To those who are conversant with the works of Maeterlinck it may seem rather far-fetched to discuss him from the point of view of revolutionary and social significance. Above all, Maeterlinck is the portrayer of the remote, the poet of symbols: therefore it may seem out of place to bring him down to earth, to simplify him, or to interpret his revolutionary spirit. To some extent these objections have considerable weight; but on the other hand, if one keeps in mind that only those who go to the remote are capable of understanding the obvious, one will readily see how very significant Maeterlinck is as a revolutionizing factor. Besides, we have Maeterlinck's own conception of the significance of the revolutionary spirit. In a very masterly article called "The Social Revolution," he discusses the objection on the part of the conservative section of society to the introduction of revolutionary methods. He says that they would like us to "go slow"; that they object to the use of violence and the forcible overthrow of the evils of society. And Maeterlinck answers in these significant words:

"We are too ready to forget that the headsmen of misery are less noisy, less theatrical, but infinitely more numerous, more cruel and active than those of the most terrible revolutions."

Maeterlinck realizes that there are certain grievances in society, iniquitous conditions which demand immediate solution, and that if we do not solve them with the readiest and quickest methods at our command, they will react upon society and upon life a great deal more terribly than even the most terrible revolutions. No wonder, then, that his works were put under the ban by the Catholic Church which forever sees danger in light and emancipation. Surely if Maeterlinck were not primarily the spokesman of truth, he would be embraced by the Catholic Church.

MONNA VANNA

In "Monna Vanna" Maeterlinck gives a wonderful picture of the new woman—not the new woman as portrayed in the newspapers, but the new woman as a reborn, regenerated spirit; the woman who has emancipated herself from her narrow outlook upon life, and detached herself from the confines of the home; the woman, in short, who has become race-conscious and therefore understands that she is a unit in the great ocean of life, and that she must take her place as an independent factor in order to rebuild and remold life. In proportion as she learns to become race-conscious, does she become a factor in the reconstruction of society, valuable to herself, to her children, and to the race.

Pisa is subdued by the forces of Florence; it is beaten and conquered. The city is in danger of being destroyed, and the people exposed to famine and annihilation. There is only one way of saving Pisa. Marco Colonna, the father of the Commander of Pisa, brings the ultimatum of the enemy:

Marco. Know, then, that I saw Prinzivalle and spoke with him.... I thought to find some barbarian, arrogant and heavy, always covered with blood or plunged in drunken stupor; at best, the madman they have told us of, whose spirit was lit up at times, upon the battlefield, by dazzling flashes of brilliance, coming no man knows whence. I thought to meet the demon of combat, blind, unreasoning, vain and cruel, faithless and dissolute.... I found a man who bowed before me as a loving disciple bows before the master. He is lettered, eager for knowledge, and obedient to the voice of wisdom.... He loves not war; his smile speaks of understanding and gentle humanity. He seeks the reason of passions and events. He looks into his own heart; he is endowed with conscience and sincerity, and it is against his will that he serves a faithless State.... I have told you that Prinzivalle seems wise, that he is humane and reasonable. But where is the wise man that hath not his private madness, the good man to whom no monstrous idea has ever come? On one side is reason and pity and justice; on the other—ah! there is desire and passion and what you will—the insanity into which we all fall at times. I have fallen into it myself, and shall, belike, again—so have you. Man is made in that fashion. A grief which should not be within the experience of man is on the point of touching you.... Hearken: this great convoy, the victuals that I have seen, wagons running over with corn, others full of wine and fruit; flocks of sheep and herds of cattle, enough to feed a city for months; all these tuns of powder and bars of lead, with which you may vanquish Florence and make Pisa lift her head—all this will enter the city to-night, ... if you send in exchange, to give her up to Prinzivalle until to-morrow's dawn, ... for he will send her back when the first faint gray shows in the sky, ... only, he exacts that, in sign of victory and submission, she shall come alone, and her cloak for all her covering....

Guido. Who? Who shall thus come?

Marco. Giovanna.

Guido. My wife? Vanna?

Marco. Ay, your Vanna.

Guido Colonna, in the consciousness that the woman belongs to him, that no man may even look, with desire, upon her dazzling beauty, resents this mortal insult. He is willing that all the other women should face danger, that the little children of Pisa should be exposed to hunger and destruction, rather than that he give up his possession. But Monna Vanna does not hesitate. When she is before the issue of saving her people, she does not stop to consider. She goes into the enemy's tent, as a child might go, without consciousness of self, imbued solely with the impulse to save her people.

The meeting of Monna Vanna and Prinzivalle is an exquisite interpretation of love—the sweetness, purity, and fragrance of Prinzivalle's love for the woman of his dream—the one he had known when she was but a child, and who remained an inspiring vision all through his career. He knows he cannot reach her; he also knows that he will be destroyed by the political intriguers of Florence, and he stakes his all on this one step to satisfy the dream of his life to see Vanna and in return to save Pisa.

Prinzivalle. Had there come ten thousand of you into my tent, all clad alike, all equally fair, ten thousand sisters whom even their mother would not know apart, I should have risen, should have taken your hand, and said, "This is she!" Is it not strange that a beloved image can live thus in a man's heart? For yours lived so in mine that each day it changed as in real life—the image of to-day replaced that of yesterday—it blossomed out, it became always fairer; and the years adorned it with all that they add to a child that grows in grace and beauty. But when I saw you again, it seemed to me at first that my eyes deceived me. My memories were so fair and so fond—but they had been too slow and too timid—they had not dared to give you all the splendor which appeared so suddenly to dazzle me. I was as a man that recalled to mind a flower he had but seen in passing through a garden on a gray day, and should be suddenly confronted with a hundred thousand as fair in a field bathed with sunshine. I saw once more your hair, your brow, your eyes, and I found all the soul of the face I had adored—but how its beauty shames that which I had treasured in silence through endless days, through years whose only light was a memory that had taken too long a road and found itself outshone by the reality!... Ah! I knew not too well what I meant to do. I felt that I was lost—and I desired to drag with me all I could.... And I hated you, because of the love.... Yes, I should have gone to the end had it not been you.... Yet any other would have seemed odious to me—you yourself would have had to be other than you are.... I lose my reason when I think of it.... One word would have been enough that was different from your words—one gesture that was not yours—the slightest thing would have inflamed my hate and let loose the monster. But when I saw you, I saw in that same moment that it was impossible.

