Plays
state. He's experimented with it--created a new kind. They've given it
his name--Morton corn. It seems corn is rather fascinating to work
with--very mutable stuff. It's a good thing Ira has it, for it's about
the only thing he does care for now. Oh, Madeline, of course. He has a
daughter here in the college--Madeline Morton, senior this year--one of
our best students. I'd like to have you meet Madeline--she's a great
girl, though--peculiar.
SENATOR: Well, that makes a girl interesting, if she isn't peculiar the
wrong way. Sounds as if her home life might make her a little peculiar.
FEJEVARY: Madeline stays here in town with us a good part of the time.
Mrs Fejevary is devoted to her--we all are. (_a boy starts to come
through from right_) Hello, see who's here. This is my boy. Horace, this
is Senator Lewis, who is interested in the college.
HORACE: (_shaking hands_) How do you do, Senator Lewis?
SENATOR: Pleased to see you, my boy.
HORACE: Am I butting in?
FEJEVARY: Not seriously; but what are you doing in the library? I
thought this was a day off.
HORACE: I'm looking for a book.
FEJEVARY: (_affectionately bantering_) You are, Horace? Now how does
that happen?
HORACE: I want the speeches of Abraham Lincoln.
SENATOR: You couldn't do better.
HORACE: I'll show those dirty dagoes where they get off!
FEJEVARY: You couldn't show them a little more elegantly?
HORACE: I'm going to sick the Legion on 'em.
FEJEVARY: Are you talking about the Hindus?
HORACE: Yes, the dirty dagoes.
FEJEVARY: Hindus aren't dagoes you know, Horace.
HORACE: Well, what's the difference? This foreign element gets my goat.
SENATOR: My boy, you talk like an American. But what do you
mean--Hindus?
FEJEVARY: There are two young Hindus here as students. And they're good
students.
HORACE: Sissies.
FEJEVARY: But they must preach the gospel of free India--non-British
India.
SENATOR: Oh, that won't do.
HORACE: They're nothing but Reds, I'll say. Well, one of 'em's going
back to get his. (_grins_)
FEJEVARY: There were three of them last year. One of them is wanted back
home.
SENATOR: I remember now. He's to be deported.
HORACE: And when they get him--(_movement as of pulling a rope_) They
hang there.
FEJEVARY: The other two protest against our not fighting the deportation
of their comrade. They insist it means death to him. (_brushing off a
thing that is inclined to worry him_) But we can't handle India's
affairs.
SENATOR: I should think not!
HORACE: Why, England's our ally! That's what I told them. But you can't
argue with people like that. Just wait till I find the speeches of
Abraham Lincoln!
(_Passes through to left_)
SENATOR: Fine boy you have, Mr Fejevary.
FEJEVARY: He's a live one. You should see him in a football game.
Wouldn't hurt my feelings in the least to have him a little more of a
student, but--
SENATOR: Oh, well, you want him to be a regular fellow, don't you, and
grow into a man among men?
FEJEVARY: He'll do that, I think. It was he who organized our boys for
the steel strike--went right in himself and took a striker's job. He
came home with a black eye one night, presented to him by a picket who
started something by calling him a scab. But Horace wasn't thinking
about his eye. According to him, it was not in the class with the
striker's upper lip. 'Father,' he said, 'I gave him more red than he
could swallow. The blood just--' Well, I'll spare you--but Horace's
muscle is one hundred per cent American. (_going to the window_) Let me
show you something. You can see the old Morton place off on that first
little hill. (_pointing left_) The first rise beyond the valley.
SENATOR: The long low house?
FEJEVARY: That's it. You see, the town for the most part swung around
the other side of the hill, so the Morton place is still a farm.
SENATOR: But you're growing all the while. The town'll take the
cornfield yet.
FEJEVARY: Yes, our steel works is making us a city.
SENATOR: And this old boy (_turning to the portrait of_ SILAS MORTON)
can look out on his old home--and watch the valley grow.
FEJEVARY: Yes--that was my idea. His picture really should be in
Memorial Hall, but I thought Uncle Silas would like to be up here among
the books, and facing the old place. (_with a laugh_) I confess to being
a little sentimental.
SENATOR: We Americans have lots of sentiment, Mr Fejevary. It's what
makes us--what we are. (FEJEVARY _does not speak; there are times when
the senator seems to trouble him_) Well, this is a great site for a
college. You can see it from the whole country round.
FEJEVARY: Yes, that was Uncle Silas' idea. He had a reverence for
education. It grew, in part, out of his feeling for my father. He was a
poet--really, Uncle Silas. (_looking at the picture_) He gave this hill
for a college that we might become a deeper, more sensitive people--
(_Two girls, convulsed with the giggles, come tumbling in_.)
DORIS: (_confused_) Oh--oh, excuse us.
FUSSIE: (_foolishly_) We didn't know anybody was here.
(MR FEJEVARY _looks at them sternly. The girls retreat_.)
SENATOR: (_laughing_) Oh, well girls will be girls. I've got three of my
own.
(HORACE _comes back, carrying an open book_.)
HORACE: Say, this must be a misprint.
FEJEVARY: (_glancing at the back of the book_) Oh, I think not.
HORACE: From his first inaugural address to Congress, March 4, 1861.
(_reads_) 'This country with its institutions belong to the people who
inhabit it.' Well, that's all right. 'Whenever they shall grow weary of
the existing government they can exercise their constitutional right of
amending it'--(_after a brief consideration_) I suppose that that's all
right--but listen! 'or their revolutionary right to dismember or
overthrow it.'
FEJEVARY: He was speaking in another age. An age of different values.
SENATOR: Terms change their significance from generation to generation.
HORACE: I suppose they do--but that puts me in bad with these lice. They
quoted this and I said they were liars.
