  Several things had conspired to put off the White Mountain and Wiscasset trips, till within about ten days of the close of camp. The first was a three days’ jaunt, when the girls were taken first by boat, then by truck, with their packs, to the foot of Mt. Washington, which they were to climb. The second led to historic little Wiscasset, part of the way by boat, the rest a hike, except for the little girls who were taken all the way by launch. The night was spent under the stars near the old block house, meals were carried in the launches, and the return the next day was on the same plan, partly by boat, partly on foot. Patty despaired of having any practice for the Squirrels’ Inn “stunt”, but concluded that inasmuch as they were not attempting any formal performance before a critical audience, one or two hasty rehearsals of the program as a whole in the club room would do. Only Frances and Hilary were going to Mt. Washington, but the other girls all went to Wiscasset. At last the fateful night arrived, stage property was quickly collected, each girl having her own peculiar accoutrement to gather, and Miss Patricia was on hand with the program in full, ready to prompt or to take part with the performers. At the piano was a musical councillor, who was to play the accompaniments, and Eloise, who had been ill when her own klondike had their evening, had been asked to help with the singing. That it was a musical program might be taken for granted by any who knew Miss West’s tastes and her chief avocation. But it is not to be supposed that she would undertake any classical performance as a “stunt”. The music consisted of the popular airs; the songs were little verses illustrating Merrymeeting activities, all bound together by one central idea. That announcement of the numbers might be avoided, the girls had prepared small programs written on ordinary yellow tablet paper, cut and folded. The audience upon the floor of the club room read upon the outside: Squirrels’ Inn Presents The Merrymeeting Follies of 19— Monday Evening, August —— Inside they found the program in order, and tongues were busy as they looked it through. “O, I wonder what that is. Do you suppose that the doctor will really be in it?” “Took at this: ‘Bird Hike.... Bird, Mother Nature and Chorus’. Birdie, are you going to take part?” “Of course not,” replied the nature lady, settling back in her little rocking chair. “But I lent them my rubber boots and hat.” “I wonder,” said Betty behind the curtain, “if they will take it in about the head band.” “Of course they will,” said Frances, who was just adjusting hers across her forehead. “The headband—the connecting link which has a symbol for all the things we do!” This with the explanatory gesture of an orator. “There will be some funny symbols put up tonight,” said Betty, tossing up a volley ball. “I guess so. Imagine a pickle jar on our head bands! Dear me, I hope I don’t forget my songs.” “You haven’t had much time to learn them. Have you gotten over the effects of mountain climbing?” “O, yes; there weren’t any, except my tired feet.” “Everybody here and ready?” asked Miss Patricia, looking last to see if Isabel and Virgie, who were to manage the curtains, were in place. At her signal, they drew aside the curtains, revealing the eight girls—Frances, Marion, Nora, Hilary, Lilian, Betty, Cathalina and Eloise, who were dressed in full camp costume, including head bands, arm bands, and diamonds on the sweaters, and carried each some emblem of Merrymeeting activities, from volley ball and paddle to the silver cup marked Merrymeeting Trophy. After a chord from the accompanist, the girls sang to a popular ragtime tune the “Opening Chorus” of the program: “Just a head band, Golden and Blue; Athletic emblems Of what we can do— Swimming, baseball, tennis, paddling, basketball, Volley, hiking,—at our camp we do them all. But these symbols Don’t represent you; There are other things That you do, And if you will watch our little show tonight, We’ll give you a head band that’ll be right.” The curtains were drawn together in the midst of the applause which welcomed the first appearance, but in a few moments were again parted and drawn aside. The audience for a second expected an encore or a new number, then saw the point as June shouted, “O, there’s the head band!” For across the stage at a convenient height and pinned upon the wall was an immense dark-blue “head band”, upon which had just been placed the customary M C with a small pine tree on each side. The golden symbols, like the program, were cut from yellow tablet paper. “I get it,” said Jo. “They’re making a head band with our ‘Follies’.” The first activity to be perpetuated in song was the “Marshmallow Roast” of the program. When the curtains were drawn, they disclosed in the foreground a camp fire made of sticks, in the center of which glowed a lighted lantern covered with red paper. Close to this sat the “marshmallow”, covered with white and occasionally shaking a white powder from the drapery, by which she was concealed. Frances stood back of her holding the stick on which she was supposed to be impaled. The tune was “Old Black Joe”. “Marshmallow plump, With sugar powdered o’er; Marshmallow white, They wish they had some more; Marshmallow brown, As down their throats I go,— I hear Camp Merrymeeting calling ‘Marshmallow!’ CHORUS: Marshmallow, marshmallow, I’m used for every roast; I hear Camp Merrymeeting calling, ‘Toast! Toast! Toast!’” Curtain. Curtains apart again. A fat marshmallow on the head band, next to one of the pine trees. “This next ought to be funny,” said Dot, who was in the front row. “‘Deep Sea Fishing, (a) Fish Chorus, (b) Fishermen’s Chorus.’ How can they fix up fish?” “They don’t have to much,” answered June. “We are supposed to use our imagination. Hilary says that they didn’t use to have all the stage fixings that they think they have to now.” “Sh-sh, here they are!” Four girls in Merrymeeting costume sat upon the edge of the big table under the head band. With sticks and lines they were fishing. In front of them, facing the audience, but lying upon the floor in swimming position, were four “fish”, just the girls, in customary garb, without any attempt at a fish costume. To the lively tune of Jingle Bells, and with the movements appropriate to swimming and “flapping” of fins, they sang the following ditty: “We are the fishes gay, Swimming every day, In the ocean blue, Just see what we can do! We dart and dance about, Each minnow and each trout; We glisten and we gleam, As we sidestroke down stream. CHORUS: Flap your fins! Flap your fins, Fishies in the sea, Oh what fun to splash and dive And swim so gay and free! Flap your fins! Flap your fins, Fishies in the sea, O, who would not a fishie be In the bottom of the sea!” At this, the fishers started a rollicking chorus with waving lines: “We’re deep-sea fishers, Watch us fish! We ride out over the ocean Where-e’er we wish. We don’t have to wait for the fish to bite, They jump on the hooks when we heave in sight,— We’re deep-sea fishers, Watch us fish!” At the appropriate time the fishes turned and caught the lines, then rose as the fishers jumped down from the table, and all danced around in a circle, while the accompanist played the tune through once, finishing it as the last fish or fisher disappeared through the door in the midst of most enthusiastic applause, especially from those who had memories of the deep-sea fishing trip. The Bird Hike was introduced by a solo from the bird, the burden of whose refrain was: “Come along, there’s a bird hike here today; Get you ready, there’s a bird hike here today; I know them by their graceful walk, There’s a bird hike here today. I’m a poor old fowl, but I’ll fool ’em yet,” etc. Hilary was the “bird”, and sat on the corner of that most convenient table, when—enter Mother Nature and Girls. “Clementine” was the tune in which the following musical conversation occurred: GIRLS— Mother Nature, Mother Nature, Shall we see some birds today? MOTHER NATURE (ELOISE)— Very likely, very likely, If only quiet you will stay. GIRLS— Mother Nature, Mother Nature, Here’s a rock where we may sit. MOTHER NATURE— Yes, sit down and all be quiet, While we wait for birds to flit. GIRLS— Mother Nature, Mother Nature, What’s that bird upon the limb? MOTHER NATURE— Steady now, give me the glasses, While I take a look at him. Eloise as Mother Nature, in the well known hat pulled down over her face, the scarlet blouse of the nature lady and the rubber boots which had given her the title of Puss in Boots, was hailed with wild applause and shrieks of delight from the audience. The nature lady herself leaned back in her chair to laugh at this clever representation. In a sweet contralto, Eloise sang her comments on the bird while she gazed through the glasses: “Dear little bird in the bushes, Under the old pine tree, Singing alone, In a sweetly cheerful tone, Perching in the air(!) Flying everywhere! Notice the marks on his wings, girls; Look at the stripe on his knee; I’m sure this pretty bird Will be the rarest thing we’ve heard What kind of a bird, girls, Can that bird be?” The girls now took up the air, repeating the same song with Eloise, and assuming attitudes of delight when the Bird began to sing. But how their expressions changed as he announced that as only a Plymouth Rock rooster “cock-a-doodle-doo” was all that he could sing, “when I flap my wing, scaring everything”. And while he would like to be an “eagle” or a “flycatcher”, it was merely as a “scratcher” that he could claim their interest. Curtain. The “Merrymeeting Moon”, which came next, was entirely different from anything which had been given. Lilian, who represented the chief editor, Maribelle Hartley, was prettily dressed in a real party frock, filmy and beautiful, wore silver slippers and carried a round “moon.” This was a round circle of cardboard, cut out in the center to leave only a wide rim and covered with silvered paper. Grace and gestures with this moon and a few steps here and there to show the silver slippers accompanied a very pretty song written to one of the more elaborate ragtime tunes. “Merrymeeting needs your gleaming, just to keep us all a-beaming,” sang Lilian, addressing the silver moon which she was holding above her head; and at the close of the song she stood with her face