Vanna. I felt a change, too.... I marveled that I could speak to you as I have spoken since the first moment.... I am silent by nature—I have never spoken thus to any man, unless it be to Marco, Guido's father.... And even with him it is not the same. He has a thousand dreams that take up all his mind, ... and we have talked but a few times. The others have always a desire in their eyes that will not suffer one to tell them that one loves them and would fain know what they have in their hearts. In your eyes, too, a longing burns; but it is not the same—it does not affright me nor fill me with loathing. I felt at once that I knew you before I remembered that I had ever seen you....

Vanna, awed by the character and personality of this despised and hated outlaw, pleads with him to come with her to Pisa under the protection of herself and her husband. She is sure that he will be safe with them, and that he will be hailed as the redeemer of the people of Pisa. Like innocent children they walk to their doom.

Vanna is honored by the people whom she has saved, but scorned by her husband who, like the true male, does not credit her story.

Vanna. Hear me, I say! I have never lied—but to-day, above all days, I tell the deepest truth, the truth that can be told but once and brings life or death.... Hearken, Guido, then—and look upon me, if you have never known me until this hour, the first and only hour when you have it in your power to love me as I would be loved. I speak in the name of our life, of all that I am, of all that you are to me.... Be strong enough to believe that which is incredible. This man has spared my honor.... He had all power—I was given over to him. Yet he has not touched me—I have issued from his tent as I might from my brother's house.... I gave him one only kiss upon the brow—and he gave it me again.

Guido. Ah, that was what you were to tell us—that was the miracle! Ay, already, at the first words, I divined something beneath them that I understood not.... It passed me like a flash—I took no heed of it.... But I see now that I must look more closely. So, when he had you in his tent, alone, with a cloak for all your covering, all night long, you say he spared you?... Am I a man to believe that the stars are fragments of hellebore, or that one may drop something into a well and put out the moon?... What! a man desires you so utterly that he will betray his country, stake all that he has for one single night, ruin himself forever, and do it basely, do such a deed as no man ever thought to do before him, and make the world uninhabitable to himself forever! And this man has you there in his tent, alone and defenseless, and he has but this single night that he has bought at such a price—and he contents himself with a kiss upon the brow, and comes even hither to make us give him credence! No, let us reason fairly and not too long mock at misfortune. If he asked but that, what need was there that he should plunge a whole people into sadness, sink me in an abyss of misery such that I have come from it crushed and older by ten years? Ah! Had he craved but a kiss upon the brow, he might have saved us without torturing us so! He had but to come like a god to our rescue.... But a kiss upon the brow is not demanded and prepared for after his fashion.... The truth is found in our cries of anguish and despair....

It is only at this psychological moment, a moment that sometimes changes all our conceptions, all our thoughts, our very life, that Monna Vanna feels the new love for Prinzivalle stirring in her soul, a love that knows no doubt. The conception of such a love is revolutionary in the scope of its possibilities—a love that is pregnant with the spirit of daring, of freedom, that lifts woman out of the ordinary and inspires her with the strength and joy of molding a new and free race.

EDMOND ROSTAND

CHANTECLER

In view of the progress the modern drama has made as an interpreter of social ideas and portrayer of the human struggle against internal and external barriers, it is difficult to say what the future may bring in the way of great dramatic achievement. So far, however, there is hardly anything to compare with "Chantecler" in philosophic depth and poetic beauty.

Chantecler is the intense idealist, whose mission is light and truth. His soul is aglow with deep human sympathies, and his great purpose in life is to dispel the night. He keeps aloof from mediocrity; indeed, he has little knowledge of his immediate surroundings. Like all great visionaries, Chantecler is human, "all too human"; therefore subject to agonizing soul depressions and doubts. Always, however, he regains confidence and strength when he is close to the soil; when he feels the precious sap of the earth surging through his being. At such times he feels the mysterious power that gives him strength to proclaim the truth, to call forth the golden glory of the day.

The pheasant hen is the eternal female, bewitchingly beautiful, but self-centered and vain. True to her destiny, she must possess the man and is jealous of everything that stands between her and him she loves. She therefore employs every device to kill Chantecler's faith in himself, for, as she tells him, "You can be all in all to me, but nothing to the dawn."

The blackbird is the modernist who has become blasÉ, mentally and spiritually empty. He is a cynic and scoffer; without principle or sincerity himself, he sees only small and petty intentions in everybody else.

Patou, true and stanch, is the symbol of honest conviction and simplicity of soul. He loathes the blackbird because he sees in him the embodiment of a shallow, superficial modernity, a modernity barren of all poetic vision, which aims only at material success and tinseled display, without regard for worth, harmony or peace.

The peacock is the overbearing, conceited, intellectual charlatan; the spokesman of our present-day culture; the idle prater of "art for art's sake." As such he sets the style and pace for the idle pursuits of an idle class.

The guinea hen is none other than our most illustrious society lady. Sterile of mind and empty of soul, she flits from one social function to another, taking up every fad, clinging to the coattails of every newcomer, provided he represent station and prestige. She is the slave of fashion, the imitator of ideas, the silly hunter after effect—in short, the parasite upon the labor and efforts of others.

The night birds are the ignorant, stupid maintainers of the old. They detest the light because it exposes their mediocrity and stagnation. They hate Chantecler because, as the old owl remarks, "Simple torture it is to hear a brazen throat forever reminding you of what you know to be only too true!" This is a crime mediocrity never forgives, and it conspires to kill Chantecler.

The woodpecker is our very learned college professor. Dignified and important, he loudly proclaims the predigested food of his college as the sole source of all wisdom.

The toads represent the cringing, slimy hangers-on, the flunkies and lickspittles who toady for the sake of personal gain.

