256

A RECONCILIATION.

A Comedy in One Act by Elia W. Peattie.

CHARACTERS.

FRANZ [?]. }
KARL SCHULTZ. } Musicians.

Mercy Woods -- Her daughter.

(Scene: Two very small lodging rooms in a large city. The partition between the two rooms divides the stage in halves. Each room contains a single bed, a table, and some chairs. One room has a piano. The other [?] a violin case conspicuously placed.

Mrs. Woods and Mercy enter the room of Franz [?] -- the one which contains the piano. "Mercy" carries a bunch of roses. Mrs. Woods has a tea tray.)

MRS WOODS -- It's fifteen minutes past his time. When he does come he'll be in such a rush to get away again to that dreadful society, where the men drink beer and sing bass choruses. It's raining worse than ever outside, and if he gets wet it will make his cough a great deal worse.

(Mercy puts in it the roses in a Flemish jug on the trouble and carries the rest of the roses [?] the adjoining room and puts them in a vase on the table beside the violin. There is a slight noise without us of the elevator stopping. The women look up expectantly. And Mueller enters his room. Throughout he speaks with a slight German accent not necessary to indicate in the spelling, and more a matter of ludiction than anything else. The same applies to Heri Schultze.)

MUELLER Good evening, Mrs. Woods. I see you have not forgotten to bring up [?]. You are very kind, I assure you.

MRS. WOODS -- I knew you would be wet to the skin. You see, I have a fire started. What a shame it is you have to go out tonight! Come over here and dry yourself Why is it, I should like to know, that you never carry an umbrella?

[MURILLER?] -- My dear Mrs. Woods, you so exaggerate. I do sometimes carry an umbrella. But the truth is, Mr. Schultze until I have only one between us, and he has it.

MRS. WOODS -- Now you see the inconveniences of falling out! Here are you with a tire, and [?] without any. And him with an umbrella, and you without any, and all because of a quarrel over goodness known what. When are you going to make up? You promised me last night --

MUELLER -- Pardon me, Mrs. Woods. I promised you nothing. You tried to make me apologize to a man to whom I owe no apology -- to [?], madam, who, under the preleuse of friendliness, has wounded my feelings -- a man who had the impertinence to say that I did not know how to phrase Ratt's andanto in A major. A composition, [?], that I know as well as you know your alphabet! The truth is, he is not willing to give the piano a chance in it. He has got too used to relegating the piano to a secondary place. He wants to play a continual solo. He is not fit for a composer -- who knows how to balance the [?] And it is impossible to discuss with him -- he can no more keep his temper -- its a disgrace to a man of his age --

MRS. WOODS -- There you go again. Herr Mueller. Now don't talk to me about that Ann Dante! I don't know her from Eve, and I don't want to But what I do wish is that I could hear you playing that serenade together again. That's just like heaven, Herr Mueller.

MUELLER -- The serenade will never be played by me again, Mrs. Woods. I have never played it without --

MRS. WOODS -- Without Herr Shultze. Of course not. And nobody wants you to play it alone. I want to hear the piano moaning and moaning away underneath, and the violin sighing and sighing above, and the whole making you forget that you are in a dusty down-town lodging house, and imagine you are out in the woods at night, with the moonlight shining through the leaves, and the nightingale singing, and you singing too, as hard as you can, to your sweetheart. That's what Mercy and me like. And we don't see why two old friends, who can't get along without each other a minute and be happy, should fall out and get like a couple of school boys.

MUELLER - Madaurl

MRS. WOODS -- Now Herr Mueller, don't be [?[ with me. it isn't worth while to be dignified with a plain sort of woman who makes her living taking lodgers. It isn't indeed. Did you see the roses Mercy brought you?

MUELLER -- Dear me, no! That's just like me -- just like me. They are as sweet as she is? She is a good daughter, Mrs. Woods. She is a comfort! The older I grow -- and I'm getting an old man, Mrs. Woods, an old and lonely man -- the more I love youth, and freshness, and beauty, like your daughter or the 40 roses.

MRS. WOODS -- You ought to have had a daughter yourself, Herr Mueller.

MUELLER (sighs) -- Perhaps so. I might have had, maybe, only -- but what's the use? I have had no one but a friend, and now I have lost him.

MRS. WOODS -- Noncsense! You haven't lost him any such thing. All you have to do --

MUELLER -- Say no more. Mrs. Woods! Not another word, I beg. Do you mean to repeat your request to me to apologize to a man who said I did not know the [?] --

(Mrs. Woods puts her hands over her ears and runs from the room. Mueller smiles grimly and sits down before the fire. He pulls off his shoes, puts on his slippers, draws the tea table up and pours out his tea. Now and then he smells of his roses, in the meantime Mercy has been tyding the adjoining room. It is left and returned with a tea tray, and placed the slippers in front of the big chair. As she is finishing, Karl Schultze cuters. He shakes out his umbrella, and hangs up his hat and coat.)

