The Acorn-Planter, Jack London [free ebook reader .txt] 📗

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CHANT OF PROPHECY

{Shaman}
The Sun never grows cold.
The Sun Man is like the Sun.
His anger never grows cold.
The Sun Man will return.
The Sun Man will come back from the Sun.

{People}
The Sun Man will return.
The Sun Man will come back from the Sun.

{Shaman}
There is a sign.
As the water burst forth when he rose into the sky,
So will the water cease to flow when he returns from the sky.
The Sun Man is mighty.
In his eyes is blue fire.
In his hands he bears the thunder.
The lightnings are in his hair.

{People}
In his hands he bears the thunder.
The lightnings are in his hair.

{Shaman}
There is a sign.
The Sun Man is white.
His skin is white like the sun.
His hair is bright like the sunlight.'
His eyes are blue like the sky.

{People}
There is a sign.
The Sun Man is white.

{Shaman}
The Sun Man is mighty.
He is the enemy of the Nishinam.
He will destroy the Nishinam.

{People}
He is the enemy of the Nishinam.
He will destroy the Nishinam.

{Shaman}
There is a sign.
The Sun Man will bear the thunder in his hand.

{People}
There is a sign.
The Sun Man will bear the thunder in his hand.

{Shaman}
In the day the Sun Man comes
The water from the spring will no longer flow.
And in that day he will destroy the Nishinam.
With the thunder will he destroy the Nishinam.
The Nishinam will be like last year's grasses.
The Nishinam will be like the smoke of last year's campfires.
The Nishinam will be less than the dreams that trouble the sleeper.
The Nishinam will be like the days no man remembers.
I am the Shaman.
I have spoken.

(The People set up a sad wailing.)

{War Chief}
(Striking his chest with his fist.)
Hoh! Hoh! Hoh!

(The People cease from their wailing and
look to the War Chief with hopeful
expectancy.)

{War Chief}
I am the War Chief. In war I command.
Nor the Shaman nor Red Cloud may say me nay
when in war I command. Let the Sun Man
come back. I am not afraid. If the foxes snared
him with ropes, then can I slay him with spear-
thrust and war-club. I am the War Chief. In
war I command.

(The People greet War Chief's pronouncement
with warlike cries of approval.)

{Red Cloud}
The foxes are cunning. If they snared the Sun Man
With ropes of sinew, then let us be cunning
And snare him with ropes of kindness.
In kindness, O War Chief, is strength, much strength.

{Shaman}
Red Cloud speaks true. In kindness is strength.

{War Chief}
I am the War Chief.

{Shaman}
You cannot slay the Sun Man.

{War Chief}
I am the War Chief.

{Shaman}
The Sun Man fights with the thunder in his hand.

{War Chief}
I am the War Chief.

{Red Cloud}
(As he speaks the People are visibly wan by
his argument.)

You speak true, O War Chief. In war you
command. You are strong, most strong. You
have slain the Modoc. You have slain the Napa.
You have slain the Clam-Eaters of the big water
till the last one is not. Yet you have not slain
all the foxes. The foxes cannot fight, yet are
they stronger than you because you cannot slay
them. The foxes are foxes, but we are men.
When the Sun Man comes we will not be cunning
like the foxes. We will be kind. Kindness and
love will we give to the Sun Man, so that he will
be our friend. Then will he melt the frost, pull
the teeth of famine, give us back our rivers of
deep water, our lakes of sweet water, take the
bitter from the buckeye, and in all ways make
the world the good world it was before he left us.

{People}
Hail, Red Cloud, the first man!
Hail, Red Cloud, the Acorn-Planter!
Who showed us the way of our feet in the world!
Who showed us the way of our food in the world!
Who showed us the way of our hearts in the world!
Who gave us the law of family,
The law of tribe,
The law of totem,
And made us strong in the world among men!

(While the People sing the hillside slowly
grows dark.)


ACT I

(Ten thousand years have passed, and it is
the time of the early voyaging from Europe
to the waters of the Pacific, when the
deserted hillside is again revealed as the
moon rises. The stream no longer flows
from the spring. Since the grove is used
only as a camp for the night when the
Nishinam are on their seasonal migration
there are no signs of previous camps.)

(Enter from right, at end of day's march,
women, old men, and Shaman, the
women bending under their burdens of
camp gear and dunnage)

(Enter from left youths carrying fish-spears
and large fish)

(Appear, coming down the hillside, Red
Cloud and the hunters, many carrying
meat.)

(The various repeated characters, despite
differences of skin garmenting and decoration,
resemble their prototypes of the prologue.)

{Red Cloud}
Good hunting! Good hunting!

{Hunters}
Good hunting! Good hunting!

{Youths}
Good fishing! Good fishing!

{Women}
Good berries! Good acorns!

(The women and youths and hunters, as they
reach the campsite, begin throwing down
their burdens)

{Dew-Woman}
(Discovering the dry spring.)
The water no longer flows!

{Shaman}
(Stilling the excitement that is immediate
on the discovery.)
The word of old time that has come down to
us from all the Shamans who have gone before!
The Sun Man has come back from the Sun.

{Dew-Woman}
(Looking to Red Cloud.)
Let Red Cloud speak. Since the morning of
the world has Red Cloud ever been reborn with
the ancient wisdom to guide us.

{War Chief}
Save in war. In war I command.

(He picks out hunters by name.)
Deer Foot... Elk Man... Antelope. Run
through the forest, climb the hill-tops, seek down
the valleys, for aught you may find of this Sun Man.

(At a wave of the War Chief's hand the
three hunters depart in different directions.)

{Dew-Woman}
Let Red Cloud speak his mind.

{Red Cloud}