"Chantecler," then, is a scathing arraignment of the emptiness of our so-called wise and cultured, of the meanness of our conventional lies, the petty jealousies of the human breed in relation to each other. At the same time "Chantecler" characterizes the lack of understanding for, and appreciation of, the ideal and the idealists—the mob spirit, whether on top or at the bottom, using the most cruel and contemptible methods to drag the idealist down; to revile and persecute him—aye, even to kill him—for the unpardonable sin of proclaiming the ideal. They cannot forgive Chantecler for worshiping the sun:

Chantecler.
Blaze forth in glory!...
O thou that driest the tears of the meanest among weeds
And dost of a dead flower make a living butterfly—
Thy miracle, wherever almond-trees
Shower down the wind their scented shreds,
Dead petals dancing in a living swarm—
I worship thee, O Sun! whose ample light,
Blessing every forehead, ripening every fruit,
Entering every flower and every hovel,
Pours itself forth and yet is never less,
Still spending and unspent—like mother's love!

I sing of thee, and will be thy high priest,
Who disdainest not to glass thy shining face
In the humble basin of blue suds,
Or see the lightning of thy last farewell
Reflected in an humble cottage pane!

...

Glory to thee in the vineyards! Glory to thee in the fields!
Glory among the grass and on the roofs,
In eyes of lizards and on wings of swans,—
Artist who making splendid the great things
Forgets not to make exquisite the small!
'Tis thou that, cutting out a silhouette,
To all thou beamest on dost fasten this dark twin,
Doubling the number of delightful shapes,
Appointing to each thing its shadow,
More charming often than itself.

I praise thee, Sun! Thou sheddest roses on the air,
Diamonds on the stream, enchantment on the hill;
A poor dull tree thou takest and turnest to green rapture,
O Sun, without whose golden magic—things
Would be no more than what they are!

In the atmosphere of persecution and hatred Chantecler continues to hope and to work for his sublime mission of bringing the golden day. But his passion for the pheasant hen proves his Waterloo. It is through her that he grows weak, disclosing his secret. Because of her he attends the silly five o'clock function at the guinea hen's, and is involved in a prize fight. His passion teaches him to understand life and the frailties of his fellow creatures. He learns the greatest of all truths,—that "it is the struggle for, rather than the attainment of, the ideal, which must forever inspire the sincere, honest idealist." Indeed, it is life which teaches Chantecler that if he cannot wake the dawn, he must rouse mankind to greet the sun.

Chantecler finds himself in a trying situation when he comes into the gathering at the guinea hen's five o'clock tea, to meet the pompous, overbearing cocks representing the various governments. When he arrives in the midst of these distinguished society people, he is plied with the query, "How do you sing? Do you sing the Italian school or the French school or the German school?" Poor Chantecler, in the simplicity of his idealism, replies, "I don't know how I sing, but I know why I sing." Why need the chanteclers know how they sing? They represent the truth, which needs no stylish clothes or expensive feathers. That is the difference between truth and falsehood. Falsehood must deck herself out beyond all semblance of nature and reality.

Chantecler. I say ... that these resplendent gentlemen are manufactured wares, the work of merchants with highly complex brains, who to fashion a ridiculous chicken have taken a wing from that one, a topknot from this. I say that in such Cocks nothing remains of the true Cock. They are Cocks of shreds and patches, idle bric-a-brac, fit to figure in a catalogue, not in a barnyard with its decent dunghill and its dog. I say that those befrizzled, beruffled, bedeviled Cocks were never stroked and cherished by Nature's maternal hand.... And I add that the whole duty of a Cock is to be an embodied crimson cry! And when a Cock is not that, it matters little that his comb be shaped like a toadstool, or his quills twisted like a screw, he will soon vanish and be heard of no more, having been nothing but a variety of a variety!

The Game Cock appears. He greets Chantecler with the announcement that he is the Champion fighter, that he has killed so and so many Cocks in one day and an equal number on other occasions. Chantecler replies simply, "I have never killed anything. But as I have at different times succored, defended, protected this one and that, I might perhaps be called, in my fashion, brave."

The fight begins. Chantecler is wounded and about to succumb, when suddenly all the guests present rush to Chantecler for protection: the common enemy, the Hawk is seen to approach. Chantecler mistakes the cowardice of those who come to seek his aid, for friendship; but the moment the danger is over, the crowd again circles around the fighters, inciting the Game Cock to kill Chantecler. But at the critical moment the Game Cock mortally wounds himself with his own spurs, and is jeered and driven off the scene by the same mob that formerly cheered him on. Chantecler, weak and exhausted from loss of blood, disillusioned and stung to the very soul, follows the pheasant hen to the Forest.

Soon he finds himself a henpecked husband: he may not crow to his heart's content any more, he may not wake the sun, for his lady love is jealous. The only time he can crow is when her eyes are closed in sleep.

But leave it to the pheasant hen to ferret out a secret. Overhearing Chantecler's conversation with the woodpecker, she is furious. "I will not let the sun defraud me of my love," she cries. But Chantecler replies, "There is no great love outside of the shadow of the ideal." She makes use of her beauty and charm to win him from the sun. She embraces him and pleads, "Come to my soft bosom. Why need you bother about the sun?"

Chantecler hears the nightingale and, like all great artists, he recognizes her wonderful voice, her inspiring powers compared with which his own must seem hard and crude. Suddenly a shot is heard, and the little bird falls dead to the ground. Chantecler is heart-broken. And as he mourns the sweet singer, the dawn begins to break. The pheasant hen covers him with her wing, to keep him from seeing the sun rise, and then mocks him because the sun has risen without his crowing. The shock is terrible to poor Chantecler, yet in his desperation he gives one tremendous cock-a-doodle-do.

"Why are you crowing?" the hen asks.

"As a warning to myself, for thrice have I denied the thing I love."

Chantecler is in despair. But now he hears another Nightingale, more silvery and beautiful than the first. "Learn, comrade, this sorrowful and reassuring fact, that no one, Cock of the morning or evening nightingale, has quite the song of his dreams."

