swift that, meseems, he borrows the birds’ wings;
An eye, that glows and twinks
Through noon like twilight’s vesper star; an ear
That harks a mile hence
The purring of a lynx!
I love him, follow, obey him, yet I know
Naught of him—but his love.
ALWYN
Not even his name?
QUERCUS
Yea, what men call him by;
And he is like the same.
Men call him Master Shy.
ALWYN
Ah, Shy, the naturalist.
Why, he is my good crony. If he wist
To rhyme he’d be a better bard than I.
How do you serve him?
QUERCUS
I’m crew to his Jason!
I multiply myself for rare adventures,
And serve his Ship of Birds as carpenter,
Box-joiner, bath-cementer, mason,
Seed-storer, water-carrier,
Worm-steward, nest-ward, treehouse thatcher,
Man-chaser and mouse-catcher.
ALWYN
Nay, do you please in all?
QUERCUS
I carry to his call,
And never yet have earned his censures
For botch or shirk.
ALWYN
I prithee show me of your handiwork.
What’s here—this little box
With paddle wings?
QUERCUS
One of our weather-cocks.
Look you, it swings:
So when, in winter, the white tempest blows,
Here sit the birds at breakfast ’mid the snows,
With porch turned ever to the cosy side.
In that cold time, my master Shy
Brings more devices to provide
Bird-comfort: Food-bells full of millet
We place in covert nooks, and tie
Our knitted suet bags on many a bough
Of pine and larch. And I must plough
Through many a drift, to crack the frozen rillet
For little beaks to drink.
ALWYN
By Phœbus, now
Is this in sooth mine old Sicilian faun,
That wont of yore to dally
On violet-scented lawn
With lily-crownéd nymphs in lovelorn valley!
What modern change is here? What magic—
QUERCUS
Hush!
[With lowered voice, he looks around warily.]
I am not always quite so modern!
At times—at times—as when just now
You heard me pipe below this bough—
I slip my master’s traces,
And slink by paths untrodden
To lovelorn, lush
Arcadian places,
Where Philomel still lingers,
Plaining her ancient pity,
And there I fetch forth this
With idling fingers,
And, pouting on its lip my kiss,
I pipe some dulcet, old, bucolic ditty.
[Taking out his pipe, he plays again a few languorous strains, but breaks off abruptly.]
Whist! Here he comes.—It grates upon his ear.
“IS THIS IN SOOTH MINE OLD SICILIAN FAUN?”
III
Shy. Quercus. Alwyn.
SHY
[Enters, carrying a nest-box.]
A hermit thrush is pleasanter to hear.
[He greets Alwyn.]
Good morning, friend! How comes it you are caught
Walking so early? Poets, I had thought,
Salute the sunrise only in their song.
ALWYN
[Smiling.]
Fie, then! You do us wrong:
We rhyming slugabeds
Walk with Aurora at our pillows’ heads,
For dreamers can see dawn rise in the dark.
Poets are owls that elegize the lark.
SHY
And now you’ll talk to me of nightingales!