THE MAGPIE [_Announcing._] The Swan! CHANTECLER [_Coming forward delighted._] Good! A Swan! [_Shrinking away._] He is black! THE BLACK SWAN [_With swaggering satisfaction._] I have discarded the whiteness while preserving the outline! CHANTECLER The real Swan’s shadow does no less! [_Thrusting the_ SWAN _aside to hop up on a bench whence, through a gap in the hedge, he can see the distant meadows._] Let me climb up on this bench. I need to make sure that Nature still exists--though so far away! Ah, yes! The grass is green, a cow is grazing, a calf sucking--And Heaven be praised, the calf has a single head! [_Coming down again beside the_ PHEASANT-HEN.] THE PHEASANT-HEN Oh, come away to the innocent woods, sincere and dewy, where we will love each other! THE BLACKBIRD [_Pointing at_ CHANTECLER _and the_ PHEASANT-HEN, _who are standing close and talking low._] We are getting on! THE GUINEA-HEN [_Intensely interested._] Do you think so? [_She spreads her wings to screen them._] Oh, I am so fond of helping along a clandestine love affair! THE BLACKBIRD [_Sticking his bill under the_ GUINEA-HEN’S _wing so as to keep the pair in sight._] I believe she has thoughts of annexing his comb. THE PHEASANT-HEN [_To_ CHANTECLER.] Come, dearest, come away! CHANTECLER [_Resisting._] No, I must sing where Destiny placed me. I am useful here, I am beloved-- THE PHEASANT-HEN [_Remembering what she overheard the night before in the farmyard._] Are you so sure?--Come away to the woods, where we shall hear real pigeons cooing tenderly to each other! THE TURKEY [_At the back._] Ladies, the great Peacock-- THE PEACOCK [_Modestly._] The Super-peacock--who supervenes, and supersedes-- THE GUINEA-HEN Will spread his tail for us! He has expressed his amiable willingness so far to favour us. [_The company falls into groups of spectators, the outlandish_ COCKS _forming a wreath around their patron._] THE PEACOCK [_Preparing to spread his tail._] I am, by precious natural gift, in addition to my multifarious accomplishments something of a--shall I say artist in firework? THE GUINEA-HEN [_Effervescently._] Yes! THE PEACOCK No. Pyrotechnist. For the choicest piece in urban gardens, where Catharine-wheels on festival nights spurt sidereal spray, and rockets shot into gold-riddled skies fall back in prismatic showers, is less sapphirine, smaragdine, cuprine-- CHANTECLER Zounds! THE PEACOCK --than, I venture to say, ladies, am I-- THE PHEASANT-HEN Oh, I understood that last word! THE PEACOCK --when I unfurl the union of fan, jewel-case, and screen, upon which I offer to the self-same sunbeams that redden the reed all the joyous gems you now may contemplate! CHANTECLER What a silly bill! [_The_ PEACOCK _has spread his tail._] A COCK [_To the_ PEACOCK.] Master, which of us will you make the fashion? THE PADUA COCK [_Quickly coming forward._] Me! I look like a palm-tree! A CHINA COCK [_Pushing the_ PADUA COCK _aside._] I look like a pagoda!