SCHULTZE -- [?] that you Mignon? And did you bring me those wonderful roses? Ah, the wonder of the good God is in the roses -- and in the kindness of heart that made you bring them to a lonely man. Where did you get them, my dear?

MERCY (hanging her head a trifle) -- Oh, they were given to me by a friend. And I had so many -- four dozen -- only thing! So I brought you some, and I gave some to Herr Mueller. He has such a pleasant fire in his room. I do wish you would go in there and sit with him by his fire, the way you used to do. I can't take any comfort thinking of you sitting up here alone. it is just the same with mother. When we are down in the sitting room together, and it is so cheerful and bright, she says: "There's those two [?] men sitting up there smoking their pipes all alone!" And we're just dying to hear you play together again. If I could just hear you play the serenade --

SCHULTZE -- There, Mignon, there! Don't mention the serenade again. I shall not play the serenade ay more, at all, forever. You are a sweet maiden, and know nothing of sorrow, or the disappointments that one [?] in friends. There's that man I've lived with, traveled with, worked with, feasted with and starved with, and for [?] miserable criticism he leaves me! His temper is worse than his phrasing -- and I must say the way he phrased to that [?] in A major would have disgraced a beginner. He can't keep his instrument down. He wants to be spectacular all the time. I tried to show him that it was the violin that had to bring out the climax. But what is the use of talking to him? Serenade, Mignon? No, it will be a long, long time before you will hear us play the serenade together again -- a long, long time.

MERCY -- Well good night, Herr Schultze. You are going to stay in tonight, I suppose.

SCHULTZE -- Yes, I'm glad to say I am Why?

MERCY -- Oh, nothing. Only Herr Mueller has to go out.

SCHULTZE -- Yes, that's so. This is the night he rehearses the Lelderkrutz.

MERCY -- It's raining dreadfully.

SCHULTZE -- What of this, Mignon?

MERCY -- Nothing at all. Good night (Exit).

(Herr Mueller to his room, looks at his [water?], puts down his cup of tea, gently folds up his paper, combs his long, straight gray hair by running his hands through it two or three times, gets into his out-door garments, takes an arm full of music, which he carefully selects from his music cabinet and prepares to leave. Then he look s at his blazing [?], and toward the door which communicates with the room which Schultze occupies.)

MUELLER -- It's [?] a fire to go to waste. It wouldn't be speaking to him to knock on the door to let him know I am going out. (Hesitates a moment.) But I won't do it. A man who doesn't appreciate not any more than to say -- (exit, muttering to himself)

(Schultze hears him close his door behind him, and instinctively jumps up, seizes the umbrella, as if he would rush after him. Stops and looks at the umbrella a moment, and then sits down, scowling very much, lights his pipe, and begins [?] up his violin)

There is a sudden knock at the door, Schultze calls: 'Come in." Enter Mrs. Woods.)

MRS. WOODS -- Mercy would make me come up, Herr Schultze, to ask if you wouldn't come down and sit by our fire. We made up our minds that if Herr Mueller was so hard-hearted and stingy that he wouldn't ask you to, that we would.

SCHULTZE -- Hard-hearted, Mrs. Woods? I am bound to say that whatever the faults of Herr Mueller. I have never observed that he was hard-hearted.

MRS. WOODS -- I don't know, of course, how you Germans look at such things. But we Americans would call him manner than dirt. The way he went back on the alter all you had done for him makes me boiling mad.

SCHULTZE -- My dear madam, you must permit we to explain that he has done everything for me, and I have done nothing for him. Why are we together in Germany in '48. That was when we were young. He was with me at the university. We belonged to the same society. He was a hot socialist, and so was I. We made our minds to incur together the dangers attending a blow struck for Germany -- and for liberty, madam. Those were days worth talking about -- days to remember. Mueller was magnificent. He was a hero. I was his slave. I did whatever he told me. As well, nothing came of our struggle. We were banished. I was a poor [?]. He had money. he brought me to this country, and we have lived and studied together ever since.

MRS. WOODS -- lie may have done that, but that is no reason why he should go back on you now, and leave you sitting here alone. For the old men like you to fall out over a woman --

SCHULTZE -- A woman, Mrs. Woods?

MRS. WOODS -- Yes. Didn't he even mention her name to me -- Ann somebody, I have forgotten who.

SCHULTZE -- We fell out over an andante, Mrs. Woods.

MRS. WOODS -- Yes, that's it. Ann Dante! Now the idea! Of course I don't know her, and she may be a very nice woman. But is she worth having two old men get mad about? You don't mind me calling you old? I'm old myself.