SENATOR: And what's the idea? They're weary of our existing government
and are about to dismember or overthrow it?
HORACE: I guess that's the dope.
FEJEVARY: Look here, Horace--speak accurately. Was it in relation to
America they quoted this?
HORACE: Well, maybe they were talking about India then. But they were
standing up for being revolutionists. We were giving them an earful
about it, and then they spring Lincoln on us. Got their nerve--I'll
say--quoting Lincoln to us.
SENATOR: The fact that they are quoting it shows it's being misapplied.
HORACE: (_approvingly_) I'll tell them that. But gee--Lincoln oughta
been more careful what he said. Ignorant people don't know how to take
such things.
(_Goes back with book_.)
FEJEVARY: Want to take a look through the rest of the library? We
haven't been up this way yet--(_motioning left_) We need a better
scientific library. (_they are leaving now_) Oh, we simply must have
more money. The whole thing is fairly bursting its shell.
DORIS: (_venturing in cautiously from the other side, looking back,
beckoning_) They've gone.
FUSSIE: Sure?
DORIS: Well, are they here? And I saw them, I tell you--they went up to
science.
FUSSIE: (_moving the_ SENATOR'S _hat on the table_) But they'll come
back.
DORIS: What if they do? We're only looking at a book. (_running her hand
along the books_) Matthew Arnold.
(_Takes a paper from_ FUSSIE, _puts it in the book. They are bent with
giggling as_ HORACE _returns_.)
HORACE: For the love o' Pete, what's the joke? (_taking the book from
the helpless girl_) Matthew Arnold. My idea of nowhere to go for a
laugh. When I wrote my theme on him last week he was so dry I had to go
out and get a Morton Sundee (_the girls are freshly attacked, though all
of this in a subdued way, mindful of others in the library_) Say, how'd
you get that way?
DORIS: Now, Horace, don't you _tell_.
HORACE: What'd I tell, except--(_seeing the paper_) Um hum--what's this?
DORIS: (_trying to get it from him_) Horace, now _don't_ you (_a
tussle_) You great strong mean thing! Fussie! Make him _stop_.
(_She gets the paper by tearing it_.)
HORACE: My dad's around here--showing the college off to a politician.
If you don't come across with that sheet of mystery, I'll back you both
out there (_starts to do it_) and--
DORIS: Horace! You're just _horrid_.
HORACE: Sure I'm horrid. That's the way I want to be. (_takes the paper,
reads_)
'To Eben
You are the idol of my dreams
I worship from afar.'
What is this?
FUSSIE: Now, listen, Horace, and don't you _tell_. You know Eben Weeks.
He's the homeliest man in school. Wouldn't you say so?
HORACE: Awful jay. Like to get some of the jays out of here.
DORIS: But listen. Of course, no girl would _look_ at him. So we've
thought up the most _killing_ joke, (_stopped by giggles from herself
and_ FUSSIE) Now, he hasn't handed in his Matthew Arnold dope. I heard
old Mac hold him up for it--and what'd you think he said? That he'd been
_ploughing_. Said he was trying to run a farm and go to college at the
same time! Isn't it a _scream_?
HORACE: We oughta--make it more unpleasant for some of those jays. Gives
the school a bad name.
FUSSIE: But, listen, Horace, honest--you'll just _die_. He said he was
going to get the book this afternoon. Now you know what he _looks_ like,
but he turns to--(_both girls are convulsed_)
DORIS: It'll get him all fussed up! And for nothing at all!
HORACE: Too bad that class of people come here. I think I'll go to
Harvard next year. Haven't broken it to my parents--but I've about made
up my mind.
DORIS: Don't you think Morton's a good school, Horace?
HORACE: Morton's all right. Fine for the--(_kindly_) people who would
naturally come here. But one gets an acquaintance at Harvard. Wher'd'y'
want these passionate lines?
(FUSSIE _and_ DORIS _are off again convulsed_.)
HORACE: (_eye falling on the page where he opens the book_) Say, old
Bones could spill the English--what? Listen to this flyer. 'For when we
say that culture is to know the best that has been thought and said in
the world, we simply imply that for culture a system directly tending to
that end is necessary in our reading.' (_he reads it with mock
solemnity, delighting_ FUSSIE _and_ DORIS) The best that has been
thought and said in the world!'
(MADELINE MORTON _comes in from right; she carries a tennis racket_.)
MADELINE: (_both critical and good-humoured_) You haven't made a large
contribution to that, have you, Horace?
HORACE: Madeline, you don't want to let this sarcastic habit grow on
you.
MADELINE: Thanks for the tip.
FUSSIE: Oh--_Madeline, (holds out her hand to take the book from_ HORACE
_and shows it to_ MADELINE) You know--
DORIS: S-h Don't be silly, (_to cover this_) Who you playing with?
HORACE: Want me to play with you, Madeline?
MADELINE: (_genially_) I'd rather play with you than talk to you.
HORACE: Same here.
FUSSIE: Aren't cousins affectionate?
MADELINE: (_moving through to the other part of the library_) But first
I'm looking for a book.
HORACE: Well, I can tell you without your looking it up, he did say it.
But that was an age of different values. Anyway, the fact that they're
quoting it shows it's being misapplied.
MADELINE: (_smiling_) Father said so.
HORACE: (_on his dignity_) Oh, of course--if you don't want to be
serious.
(MADELINE _laughs and passes on through_.)
DORIS: What are you two talking about?
HORACE: Madeline happened to overhear a little discussion down on the
campus.
FUSSIE: Listen. You know something? Sometimes I think Madeline Morton is
a highbrow in disguise.
HORACE: Say, you don't want to start anything like that. Madeline's all