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ACT I: SCENE III
SCENE: A room in WALCOT'S House.
[MARY WALCOT seated in an arm-chair. TITUBA with a mirror.]
MARY.
Tell me another story, Tituba.
A drowsiness is stealing over me
Which is not sleep; for, though I close mine eyes,
I am awake, and in another world.
Dim faces of the dead and of the absent
Come floating up before me,--floating, fading,
And disappearing.
TITUBA.
Look into this glass.
What see you?
MARY.
Nothing but a golden vapor.
Yes, something more. An island, with the sea
Breaking all round it, like a blooming hedge.
What land is this?
TITUBA.
It is San Salvador,
Where Tituba was born. What see you now?
MARY.
A man all black and fierce.
TITUBA.
That is my father.
He was an Obi man, and taught me magic,--
Taught me the use of herbs and images.
What is he doing?
MARY.
Holding in his hand
A waxen figure. He is melting it
Slowly before a fire.
TITUBA.
And now what see you?
MARY.
A woman lying on a bed of leaves,
Wasted and worn away. Ah, she is dying!
TITUBA.
That is the way the Obi men destroy
The people they dislike! That is the way
Some one is wasting and consuming you.
MARY.
You terrify me, Tituba! Oh, save me
From those who make me pine and waste away!
Who are they? Tell me.
TITUBA.
That I do not know,
But you will see them. They will come to you.
MARY.
No, do not let them come! I cannot bear it!
I am too weak to bear it! I am dying.
[Fails into a trance.]
TITUBA.
Hark! there is some one coming!
[Enter HATHORNE, MATHER, and WALCOT.]
WALCOT.
There she lies,
Wasted and worn by devilish incantations!
O my poor sister!
MATHER.
Is she always thus?
WALCOT.
Nay, she is sometimes tortured by convulsions.
MATHER.
Poor child! How thin she is! How wan and wasted!
HATHORNE.
Observe her. She is troubled in her sleep.
MATHER.
Some fearful vision haunts her.
HATHORNE.
You now see
With your own eyes, and touch with your own hands,
The mysteries of this Witchcraft.
MATHER.
One would need
The hands of Briareus and the eyes of Argus
To see and touch them all.
HATHORNE.
You now have entered
The realm of ghosts and phantoms,--the vast realm
Of the unknown and the invisible,
Through whose wide-open gates there blows a wind
From the dark valley of the shadow of Death,
That freezes us with horror.
MARY (starting).
Take her hence!
Take her away from me. I see her there!
She's coming to torment me!
WALCOT (taking her hand.
O my sister!
What frightens you? She neither hears nor sees me.
She's in a trance.
MARY.
Do you not see her there?
TITUBA.
My child, who is it?
MARY.
Ah, I do not know,
I cannot see her face.
TITUBA.
How is she clad?
MARY.
She wears a crimson bodice. In her hand
She holds an image, and is pinching it
Between her fingers. Ah, she tortures me!
I see her face now. It is Goodwife Bishop!
Why does she torture me? I never harmed her!
And now she strikes me with an iron rod!
Oh, I am beaten!
MATHER.
This is wonderful!.
I can see nothing! Is this apparition
Visibly there, and yet we cannot see it?
HATHORNE.
It is. The spectre is invisible
Unto our grosser senses, but she sees it.
MARY.
Look! look! there is another clad in gray!
She holds a spindle in her hand, and threatens
To stab me with it! It is Goodwife Corey!
Keep her away! Now she is coming at me!
Oh, mercy! mercy!
WALCOT (thrusting with his sword.)
There is nothing there!
MATHER to HATHORNE.
Do you see anything?
HATHORNE.
The laws that govern
The spiritual world prevent our seeing
Things palpable and visible to her.
These spectres are to us as if they were not.
Mark her; she wakes.
[TITUBA touches her, and she awakes.]
MARY.
Who are these gentlemen?
WALCOT.
They are our friends. Dear Mary, are you better?
MARY.
Weak, very weak.
[Taking a spindle from her lap, and holding it up.]
How came this spindle here?
TITUBA.
You wrenched it from the hand of Goodwife Corey
When she rushed at you.
HATHORNE.
Mark that, reverend sir!
MATHER.
It is most marvellous, most inexplicable!
TITUBA. (picking up a bit of gray cloth from the floor).
And here, too, is a bit of her gray dress,
That the sword cut away.
MATHER.
Beholding this,
It were indeed by far more credulous
To be incredulous than to believe.
None but a Sadducee, who doubts of all
Pertaining to the spiritual world,
Could doubt such manifest and damning proofs!
HATHORNE.
Are you convinced?
MATHER to MARY.
Dear child, be comforted!
Only by prayer and fasting can you drive
These Unclean Spirits from you. An old man
Gives you his blessing. God be with you, Mary!
Content of ACT I SCENE III [Henry Wadsworth Longfellow's play/drama: Giles Corey of the Salem Farms]
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