SCHULTZE (sighing) -- Yes, Mrs. Woods, we're all getting old together. Old, and very lonely.

MRS. WOODS -- Well, you may be lonely, but I can't say that I am. No one could be lonely and have Mercy around.

(The voice of Mercy is heard without)

MERCY -- Oh, Herr Mueller! You back already? What was the matter? (They appear.)

MUELLER (in an irritable tone) -- That Liederkranz has no more enthusiasm! A little rain [?] them [?] off -- not a soprano there and only two tenors. I said to them: "Go to your homes. What you do is an insult to music. I will not teach such indifferent ones. Go to your homes."

SCHULTZE (sympathetically, to Mrs. Woods) -- The pigs! They appreciate nothing!

MUELLER (to Mercy) -- When a man has nothing left but his art, and that brings him only disappointment, he has had about enough of life. (Enters his room. He is dripping wet, and sits down to dry himself before the fire. Mercy brings him dry slippers and dressing gown.)

MERCY -- It is dreadful for you to get so wet. You must get your an umbrella tomorrow.

MUELLER -- Oh, yes, Miss Mercy, that is very well to say. But we musicians never have enough money to buy an umbrella when it [?]. When we have money we spend it, and then there is nothing left for a rainy day -- not even enough money to buy an umbrella wish.

MERCY -- Oh, yes, I know how you spend your money. That poor little Fraulein Paula told me how you paid her doctor's bills.

MUELLER (grossly) -- You must not talk too much, madchen. It is not proper for a young girl.

MERCY -- Will you take some cough syrup if I get it?

MUELLER -- Cough syrup? No! What do I want with cough syrup? My heart is broken with that perverse generation, and you offer me cough syrup. Go down to your mother, like a good girl. I am very sad tonight. I want to be alone.

(Mercy goes out. Schultze, who has listened to all of this, walks back and forth through the room, stopping every now to look at the door that divides the rooms. He motions Mrs. Woods to leave. She goes out. Once he picks up the umbrella and looks at it Then he sets it down and resumes his walking up and down the room. Mueller, meantime, has become dry and warm by his bright fire).

MUELLER -- it must be very dull in a room without a fire. There's nothing like the creature comforts. A man may think there is nothing worth living for, but when he is warm and has had he [?], it is hard to keep from enjoying life, even if one is friendless. Friendless!

(He gets up and also begins [?] the floor. Finally he sits down at the piano and runs his fingers over the keys. Little by little he falls into the melody of Schubert's serenade. Schultze listens, starts, listens again, and rushes for his violin, which he takes from the case, and begins playing the serenade in harmony with Mueller. Mercy softly enters Mueller's room and opens the door between the two apartments. Mrs. Woods, wiping her eyes with her apron, appears to Schultze's room, and as she does so the two men leave their instruments, and, meeting in Mueller's room before the fire, throw themselves in each other's arms.)

[?]

SCIENTIFIC MISCELLANY.

The New Lake in India -- A robort on the great Himalayan landslip of September, 1803, has been prepared by Mr. T. H. Holland of the Indian geological survey. The slip occurred at Gohna, British Garhwal This village is on the river Birah Gauga, which flows northward into the Alaknanda one of the principal tributaries of the Ganzes. The bed of the British Gauga, sloping about 24 degrees, is at Gohan 4 600 feet above the sea level, and is the bottom of a narrow gorge, with steep, and sometimes precipitous sides. The river basin, twenty miles long and nine miles wide is bounded on the north and cast by a snow-clad ridge rising to 21,286 feet from whose snow much of the water of the river is derived The area of the basin east of Gohna, and now draining into the new lake, is ninety square miles. On the north side of the river the mountain spur called Maithana by the villagers rose almost vertically to over 11,000 feet high, and near the close of the rainy season, on September 6 and the two following days, this was projected across the river gorge in a series of falls, accompanied with deafening noise and clouds of dust that whitened the ground and trees for miles around. The mass of broken material that fell stretches two miles along the river valley and rests against the cliff of similar rocks on the opposite side, a mile away. In March 42d acres of this dam was still exposed, but the water was rapidly rising over it on the eastern side and had already formed a lake covering 370 acres. Mr. Holland concluded that this lake would overflow the dam, at a height of 5850 feet above sea level, about the middle of August and that, if the channel then cut through the mud should not exceed 100 feet in depth, an ordinarily permanent lake three and one-fourth miles long and one and one-fourth wide would be preserved. At several places in the Himalayas lakes have been similarly formed in recent times.

The experiments made in France and other European countries with tree leaves as food for cattle seem to have resulted very satisfactorily. The leaves of the hazel, aspen, ash, elm and willow are found to be suitable, and are collected, dried, and stored like hay. Each