It is a huge egg.
THE SHE-ANCIENT [freeing her arms from her robe, and placing her saws on the altar ready to her hand in a businesslike manner] A girl, I think you said?
ACIS. Yes.
THE TUNIC BEARER. It is a shame. Why cant we have more boys?
SEVERAL YOUTHS [protesting] Not at all. More girls. We want new girls.
A GIRL'S VOICE FROM THE EGG. Let me out. Let me out. I want to be born. I want to be born. [The egg rocks].
ACIS [snatching a wand from one of the others and whacking the egg with it] Be quiet, I tell you. Wait. You will be born presently.
THE EGG. No, no: at once, at once. I want to be born: I want to be born. [Violent kicking within the egg, which rocks so hard that it has to be held on the altar by the bearers].
THE SHE-ANCIENT. Silence. [The music stops; and the egg behaves itself].
The She-Ancient takes her two saws, and with a couple of strokes rips the egg open. The Newly Born, a pretty girl who would have been guessed as seventeen in our day, sits up in the broken shell, exquisitely fresh and rosy, but with filaments of spare albumen clinging to her here and there.
THE NEWLY BORN [as the world bursts on her vision] Oh! Oh!!Oh!!! Oh!!!! [She continues this ad libitum during the followingremonstrances].
ACIS. Hold your noise, will you?
The washing begins. The Newly Born shrieks and struggles.
A YOUTH. Lie quiet, you clammy little devil.
A MAIDEN. You must be washed, dear. Now quiet, quiet, quiet: be good.
ACIS. Shut your mouth, or I'll shove the sponge in it.
THE MAIDEN. Shut your eyes. Itll hurt if you don't.
ANOTHER MAIDEN. Dont be silly. One would think nobody had ever been born before.
THE NEWLY BORN [yells]!!!!!!
ACIS. Serve you right! You were told to shut your eyes.
THE YOUTH. Dry her off quick. I can hardly hold her. Shut it, will you; or I'll smack you into a pickled cabbage.
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