Snickerty Nick and the Giant

by Julia Ellsworth Ford and Harold Witter Bynner

SNICKERTY NICK

DANCE OF SPRING

SNICKERTY NICK

BY

JULIA ELLSWORTH FORD

Rhymes by
Witter Bynner

Illustrations by
Arthur Rackham

New York

MOFFAT, YARD & CO.

1919

Copyright, 1919,

by

Moffat, Yard & Co.

The acting rights are reserved by the author.

FOR THE DELIGHTFUL CHILD SPIRIT
OF THE RHYMES OF

WITTER BYNNER

AM DEEPLY GRATEFUL
AND THAT PART OF THE PLAY WHICH IS MINE
I DEDICATE TO HIM
WITH SINCERE APPRECIATION

BY THE SAME AUTHOR

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PICTURES by GEORGE FREDERICK WATTS. 23 illustrations. Introduction by Author and Thomas W. Lamont. 4lo, $3.50.

KING SOLOMON AND THE FAIR SHULAMITE with 7 photogravure illustrations. 12mo, $1.50.

“A. E.” A Note of Appreciation, with portrait and facsimile. 12mo, $1.00.

SIMEON SOLOMON. An Appreciation, with 22 illustrations. 4lo, $1.00.

THE MIST. A Play in One Act. Produced in London at The Little Theatre November, 1913.

IMAGINA. A Fanciful Tale for Children and Grown-ups. With colored illustrations by Arthur Rackham and drawings by Lauren Ford. $2.00

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MOFFAT. YARD & CO.

FOREWORD

The idea of the Selfish Giant in this play has been taken from the story of Oscar Wilde’s The Selfish Giant. Spring would not come to his garden because he would not let the children play in it. It was always winter there.

One morning he woke up hearing the music of a linnet singing in his garden. He jumped out of bed and saw a most wonderful sight, “flowers were looking up through the green grass and laughing,” and in every tree was a little child; but one little boy was too tiny to climb the tree and the Giant’s heart melted and he helped the little child into the tree. The little child kissed him and forever after the children played in the Giant’s garden, because his heart had softened through love of the little child.

The children never saw the child again. But one day he came to the Giant, who saw on the palms of the child’s hands “the prints of two nails and the prints of two nails were on the little feet.”

The little child had come to take the Giant to play in his garden, “which is Paradise.”

My indebtedness to this story is the character of the Selfish Giant. The little play of Snickerty Nick is not a dramatization of The Selfish Giant. The character of Snickerty Nick is an original character and the play centers around him. The little boy is only a loving and beloved child, and Spring and Winter are personitied by faeries and gnomes.

To Arthur Rackham I tender my most sincere thanks whose magic touch, as in Peter Pan, Grimm’s Faery Tales and Undine, making real all faeries and gnomes, endears all child life to grown-ups as well as to children.

Julia Ellsworth Ford.

CHARACTERS

THE GIANT	BARON BILL-ARRON BOMBERRUM
THE DWARF	SNICKERTY NICK
THE LITTLE BOY
THE CHILDREN
WINTER
SPRING
WINTER’S GNOMES	—	SNOW
		HAIL
		FROST
		NORTHWIND
		CHILBLAINS
SPRING’S FAERIES	—	COWSLIP
		BUTTERCUP
		SWEET WILLIAM
		DANDELION
		BLUE BELL
		BUMBLE BEE
		RAGGED SAILOR

The children may choose their names from
Mother Goose or any they may fancy.

A little boy came laughing and turned icicles
into flowers and won a kingdom with love.

Chapters (not listed in original)

Scene I . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

13

Scene II . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

42