"GOOD-NIGHT, BABETTE!" "Si vieillesse pouvait !—" SCENE. A small neat Room. In a high Voltaire Chair sits a white-haired old Gentleman. MONSIEUR VIEUXBOIS. BABETTE. M. VIEUXBOIS (turning querulously). DAY of my life! Where can she get? BABETTE! I say! BABETTE!-BABETTE! BABETTE (entering hurriedly). Coming M'sieu'! If M'sieu' speaks M. VIEUXBOIS. Where have you been? ВАВЕТТЕ. Why, M'sieu' knows: April!... Ville d'Avray!... Ma'am'selle Rose! M. VIEUXBOIS. Ah! I am old,-and I forget. Was the place growing green, BABETTE? BABETTE. But of a greenness !—yes, M'sieu' ! And then the sky so blue! so blue! And when I dropped my immortelle, How the birds sang! (Lifting her apron to her eyes.) This poor Ma'am'selle! M. VIEUXBOIS. You're a good girl, BABETTE, but she, She was an Angel, verily. Sometimes I think I see her yet Stand smiling by the cabinet ; And once, I know, she peeped and laughed Betwixt the curtains... Where's the draught? (She gives him a cup.) Now I shall sleep, I think, BABETTE ;— Sing me your Norman chansonnette. BABETTE (sings). "Once at the Angelus (Ere I was dead), Angels all glorious Came to my Bed; Angels in blue and white Crowned on the Head." M. VIEUXBOIS (drowsily) "She was an Angel ".. "Once she laughed " What, was I dreaming? ... Where's the draught? BABETTE (showing the empty cup). The draught, M'sieu'? M. VIEUXBOIS. How I forget! I am so old! But sing, BABETTE! BABETTE (sings). "One was the Friend I left Stark in the Snow; One was the Wife that died Long,-long ago; One was the Love I lost.. How could she know?" M. VIEUXBOIS (murmuring). Ah, PAUL!... old PAUL! EULALIE too! And ROSE... And O! "the sky so blue!" BABETTE (sings). "One had my Mother's eyes, One had my Father's face; One was a Child: All of them bent to me,- (He is asleep!) M. VIEUXBOIS (almost inaudibly). "How I forget!" "I am so old!" ... 66 Good-night, BABETTE!" THE DRAMA OF THE DOCTOR'S WINDOW IN THREE ACTS, WITH A PROLOGUE "A tedious brief scene of young Pyramus, And his love Thisbe; very tragical mirth." -MIDSUMMER-Night's Dream. PROLOGUE. "WELL, I must wait!" The Doctor's room, Where I used this expression, Wore the severe official gloom Attached to that profession; Rendered severer by a bald And skinless Gladiator, Whose raw robustness first appalled The entering spectator. |