A wonderful message, for there must always be "in the soul a faith so faithful that it comes back even after it has been slain." It Is vital to understand that it is rather the consciousness that though we cannot wake the dawn, we must prepare the people to greet the rising sun.

BRIEUX

DAMAGED GOODS

In the preface to the English edition of "Damaged Goods," George Bernard Shaw relates a story concerning Lord Melbourne, in the early days of Queen Victoria. When the cabinet meeting threatened to break up in confusion, Lord Melbourne put his back to the door and said: "Gentlemen, we can tell the house the truth or we can tell it a lie. I don't give a damn which it is. All I insist on is that we shall all tell the same lie, and you shall not leave the room until you have settled what it is to be."

This seems to characterize the position of our middle-class morality to-day. Whether a thing be right or wrong, we are all to express the same opinion on the subject. All must agree on the same lie, and the lie upon which all agree, more than on any other, is the lie of purity, which must be kept up at all costs.

How slow our moralists move is best proved by the fact that although the great scientist Neisser had discovered, as far back as 1879, that supposedly insignificant venereal afflictions are due to a malignant micro-organism often disastrous not only to the immediate victim, but also to those who come in touch with him, the subject is still largely tabooed and must not be discussed.

To be sure, there is a small contingent of men and women who realize the necessity of a frank discussion of the very important matter of venereal disease. But unfortunately they are attempting to drive out the devil with fire. They are enlightening the public as to the gravity of gonorrhea and syphilis, but are implanting an evil by no means less harmful, namely, the element of fear. The result often is that the victims who contract an infection are as little capable of taking care of themselves now as in the past when they knew little about the subject.

Brieux is among the few who treats the question in a frank manner, showing that the most dangerous phase of venereal disease is ignorance and fear, and that if treated openly and intelligently, it is perfectly curable. Brieux also emphasizes the importance of kindness and consideration for those who contract the affliction, since it has nothing to do with what is commonly called evil, immorality, or impurity.

Therein lies the superiority of "Damaged Goods" to most scientific treatises. Without lacking logic and clarity, it has greater humanity and warmth.

But "Damaged Goods" contains more than an exposÉ of venereal disease. It touches upon the whole of our social life. It points out the cold-blooded indifference of the rich toward those who do not belong to their class, to the poor, the workers, the disinherited whom they sacrifice without the slightest compunction on the altar of their own comforts. Moreover, the play also treats of the contemptible attitude towards love not backed by property or legal sanction. In short, it uncovers and exposes not only sexual disease but that which is even more terrible—our social disease, our social syphilis.

George Dupont, the son of wealthy people is informed by a specialist that he has contracted a venereal disease of a most serious nature; but that with patience and time he will be cured. Dupont is crushed by the news, and decides to blow out his brains. His only regret is that he cannot in the least account for his trouble.

George. I'm not a rake, Doctor. My life might be held up as an example to all young men. I assure you, no one could possibly be more prudent, no one. See here; supposing I told you that in all my life I have only had two mistresses, what would you say to that?

Doctor. That would have been enough to bring you here.

George. No, Doctor. Not one of those two. No one in the world has dreaded this so much as I have; no one has taken such infinite precautions to avoid it. My first mistress was the wife of my best friend. I chose her on account of him; and him, not because I cared most for him, but because I knew he was a man of the most rigid morals, who watched his wife jealously and didn't let her go about forming imprudent connections. As for her, I kept her in absolute terror of this disease. I told her that almost all men were taken with it, so that she mightn't dream of being false to me. My friend died in my arms. That was the only thing that could have separated me from her. Then I took up with a young seamstress.... Well, this was a decent girl with a family in needy circumstances to support. Her grandmother was an invalid, and there was an ailing father and three little brothers. It was by my means that they all lived.... I told her and I let the others know that if she played me false I should leave her at once. So then they all watched her for me. It became a regular thing that I should spend Sunday with them, and in that sort of way I was able to give her a lift up. Church-going was a respectable kind of outing for her. I rented a pew for them and her mother used to go with her to church; they liked seeing their name engraved on the card. She never left the house alone. Three months ago, when the question of my marriage came up, I had to leave her.

Doctor. You were very happy, why did you want to change?

George. I wanted to settle down. My father was a notary, and before his death he expressed a wish that I should marry my cousin. It was a good match; her dowry will help to get me a practice. Besides, I simply adore her. She's fond of me, too. I had everything one could want to make my life happy. And then a lot of idiots must give me a farewell dinner and make me gad about with them. See what has come of it! I haven't any luck, I've never had any luck! I know fellows who lead the most racketty life: nothing happens to them, the beasts! But I—for a wretched lark—what is there left for a leper like me? My future is ruined, my whole life poisoned. Well then, isn't it better for me to clear out of it? Anyway, I shan't suffer any more. You see now, no one could be more wretched than I am.

The doctor explains to him that there is no need for despair, but that he must postpone his marriage if he does not wish to ruin his wife and possibly make her sterile for life. It is imperative especially because of the offspring, which is certain to be syphilitic.

Doctor. Twenty cases identical with yours have been carefully observed—from the beginning to the end. Nineteen times—you hear, nineteen times in twenty—the woman was contaminated by her husband. You think that the danger is negligible: you think you have the right to let your wife take her chance, as you said, of being one of the exceptions for which we can do nothing! Very well then; then you shall know what you are doing. You shall know what sort of a disease it is that your wife will have five chances per cent. of contracting without so much as having her leave asked. ... But there is not only your wife,—there are her children, your children, whom you may contaminate, too. It is in the name of those innocent little ones that I appeal to you; it is the future of the race that I am defending.

But George Dupont will not postpone the marriage for several years. He would have to give an explanation, break his word, and lose his inheritance,—things infinitely more important than any consideration for the girl he "adores" or for their children, should they have any. In short, he is actuated by the morality of the bourgeoisie: the silly conception of honor, the dread of public opinion and, above all, the greed for property.