framed within the rim while singing: “Can’t you all tell That I’m Maribelle, I’m the Man in the Moon, you see.” The audience was scarcely satisfied with one repetition of this, but time was pressing and the program had to go on. By this time a fish, a bird and a moon had been added to the symbols on the head band. The girls enjoyed taking off the camp doctor in the next act, called on the program, The Infirmary, Doctor—and Gargling Girls. There had been some mild cases of tonsilitis, immediately isolated in the “Infirmary”, where, with skull and cross-bones, the girls had announced the “Leper Colony” on a clever sign, and bewailed their isolation. This was all portrayed in the sketch. First the girls appeared, wrapped in long bath robes and singing pathetically about the “tonsils’ retreat” and the “little cots, whose owners have spots,— And the doctor’s job, Their throats to swab, Can’t be beat!” Their temperature was “torrid” and the gargle “horrid”. Then came the doctor, who looked at their throats with the aid of an immense kitchen spoon, and sang with great enjoyment a solo to the effect that he had waited long to catch them, but had them fast quarantined now. Giving each a spoonful from a large bottle, he stood before them like an orchestra leader, and beat time with the spoon, while in throaty tones to the tune of John Brown’s Body the girls sang, “Gargle, gargle, gargle, gargle,” etc., and falling into a procession behind the doctor, filed out. This proved so popular that the “doctor” was forced to repeat his solo and lead again the chorus of gargling girls. Frances, of course, as the tallest of the girls, impersonated the doctor and tried to imitate his step and movements. This time the curtains parted to show a spoon on the head band. “What do you suppose the next will be?” asked Jean in the audience. “It says ‘Pickles’,” replied Rhoda, “but who knows how they’ll do it?” “Pickles (a) Onion (b) Cauliflower (c) Quartered pickle,” read the program. When Isabel and Virgie drew the curtains, Betty, Cathalina and Nora stood there decked in green crepe paper, Betty’s costume having yellow trimmings. At once Betty, to the tune of “Reuben, Reuben” began the song of the pickled onion: “Picnic pickles you’ve been eating, All the pickles you could get, I should think you’d hate to think of All the pickles you have ‘et’,— H’m-te-dum-tum, H’m-tum-dum!” (Turning around quickly) “Here behold the pickled onion Round and sweet as I can be, Where’ll you find another onion Anywhere to equal me? H’m-te-dum-tum,” etc. Nora now took up the song: “My name’s pickled cauliflower, I’m as crisp as I can be; Where’ll you find another cauliflower Anywhere to equal me?” Refr. Cathalina’s inquiry was similar: “Once I was a full-sized pickle, But they came and quartered me; Where’ll you find a quartered pickle Anywhere to equal me?” Refr. At this point the Picnic Pickles joined hands above their heads and circled the stage singing: “Three sweet pickles in the barrel, Picnic pickles can’t be beat; Merrymeeting girls all love us, Eat and smile and smile and eat!” “Merrymeeting Music” not unkindly took off several of the girls in camp, among them one of the chief “yell-leaders”, and Rhoda, whose really beautiful piano playing the girls had so much enjoyed all through the weeks of camp. Marion represented her and sang; to “Boola, Boola”: “I am Rhoda I can play Brahms and Chopin Any day. If you listen I’ll start you off On the Prelude Of Rachmaninoff.” Lilian, with her guitar, and Eloise with ukulele, sat upon the floor to sing two or three of the camp favorites and represented the “Jazz” of the program. Musical notes now appeared upon the head band next to the pickle jar, and the audience again consulted their programs. “Whiskaway” was to appear. Betty was slim and had made a remarkable though simple costume of black, covering her arms with long black stockings and padding out with cotton a muslin mask to imitate the muzzle of a dog. The rest of the face had a comical expression, and the corners of the big square of muslin had been tied into ears. A gentle old dog sometimes wandered into camp from a neighboring farm, although dogs were forbidden, and had been dubbed “Whiskaway” by the girls. Down on her knees Betty moved about, causing much amusement among the little girls in front by the waving of her paws and the swinging of the doggy nose, which was not very well fastened at the lower part. At the last Betty assumed a begging attitude, her stocking-covered hands hanging limply over, with such effect that this tableau and chorus had to be repeated: “When a cold nose gives you a fright, That’s dear Whiskaway; When a footstep sounds in the night That’s poor Whiskaway! I love to sleep in the softest bed,— I don’t care whether it’s the foot or the head. I don’t mean to scare you, But only prepare you For poor, dear Whiskaway!” The ensemble chorus gave the new Merrymeeting song which had won the prize. In this and the camp yell with which the performance closed the audience could not help joining, and went away to sing these masterpieces of poesy and song for the rest of the week. |
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