The Plays of W. E. Henley and R. L. Stevenson

The Plays of W. E. Henley and R. L. Stevenson

The Scene is laid in Edinburgh. The Time is towards the close of the Eighteenth Century. The Action, some fifty hours long, begins at eight p.m. on Saturday and ends before midnight on Monday. The Stage represents a room in the Deacons house, furnished partly as a sitting-, partly as a bed-room, in the style of an easy burgess of about 1780. C., a door; L. C., a second and smaller door; R. C., practicable window; L., alcove, supposed to contain bed; at the back, a clothes-press and a corner cupboard containing bottles, etc. Mary Brodie at needlework; Old Brodie, a paralytic, in wheeled chair, at the fireside, L. Mary. The dad and I must have a corner, must we not? So when my brothers friends are in the parlour he allows us to sit in his room. Tis a great favour, I can tell you; the place is sacred. Mary. And now you are impertinent! Do you mean to go any further? We are a fighting race, we Brodies. Oh, you may laugh, sir! But tis no childs play to jest us on our Deacon, or, for that matter, on our Deacons chamber either. It was his fathers before him: he works in it by day and sleeps in it by night; and scarce anything it contains but is the labour of his hands. Do you see this table, Walter? He made it while he was yet a prentice. I remember how I used to sit and watch him at his work. It would be grand, I thought, to be able to do as he did, and handle edge-tools without cutting my fingers, and getting my ears pulled for a meddlesome minx! He used to give me his mallet to keep and his nails to hold; and didnt I fly when he called for them! and wasnt I proud to be ordered about with them! And then, you know, there is the tall cabinet yonder; that it was that proved him the first of Edinburgh joiners, and worthy to be their Deacon and their head. And the fathers chair, and the sisters workbox, and the dear dead mothers footstoolwhat are they all but proofs of the Deacons skill, and tokens of the Deacons care for those about him? ......Buy Now (To Read More)

Product details

Ebook Number: 719
Author: Henley, William Ernest
Release Date: Nov 1, 1996
Format: eBook
Language: English

Contributors

Contributor (Author): Stevenson, Robert Louis, 1850-1894