The second act is laid at the home of George Dupont. George and his wife Henriette are childishly happy, except for the regret that their marriage could not have taken place six months earlier because poor George had been declared consumptive. How stupid of doctors to suspect the healthy strong George Dupont of consumption! But, then, "all doctors are stupid." But now that they are together, nothing shall part them in their great happiness, and especially in their great love for their baby. True, a little cloud obscures their sunny horizon. The baby is not very strong; but with the care and devotion of the grandmother, out in the country air, it is sure to recover.

The grandmother unexpectedly arrives, announcing that she has brought the baby back to town: it is very ill and she has consulted a specialist who has promised to come at once to examine the child. Presently the doctor arrives. He insists that the wet nurse be dismissed immediately, as the child would infect her and she in return would infect her own husband and baby. Madame Dupont is scandalized. What, leave her precious grandchild! Rob him of the milk he needs!

Mme. Dupont. If there is one way to save its life, it is to give it every possible attention, and you want me to treat it in a way that you doctors condemn even for healthy children. You think I will let her die like that! Oh, I shall take good care she does not! Neglect the one single thing that can save her! It would be criminal! As for the nurse, we will indemnify her. We will do everything in our power, everything but that.

Doctor. This is not the first time I have found myself in this situation, and I must begin by telling you that parents who have refused to be guided by my advice have invariably repented of it most bitterly.... You propose to profit by her ignorance and her poverty. Besides, she could obtain the assistance of the court.... You can convince yourself. In one or two cases the parents have been ordered to pay a yearly pension to the nurse; in the others sums of money varying from three to eight thousand francs.

Mme. Dupont. If we had to fight an action, we should retain the very best lawyer on our side. Thank heaven we are rich enough. No doubt he would make it appear doubtful whether the child hadn't caught this disease from the nurse, rather than the nurse from the child.

Indeed, what matters a peasant woman! They are so numerous. In vain the doctor tries to convince Mme. Dupont that it is not a question of money. It is a question of humanity, of decency; he would not and could not be a party to such a crime.

After the doctor leaves to examine the child, Mme. Dupont and her worthy son clinch the bargain with the unsuspecting and ignorant servant. They tell her that the baby has a cold which it might communicate to her. The poor peasant girl had lived in the cold all her life, and as she justly says: "We of the country are not as delicate as the Parisian ladies." She realizes that a thousand francs would mean a great fortune to her, and that it would help her people to pay the mortgage and become independent. She consents to stay and signs away her health.

The doctor returns with the dreaded news that the child has congenital syphilis. He informs them that with care and patience the child might be cured, but that it will have to be put on bottle milk, because otherwise it would be disastrous to the nurse. When he is told that the nurse has consented to remain, he grows indignant, declaring:

"You must not ask me to sacrifice the health of a young and strong woman to that of a sickly infant. I will be no party to giving this woman a disease that would embitter the lives of her whole family, and almost certainly render her sterile. Besides, I cannot even do it from a legal standpoint.... If you do not consent to have the child fed by hand, I shall either speak to the nurse or give up the case."

But there is no need for the doctor to interfere. Fortunately for the servant, she discovers the miserable transaction. She learns from the butler the real condition of the child, and announces to the Duponts that she must refuse to stay. "I know your brat isn't going to live. I know it's rotten through and through because its father's got a beastly disease that he caught from some woman of the streets."

At this terrible moment the unsuspecting, light-headed and light-hearted mother, Henriette, arrives. She overhears the horrible news and falls screaming to the floor.

The last act takes place in the hospital—the refuge of the unfortunate victims of poverty, ignorance and false morality. M. Loche, the Deputy, is announced. The doctor is overjoyed because he believes that the representative of the people comes to inform himself of the causes of the widespread misery. But he is mistaken. M. Loche is the father-in-law of George Dupont. He wants to secure the signature of the doctor as evidence in the divorce sought by his daughter.

Doctor. I regret that I am unable to furnish you with such a certificate.... The rule of professional secrecy is absolute. And I may add that even were I free, I should refuse your request. I should regret having helped you to obtain a divorce. It would be in your daughter's own interest that I should refuse. You ask me for a certificate in order to prove to the court that your son-in-law has contracted syphilis? You do not consider that in doing so you will publicly acknowledge that your daughter has been exposed to the infection. Do you suppose that after that your daughter is likely to find a second husband?... Do you think that this poor little thing has not been unlucky enough in her start in life? She has been blighted physically. You wish besides indelibly to stamp her with the legal proof of congenital syphilis.

Loche. Then what am I to do?

Doctor. Forgive.... When the marriage was proposed you doubtless made inquiries concerning your future son-in-law's income; you investigated his securities; you satisfied yourself as to his character. You only omitted one point, but it was the most important of all: you made no inquiries concerning his health.

Loche. No, I did not do that. It is not the custom.... I think a law should be passed.

Doctor. No, no! We want no new laws. There are too many already. All that is needed is for people to understand the nature of this disease rather better. It would soon become the custom for a man who proposed for a girl's hand to add to the other things for which he is asked a medical statement of bodily fitness, which would make it certain that he did not bring this plague into the family with him.... Well, there is one last argument which, since I must, I will put to you. Are you yourself without sin, that you are so relentless to others?

Loche. I have never had any shameful disease, sir.

Doctor. I was not asking you that. I was asking you if you had never exposed yourself to catching one. Ah, you see! Then it is not virtue that has saved you; it is luck. Few things exasperate me more than that term "shameful disease," which you used just now. This disease is like all other diseases: it is one of our afflictions. There is no shame in being wretched—even if one deserves to be so. Come, come, let us have a little plain speaking! I should like to know how many of these rigid moralists, who are so shocked with their middle-class prudery, that they dare not mention the name syphilis, or when they bring themselves to speak of it do so with expressions of every sort of disgust, and treat its victims as criminals, have never run the risk of contracting it themselves? It is those alone who have the right to talk. How many do you think there are? Four out of a thousand? Well, leave those four aside: between all the rest and those who catch the disease there is no difference but chance, and by heavens, those who escape won't get much sympathy from me: the others at least have paid their fine of suffering and remorse, while they have gone scot free! Let's have done, if you please, once for all with this sort of hypocrisy.

