In political matters 'tis best you will own,
To leave Camarina severely alone.
This superlative animal barely conceals
The contempt and the deep British bias he feels,
For all that he wilfully misunderstands,
He raises his eyebrows and holds up his hands.
To him there's no reading of lines between,
And life is the life of the mandarin.
The nursery cow still jumps over the moon,
The old tune is still the 'opportune,'
And Britain, vacuous, placid and kind,
Still conquers the world in absence of mind.
So high does he stand in his own esteem
That Progress to him is an old world dream,
A myth, a mere hypothetical theme,
Come sugar the brew! is it milk or cream?
Come dish it up! is it tea or coffee, sir?
SELF-COM.: A 'Times,' a 'top hat,' a 'half trained British officer!'
ALL: Is that your tribute to Progress? Ho!
Into the melting pot they go!
Off with the cover—serve up the dish and see
The outcome of British inefficiency!
No! there's something yet—he's silent & sinister!
Take care! sit tight!
SELF-COM.: A cabinet minister!
The pot explodes, for Self-Complaceny has held up and dropped into it the effigy of the minister most or least desired, & that was too much for the pot. Or should it for scenic purposes be deemed advisable, Self-Complacency reveals himself as the minister in question, in which case be shall wear in his button hole an orchid and in his eye an eye glass. Then shall be spring himself into the pot. In the confusion that ensues, the imps as they disappear are still heard singing.
ALL: Ho, ho, for the melting pot,
That was too hot, that was too hot!
Fury and flame, powder and shot,
We've put it all in and it comes out what?
Ho, ho, for the molting pot!
THE FOURTH SCENE.
THE PAGEANT OF THE CENTURIES.
THE PROLOCUTOR.
Mad is the movement of Time, and strange are the ways of the All-Seeing that we cannot understand. Yet do we know that nothing is destroyed, nothing lost. The Pelican in her piety lives again, & the Phoenix springs from out of his own ashes. What we destroy we are given to recreate, what we lose we find again. Thus saith the Lord. With the Sixth Edward came a great change upon this England of ours, as with the Seventh Edward there is coming likewise. Even as there came with the Confessor and with the first Edward. With each of these a cleavage of the ways, a parting of the roads in the History of England. Mourn not for the Past, saith the Lord, nor for the ages of Faith that have passed away. We live in the Present, and the Present likewise is passing, and if within us we bear the heart of flame, if in our passing we watch and learn, learn of the Past and still have faith, it shall be given to us even yet more divinely to create.
Each Edward brings his lesson, each Century brings her meinie. The Edwards, all but the last, have ye seen, see now the meinies of the Ten Centuries of England, and mark well those that be of the company. Not one of all the gathering but has left some precious gift behind, left the world sweeter and nobler, left for us English a heritage that no one who speaks the tongue, lives in the law, or thinks the thought, whether here on this little island, or all the world over, would willingly forego. Mark the pageant of the Centuries.
The Eleventh Century enters from the right through the inner scene across which is now drawn a veil, so that the figures behind are seen, but not too distinctly, yet so that they shall be clearly discerned. Passing out of the inner scene to the right, they enter again on the left and cross the outer stage. There is stately music, varying to the passing of each, and ending in a march of triumph at the close. The Eleventh Century beckons, and there follows to her beckoning her meinie, to wit:
William the Conqueror.
The Abbot of Battle; and
Passing from the inner on to the outer scene, the Eleventh Century and her meipie march in procession to the right across the outer stage, during or after which is chanted or intoned the chant following:
THE CHANT.
To us the Past is sacred still
Not for the forms, the things it feigns,
Not for the record it contains,
Not for the tropes that life disdains,
But as the symbol of a will
That guides, admonishes, informs,
A light at peril of the storms,
A God with both hands filled to give,
A friend that teaches bow to live.
Then there shall pass in the same manner the Twelfth Century, who, beckoning, shall lead in her meinie to wit:
St. Thomas à Becket, richly apparelled & carrying the Chancellor's seal.
King Richard Coeur-de-Lion; and with him
A group of Crusaders.
While they are passing and after, shall be chanted again the Chant of the Centuries.
THE CHANT.
To us the Past is sacred still
As beacon-fires that ceaseless burn,
Lighting us on from hill to hill,
Far as the straining eye may scan;
A pivot of the soul of man
