Voir moins
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(...)
HAM: (In the tent door) Our father has stripped himself, showing all his wrinkles. Ha! Ha! He's as no young goat in the spring. Ha! Ha! (Still laughing, he reck over to the altar and finks down behind it still laughing.) The old ram, Ha! Ha! Ha! He has had no spring for years! Ha! Ha! (He subsides into slumber. Mrs. Shem looks about her exultantly.)
MRS. SHEM: Ha! The young goat has fallen into a pit! (She shakes her husband.) Shem! Shem! Rise up and become owner of Noah's vineyards as well as his flocks! (Shem kicks weakly at her.) Shem! Fool! Arise! Thou art thy fathers first born. (She pulls him protesting to his feet.) Do stand up and regain thy birthright from (She points to the altar) that dancer who plays on his harp of ram thews, and decks his brow with bay leaves. Come!
SHEM: (Brightens) How?
MRS. SHEM: Did he not go into the tent and come away laughing at thy father's nakedness? Oh (She bears her breast) that I should live to see a father so mocked and shamed by his son to whom he has given all his vineyards! (She seizes a large skin front the ground.) Take this and cover him and tell him of the wickedness of thy brother.
MRS. JAPHETH: (Arising takes hold of the skin also) No, my husband shall also help to cover Noah, our lather. Did I not also hear? Think your Shem and his seed shall possess both flocks and vineyard while lapheth and his seed have only the fields? (She arouses Japheth, he stands.)
SHEM: He shall share—
MRS. SHEM: (Impatiently) Then go in (The women release the skin to the men) quickly, lest he wake sober, then will he not believe one word against Ham who needs only to smile to please him.
(The men lay the skin across their shoulders and back over to the tent and cover Noah. They motion to leave him.)
MRS. SHEM: GO back, fools, and wake him. You have done but half.
(They turn and enter the tent and both shake Noah. He sits up and rubs his eyes. Mrs. Shem and Mrs. Japheth commence to weep ostentatiously.)
NOAH: (Peevishly) Why do you disturb me, and why do the women weep? I thought all sorrow was washed away by the flood. (He is about to lie down again but the men hold him up.)
SHEM: Hear, father, thy age has been scoffed, and thy nakedness made a thing of shame here in the midst of the feasting where all might know—thou, the lord of all under Heaven, hast been mocked.
MRS. SHEM: And we weep in shame, that thou our father should have thy nakedness uncovered before us.
NOAH: (Struggling drunkenly to his feet) Who, who has done this thing?
MRS. SHEM: (Timidly crosses and kneels before Noah) We fear to tell thee, lord, lest thy love for the doer of this iniquity should be so much greater than the shame, that thou should slay us for telling thee.
NOAH: (Swaying drunkenly) Say it, woman, shall the lord of the Earth be mocked? Shall his nakedness be uncovered and he be shamed before his family?
SHEM: Shall the one who has done this thing hold part of thy goods after thee? How wilt thou deal with them? Thou hast been wickedly shamed.
NOAH: NO, he shall have no part in my goods—his goods shall be parceled out among the others.
MRS. SHEM: Thou art wise, father, thou art just!
NOAH: He shall be accursed. His skin shall be black! Black as the nights, when the waters brooded over the Earth!
(...)