The doctor, who is not only a sincere scientist but also a humanitarian, realizes that as things are to-day no one is exempt from the possibility of contracting an infection; that those who are responsible for the spread of the disease are they who constantly excuse themselves with the inane "I did not know," as if ignorance were not the crime of all crimes. The doctor demonstrates to M. Loche a number of cases under his observation, all of them the result of ignorance and of poverty.

There is, for instance, the woman whose husband died of the disease. He "didn't know"; so he infected her. She, on the other hand, is poor and cannot afford the treatment she needs. A private physician is beyond her means, and she has too much pride to stand the indignities heaped upon the poor who are at the mercy of dispensaries and charity. Therefore she neglects her disease and perhaps is unconsciously instrumental in infecting others.

Then there is the man whose young son has contracted the disease. His father "didn't know," and therefore he did not inform his son, as a result of which the boy became half paralyzed.

Man. We are small trades-people; we have regularly bled ourselves in order to send him to college, and now—I only wish the same thing mayn't happen to others. It was at the very college gates that my poor boy was got hold of by one of these women. Is it right, sir, that that should be allowed? Aren't there enough police to prevent children of fifteen from being seduced like that? I ask, is it right?

The poor man, in his ignorance, did not know that "these women" are the most victimized, as demonstrated by the doctor himself in the case of the poor girl of the street. She was both ignorant and innocent when she found a place as domestic servant and was seduced by her master. Then she was kicked out into the street, and in her endless search for work found every door closed in her face. She was compelled to stifle her feeling of motherhood, to send her baby to a foundling asylum, and finally, in order to exist, become a street-walker. If in return she infected the men who came to her, including her erstwhile seducer, she was only paying back in a small measure what society had done to her,—the injury, the bitterness, the misery and tears heaped upon her by a cruel and self-satisfied world.

It is to be expected that a political representative of the people like Loche should suggest the same stereotyped measures as his predecessors: legal enactments, prosecution, imprisonment. But the doctor, a real social student, knows that "the true remedy lies in a change of our ways."

Doctor. Syphilis must cease to be treated like a mysterious evil, the very name of which cannot be pronounced.... People ought to be taught that there is nothing immoral in the act that reproduces life by means of love. But for the benefit of our children we organize round about it a gigantic conspiracy of silence. A respectable man will take his son and daughter to one of these grand music halls, where they will hear things of the most loathsome description; but he won't let them hear a word spoken seriously on the subject of the great act of love. The mystery and humbug in which physical facts are enveloped ought to be swept away and young men be given some pride in the creative power with which each one of us is endowed.

In other words, what we need is more general enlightenment, greater frankness and, above all, different social and economic conditions. The revolutionary significance of "Damaged Goods" consists in the lesson that not syphilis but the causes that lead to it are the terrible curse of society. Those who rant against syphilis and clamor for more laws, for marriage certificates, for registration and segregation, do not touch even the surface of the evil. Brieux is among the very few modern dramatists who go to the bottom of this question by insisting on a complete social and economic change, which alone can free us from the scourge of syphilis and other social plagues.

MATERNITY

Motherhood to-day is on the lips of every penny-a-liner, every social patchworker and political climber. It is so much prated about that one is led to believe that motherhood, in its present condition, is a force for good. It therefore required a free spirit combined with great dramatic power to tear the mask off the lying face of motherhood, that we may see that, whatever its possibilities in a free future, motherhood is to-day a sickly tree setting forth diseased branches. For its sake thousands of women are being sacrificed and children sent into a cold and barren world without the slightest provision for their physical and mental needs. It was left to Brieux to inscribe with letters of fire the crying shame of the motherhood of to-day.

Brignac, a provincial lawyer and an unscrupulous climber for political success, represents the typical pillar of society. He believes implicitly in the supremacy of God over the destiny of man. He swears by the State and the army, and cringes before the power of money. Naturally he is the champion of large families as essential to the welfare of society, and of motherhood, as the most sacred and sole function of woman.

He is the father of three children, all of whom are in a precarious condition. He resents the idea that society ought to take care of the children already in existence, rather than continue indiscriminately breeding more. Brignac himself wants more children. In vain his wife Lucie, weakened by repeated pregnancies, pleads with him for a respite.

Lucie. Listen, Julien, since we are talking about this, I wanted to tell you—I haven't had much leisure since our marriage. We have not been able to take advantage of a single one of your holidays. I really have a right to a little rest.... Consider, we have not had any time to know one another, or to love one another. Besides, remember that we already have to find dowries for three girls.

Brignac. I tell you this is going to be a boy.

Lucie. A boy is expensive.

Brignac. We are going to be rich!

Lucie. How?

Brignac. Luck may come in several ways. I may stay in the civil service and get promoted quickly. I may go back to the bar.... I am certain we shall be rich. After all, it's not much good your saying so, if I say yes.

Lucie. Evidently. My consent was asked for before I was given a husband, but my consent is not asked for before I am given a child.... This is slavery—yes, slavery. After all you are disposing of my health, my sufferings, my life—of a year of my existence, calmly, without consulting me.

Brignac. Do I do it out of selfishness? Do you suppose I am not a most unhappy husband all the time I have a future mother at my side instead of a loving wife?... A father is a man all the same.

Lucie. Rubbish! You evidently take me for a fool. I know what you do at those times.... Don't deny it. You must see that I know all about it.... Do you want me to tell you the name of the person you go to see over at Villeneuve, while I am nursing or "a future mother," as you call it? We had better say no more about it.

Brignac goes off to his political meeting to proclaim to his constituency the sacredness of motherhood,—the deepest and highest function of woman.

Lucie has a younger sister, Annette, a girl of eighteen. Their parents being dead, Lucie takes the place of the mother. She is passionately fond of her little sister and makes it her purpose to keep the girl sheltered and protected from the outside world. Annette arrives and announces with great enthusiasm that the son of the wealthy Bernins has declared his love and asked her to marry him, and that his mother, Mme. Bernin, is coming to talk the matter over with Lucie.

