Prologue.
Time: Immediately after the Ice Age when Britain was still part of the continent of Europe.
The Waves enter.
Over and under! Over and 0n!
The sun comes up and the night is gone;
Come sisters! Let us shake up the face of the sea!
Let us put on our jewels and comb out our hair
And choose our robes with extra care!
Let us dress in rich colours with mantillas of lace
Which fall onto the shoulders and show up the face
(Grouped round a rock, they dress, comb their hair and pass a mirror from one to the other)
With eddies and races, now plaited, now curled,
Let our fathoms of beauty be known to the world;
Let the winds carry the fame of the waters
And the price of the Sea King's virgin daughters.The Sea King enters and tells his daughters that while resting in a cave the idea came to him that, if he could cut a channel between this projection of land and the continent, he would save a great deal of travelling and time and he has come to meet the son of the land, the Briton, to make him a proposal.
So now that you realise the point of this meeting
Will you call to the landman and give him my greeting.Waves:
Son of the land! leave the lambs to the sheep!
Come down to the sand! leave the fields where you reap!Briton:
Tell me, Waves of the Sea, what your king requires?
What have I got that he desires?Waves:
Passage and tide rights! 0 son of the land!Briton:
I am only a shepherd that watches the Downs
And wraps the lambs when a cloudlet frowns;
I am only a ploughman behind the ox
Claiming tilth from reeds and rocks;
I am only a man that clings to the land
And the words of the sea I can't understandThe Sea King:
Your peninsular here is not only unsightly
But a tiresome obstruction. I would carve a channel
From the west to the east
Through the chalk which in time you'll not miss in the least,
Sever the neck from sea to sea
Setting the base of the triangle free,
A short-cut between the north and my western ocean.Briton:
You'd leave you an island flung out from the main
Wrenched from the breast where I long have lain?Sea King:
I'd make you an island! and make you a man!
For if you concur in this admirable plan
You will not only grow up and become independent
But I will assure you protection and peace.
Will you accept and strike this down?
Twenty miles of your chalk estates
The least that would warrant the working of straights
And the holiest feast of the years will be
The day that the man kept tryst with the sea.Briton:
It is hard, 0 king, to decide so soon
On a change that is great as a flight to the moon;
It is hard to resist, yet hard to make sure
Tell me how long this pact will endure?Sea King:
As long as God sustains the opinion
That the whole of the globe is the sea's dominion.Briton:
Then that will be forever or later?
for nothing on earth can ever be greater.Waves:
You will never regret! You will soon rejoice
At the shape of the set; and the fall of the choice
For the island that trusts in the might of the sea
Will grasp the earth and shake it free!Briton:
Take my land, 0 king
Twenty miles from shore to shore.Sea king:
Waves of my body! advance where we stand!
Measure the reach and claim the land.The Waves start digging but stop when the landman accuses them of cheating, of taking too much but when the length of a nautical mile is explained and a compromise is reached, they dig again.
Sea King:
Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! I like this man.
I will take him and teach him the full sea-span
Of a full sea-mile. Come hack daughters, and rest.
I will give him a sail to set and test.
He shall learn to rig and trim and splice
And cling to the yards with a grip of a vice,
Be given the dog-watch and haul the keel,
Fasten a hatch and be strapped to the wheel
And then I will take him away with me
And show him the roads and paths of the sea.Waves:
We will take him to sea! We will launch his boat.Sea king:
Man of the Isle! I will make you a sailor!
The soil shall no longer be your gaoler!
Let the old men till and the women reap,
Let the children glean and the babies sleep.
Come away! come away! come away with me
Turn from the land and take to the sea.Briton:
Lay me a keel; never withdraw;
Take me and teach me the craft and the law;
Give me wealth and give me power;
To the door of the future give me the key;
I will come! I will come! I will come to the sea!Sea King:
I will bring you adventurous blood from the north
To harden the oak of your going forth;
From the south I will bring you laws, thoughts and equations
The treasures of less favoured nations;
I will furnish your house from the earth's archives
And I'll give you as well my daughters for wives.Briton:
Lie by my keel; and lie by my shore;
Love and reject not the skin nor the core;
And I will be true till the axe fells the tree
Now let me embrace my brides of the sea.Waves:
Draw up the sheets of the nuptial bed
So white and fine, in the temple spread;
Cover the host of the priest's oblation
And screen the world from the consummation;
The seed of the two shall none resist,
Crown the brow with a wreath of mist
Veil the shrine and stitch the key,
T'is the marriage night of the Isle and the Sea.