Mme. Bernin does arrive, but not for the purpose poor Annette had hoped. Rather is it to tell Lucie that her son cannot marry the girl. Oh, not because she isn't beautiful, pure or attractive. Indeed not! Mme. Bernin herself says that her son could not wish for a more suitable match. But, then, she has no money, and her son must succeed in the world. He must acquire social standing and position; that cannot be had without money. When Lucie pleads with her that after all the Bernins themselves had begun at the bottom, and that it did not prevent their being happy, Mme. Bernin replies:

No, no; we are not happy, because we have worn ourselves out hunting after happiness. We wanted to "get on," and we got on. But what a price we paid for it! First, when we were both earning wages, our life was one long drudgery of petty economy and meanness. When we set up on our own account, we lived in an atmosphere of trickery, of enmity, of lying; flattering the customers, and always in terror of bankruptcy. Oh, I know the road to fortune! It means tears, lies, envy, hate; one suffers—and one makes other people suffer. I have had to go through it: my children shan't. We've only had two children: we meant only to have one. Having two we had to be doubly hard upon ourselves. Instead of a husband and wife helping one another, we have been partners spying upon one another; calling one another to account for every little expenditure or stupidity; and on our very pillows disputing about our business. That's how we got rich; and now we can't enjoy our money because we don't know how to use it; and we aren't happy because our old age is made bitter by the memories and the rancor left by the old bad days; because we have suffered too much and hated too much. My children shall not go through this. I endured it that they might be spared.

Learning the price Mme. Bernin has paid for her wealth, we need not blame her for turning a deaf ear to the entreaties of Lucie in behalf of her sister. Neither can Lucie be held responsible for her stupidity in keeping her sister in ignorance until she was incapable of protecting herself when the occasion demanded. Poor Annette, one of the many offered up to the insatiable monster of ignorance and social convention!

When Annette is informed of the result of Mme. Bernin's visit, the girl grows hysterical, and Lucie learns that her little sister is about to become a mother. Under the pretext of love and marriage young, pampered Jaques Bernin has taken advantage of the girl's inexperience and innocence. In her despair Annette rushes out in search of her lover, only to be repelled by him in a vulgar and cruel manner. She then attempts suicide by trying to throw herself under the train which is to carry off her worthless seducer. She is rescued by the faithful nurse Catherine, and brought back to her anxious sister Lucie. Annette, in great excitement, relates:

Annette. You'll never guess what he said. He got angry, and he began to abuse me. He said he guessed what I was up to; that I wanted to make a scandal to force him to marry me—oh, he spared me nothing—to force him to marry me because he was rich. And when that made me furious, he threatened to call the police! I ought to have left him, run away, come home, oughtn't I? But I couldn't believe it of him all at once, like that! And I couldn't go away while I had any hope.... As long as I was holding to his arm it was as if I was engaged. When he was gone I should only be a miserable ruined girl, like dozens of others.... My life was at stake: and to save myself I went down into the very lowest depths of vileness and cowardice. I cried, I implored. I lost all shame.... What he said then I cannot tell you—not even you—it was too much—too much—I did not understand at first. It was only afterwards, coming back, going over all his words, that I made out what he meant.... Then he rushed to the train, and jumped into a carriage, and almost crushed my fingers in the door; and he went and hid behind his mother, and she threatened, too, to have me arrested.... I wish I was dead! Lucie, dear, I don't want to go through all that's coming—I am too little—I am too weak, I'm too young to bear it. Really, I haven't the strength.

But Lucie has faith in her husband. In all the years of their married life she has heard him proclaim from the very housetops that motherhood is the most sacred function of woman; that the State needs large numbers; that commerce and the army require an increase of the population, and "the government commands you to further this end to the best of your ability, each one of you in his own commune." She has heard her husband repeat, over and over again, that the woman who refuses to abide by the command of God and the laws to become a mother is immoral, is criminal. Surely he would understand the tragedy of Annette, who had been placed in this condition not through her own fault but because she had been confiding and trusting in the promise of the man. Surely Brignac would come to the rescue of Annette; would help and comfort her in her trying and difficult moment. But Lucie, like many wives, does not know her husband; she does not know that a man who is so hidebound by statutes and codes cannot have human compassion, and that he will not stand by the little girl who has committed the "unpardonable sin." Lucie does not know, but she is soon to learn the truth.

Lucie. I tell you Annette is the victim of this wretch. If you are going to do nothing but insult her, we had better stop discussing the matter.

Brignac. I am in a nice fix now! There is nothing left for us but to pack our trunks and be off. I am done for. Ruined! Smashed! I tell you if she was caught red handed stealing, the wreck wouldn't be more complete.... We must make some excuse. We will invent an aunt or cousin who has invited her to stay. I will find a decent house for her in Paris to go to. She'll be all right there. When the time comes she can put the child out to nurse in the country, and come back to us.

Lucie. You seriously propose to send that poor child to Paris, where she doesn't know a soul?

Brignac. What do you mean by that? I will go to Paris myself, if necessary. There are special boarding houses; very respectable ones. I'll inquire: of course without letting out that it is for anyone I know. And I'll pay what is necessary. What more can you want?

Lucie. Just when the child is most in need of every care, you propose to send her off alone; alone, do you understand, alone! To tear her away from here, put her into a train, and send her off to Paris, like a sick animal you want to get rid of. If I consented to that I should feel that I was as bad as the man who seduced her. Be honest, Julien: remember it is in our interest you propose to sacrifice her. We shall gain peace and quiet at the price of her loneliness and despair. To save ourselves—serious troubles, I admit—we are to abandon this child to strangers ... away from all love and care and comfort, without a friend to put kind arms around her and let her sob her grief away. I implore you, Julien, I entreat you, for our children's sake, don't keep me from her, don't ask me to do this shameful thing.

Brignac. There would have been no question of misery if she had behaved herself.

Lucie. She is this man's victim! But she won't go. You'll have to drive her out as you drove out the servant.... And then—after that—she is to let her child go; to stifle her strongest instinct; to silence the cry of love that consoles us all for the tortures we have to go through; to turn away her eyes and say, "Take him away, I don't want him." And at that price she is to be forgiven for another person's crime.... Then that is Society's welcome to the new born child?

Brignac. To the child born outside of marriage, yes. If it wasn't for that, there would soon be nothing but illegitimate births. It is to preserve the family that society condemns the natural child.

Lucie. You say you want a larger number of births, and at the same time you say to women: "No motherhood without marriage, and no marriage without money." As long as you've not changed that, all your circulars will be met with shouts of derision—half from hate, half from pity.... If you drive Annette out, I shall go with her.

Lucie and Annette go out into the world. As middle-class girls they have been taught a little of everything and not much of anything. They try all kinds of work to enable them to make a living, but though they toil hard and long hours, they barely earn enough for a meager existence. As long as Annette's condition is not noticeable, life is bearable; but soon everybody remarks her state. She and Lucie are driven from place to place. In her despair Annette does what many girls in her position have done before her and will do after her so long as the Brignacs and their morality are dominant. She visits a midwife, and one more victim is added to the large number slaughtered upon the altar of morality.

The last act is in the court room. Mme. Thomas, the midwife, is on trial for criminal abortion. With her are a number of women whose names have been found on her register.

Bit by bit we learn the whole tragedy of each of the defendants; we see all the sordidness of poverty, the inability to procure the bare necessities of life, and the dread of the unwelcome child.

A schoolmistress, although earning a few hundred francs, and living with her husband, is compelled to have an abortion performed because another child would mean hunger for all of them.

Schoolmistress. We just managed to get along by being most careful; and several times we cut down expenses it did not seem possible to cut down. A third child coming upset everything. We couldn't have lived. We should have all starved. Besides, the inspectors and directresses don't like us to have many children, especially if we nurse them ourselves. They told me to hide myself when I was suckling the last one. I only had ten minutes to do it in, at the recreation, at ten o'clock and at two o'clock; and when my mother brought baby to me I had to shut myself up with him in a dark closet.

The couple Tupin stand before the bar to defend themselves against the charge of criminal abortion. Tupin has been out of work for a long time and is driven by misery to drink. He is known to the police as a disreputable character. One of his sons is serving a sentence for theft, and a daughter is a woman of the streets. But Tupin is a thinking man. He proves that his earnings at best are not enough to supply the needs of an already large family. The daily nourishment of five children consists of a four-pound loaf, soup of vegetables and dripping, and a stew which costs 90 centimes. Total, 3f. 75c. This is the expenditure of the father: Return ticket for tram, 30c. Tobacco, 15c. Dinner, 1f. 25c. The rent, 300f. Clothing for the whole family, and boots: 16 pairs of boots for the children at 4f. 50c. each, 4 for the parents at 8f., total again 300f. Total for the year, 2,600f. Tupin, who is an exceptional workman, earns 160f. a month, that is to say, 2,100f. a year. There is therefore an annual deficit of 500f., provided Tupin keeps at work all the time, which never happens in the life of a workingman. Under such circumstances no one need be surprised that one of his children is imprisoned for theft, and the other is walking the streets, while Tupin himself is driven to drink.

Tupin. When we began to get short in the house, my wife and I started to quarrel. Every time a child came we were mad at making it worse for the others. And so ... I ended up in the saloon. It's warm there, and you can't hear the children crying nor the mother complaining. And besides, when you have drink in you, you forget.... And that's how we got poorer and poorer. My fault, if you like.... Our last child was a cripple. He was born in starvation, and his mother was worn out. And they nursed him, and they nursed him, and they nursed him. They did not leave him a minute. They made him live in spite of himself. And they let the other children—the strong ones—go to the bad. With half the money and the fuss they wasted on the cripple, they could have made fine fellows of all the others.

Mme. Tupin. I have to add that all this is not my fault. My husband and I worked like beasts; we did without every kind of pleasure to try and bring up our children. If we had wanted to slave more, I declare to you we couldn't have done it. And now that we have given our lives for them, the oldest is in hospital, ruined and done for because he worked in "a dangerous trade" as they call it.... There are too many people in the world.... My little girl had to choose between starvation and the street.... I'm only a poor woman, and I know what it means to have nothing to eat, so I forgave her.

Thus Mme. Tupin also understands that it is a crime to add one more victim to those who are born ill and for whom society has no place.

Then Lucie faces the court,—Lucie who loved her sister too well, and who, driven by the same conditions that killed Annette, has also been compelled to undergo an abortion rather than have a fourth child by the man she did not love any more. Like the Schoolmistress and the Tupins, she is dragged before the bar of justice to explain her crime, while her husband, who had forced both Annette and Lucie out of the house, has meanwhile risen to a high position as a supporter of the State with his favorite slogan, "Motherhood is the highest function of woman."

Finally the midwife Thomas is called upon for her defense.

Thomas. A girl came to me one day; she was a servant. She had been seduced by her master. I refused to do what she asked me to do: she went and drowned herself. Another I refused to help was brought up before you here for infanticide. Then when the others came, I said, "Yes." I have prevented many a suicide and many a crime.

It is not likely that the venerable judge, the State's attorney or the gentlemen of the jury can see in Mme. Thomas a greater benefactress to society than they; any more than they can grasp the deep importance of the concluding words of the counsel for the defense in this great social tragedy.

Counsel for the Defense. Their crime is not an individual crime; it is a social crime.... It is not a crime against nature. It is a revolt against nature. And with all the warmth of a heart melted by pity, with all the indignation of my outraged reason, I look for that glorious hour of liberation when some master mind shall discover for us the means of having only the children we need and desire, release forever from the prison of hypocrisy and absolve us from the profanation of love. That would indeed be a conquest of nature—savage nature—which pours out life with culpable profusion, and sees it disappear with indifference.

Surely there can be no doubt as to the revolutionary significance of "Maternity": the demand that woman must be given means to prevent conception of undesired and unloved children; that she must become free and strong to choose the father of her child and to decide the number of children she is to bring into the world, and under what conditions. That is the only kind of motherhood which can endure.