Bertolt Brecht: Mutter Courage und ihre Kinder 5

by Bertolt Brecht

  EILIF: Why not?

  MOTHER COURAGE: Sensible thing is stay with your mother, never mind if they poke fun at you and call you chicken, just you laugh.

  RECRUITER: If you’re pissing in your pants I’ll make do with your brother.

  MOTHER COURAGE: I told you laugh. Go on, laugh. Now you draw, Swiss Cheese. I’m not so scared on your account, you’re honest. He fishes in the helmet. Oh, why look at your slip in that strange way? It’s got to be a blank. There can’t be any cross on it. Surely I’m not going to lose you. She takes the slip. A cross? What, you too? Is that because you’re so simple, perhaps? O Swiss Cheese, you too will be sunk if you don’t stay utterly honest all the while, like I taught you from childhood when you brought the change back from the baker’s. Else you can’t save yourself. Look, sergeant, that’s a black cross, ain’t it?

  SERGEANT: A cross, that’s right. Can’t think how I come to get one. I always stay in the rear. To the recruiter: There’s no catch. Her own family get it too.

  SWISS CHEESE: I get it too. But I listen to what I’m told.

  MOTHER COURAGE to Kattrin: And now you’re the only one I know’s all right, you’re a cross yourself; got a kind heart you have. Holds the helmet up to her on the cart, but takes the slip out herself. No, that’s too much. That can’t be right; must have made a mistake shuffling. Don’t be too kindhearted, Kattrin, you’ll have to give it up, there’s a cross above your path too. Lie doggo, girl, it can’t be that hard once you’re born dumb. Right, all of you know now. Look out for yourselves, you’ll need to. And now up we get and on we go. She climbs on to the cart.

  RECRUITER to the sergeant: Do something.

  SERGEANT: I don’t feel very well.

  RECRUITER: Must of caught a chill taking your helmet off in that wind. Involve her in a deal. Aloud: Might as well have a look at that belt-buckle, sergeant. After all, our friends here have to live by their business. Hey, you people, the sergeant wants to buy that belt-buckle.

  MOTHER COURAGE: Half a florin. Two florins is what a belt like that’s worth. Climbs down again.

  SERGEANT: ‘Tain’t new. Let me get out of this damned wind and have a proper look at it. Goes behind the cart with the buckle.

  MOTHER COURAGE: Ain’t what I call windy.

  SERGEANT: I s’pose it might be worth half a florin, it’s silver.

  MOTHER COURAGE joining him behind the cart: It’s six solid ounces.

  RECRUITER to Eilif: And then we men’ll have one together. Got your bounty money here, come along. Eilif stands undecided.

  MOTHER COURAGE: Half a florin it is.

  SERGEANT: It beats me. I’m always at the rear. Sergeant’s the safest job there is. You can send the others up front, cover themselves with glory. Me dinner hour’s properly spoiled. Shan’t be able to hold nowt down, I know.

  MOTHER COURAGE: Mustn’t let it prey on you so’s you can’t eat. Just stay at the rear. Here, take a swig of brandy, man. Gives him a drink.

  RECRUITER has taken Eilifby the arm and is leading him away up stage: Ten florins bounty money, then you’re a gallant fellow fighting for the king and women’ll be after you like flies. And you can clobber me for free for insulting you.

  Exeunt both.

  Dumb Kattrin leans down from the cart and makes hoarse noises.

  MOTHER COURAGE: All right, Kattrin, all right. Sergeant’s just paying., Bites the half-florin. I got no faith in any kind of money. Burnt child, that’s me, sergeant. This coin’s good, though. And now let’s get moving. Where’s Eilif?

  SWISS CHEESE: Went off with the recruiter.

  MOTHER COURAGE stands quite still, then: You simpleton. To Kattrin: ’Tain’t your fault, you can’t speak, I know.

  SERGEANT: Could do with a swig yourself, ma. That’s life. Plenty worse things than being a soldier. Want to live off war, but keep yourself and family out of it, eh?

  MOTHER COURAGE: You’ll have to help your brother pull now, Kattrin.

  Brother and sister hitch themselves to the cart and start pulling. Mother Courage walks alongside. The cart rolls on.

  SERGEANTlooking after them:

  Like the war to nourish you?

  Have to feed it something too.

  2

  In the years 1625 and 1626 Mother Courage crosses Poland in the train of the Swedish armies. Before the fortress of Wallhof she meets her son again. Successful sale of a capon and heyday of her dashing son

  The general’s tent.

  Beside it, his kitchen. Thunder of cannon. The cook is arguing with Mother Courage, who wants to sell him a capon.

  THE COOK: Sixty hellers for a miserable bird like that?

  MOTHER COURAGE: Miserable bird? This fat brute? Mean to say some greedy old general – and watch your step if you got nowt for his dinner – can’t afford sixty hellers for him?

  THE COOK: I can get a dozen like that for ten hellers just down the road.

  MOTHER COURAGE: What, a capon like this you can get just down the road? In time of siege, which means hunger that tears your guts. A rat you might get: ‘might’ I say because they’re all being gobbled up, five men spending best part of day chasing one hungry rat. Fifty hellers for a giant capon in time of siege!

  THE COOK: But it ain’t us having the siege, it’s t’other side. We’re conducting the siege, can’t you get that in your head?

  MOTHER COURAGE: But we got nowt to eat too, even worse than them in the town. Took it with them, didn’t they? They’re having a high old time, everyone says. And look at us! I been to the peasants, there’s nowt there.

  THE COOK: There’s plenty. They’re sitting on it.

  MOTHER COURAGE triumphantly: They ain’t. They’re bust, that’s what they are. Just about starving. I saw some, were grubbing up roots from sheer hunger, licking their fingers after they boiled some old leather strap. That’s way it is. And me got a capon here and supposed to take forty hellers for it.

  THE COOK: Thirty, not forty. I said thirty.

  MOTHER COURAGE: Here, this ain’t just any old capon. It was such a gifted beast, I been told, it could only eat to music, had a military march of its own. It could count, it was that intelligent. And you say forty hellers is too much? General will make mincemeat of you if there’s nowt on his table.

  THE COOK: See what I’m doing? He takes a piece of beef and puts his knife to it. Here I got a bit of beef, I’m going to roast it. Make up your mind quick.

  MOTHER COURAGE: Go on, roast it. It’s last year’s.

  THE COOK: Last night’s. That animal was still alive and kicking, I saw him myself.

  MOTHER COURAGE: Alive and stinking, you mean.

  THE COOK: I’ll cook him five hours if need be. I’ll just see if he’s still tough. He cuts into it.

  MOTHER COURAGE: Put plenty of pepper on it so his lordship the general don’t smell the pong.

  The general, a chaplain and Eilif enter the tent.

  THE GENERAL slapping Eilif on the shoulder: Now then, Eilif my son, into your general’s tent with you and sit thou at my right hand. For you accomplished a deed of heroism, like a pious cavalier; and doing what you did for God, and in a war of religion at that, is something I commend in you most highly, you shall have a gold bracelet as soon as we’ve taken this town. Here we are, come to save their souls for them, and what do those insolent dung-encrusted yokels go and do? Drive their beef away from us. They stuff it into those priests of theirs all right, back and front, but you taught ‘em manners, ha! So here’s a pot of red wine for you, the two of us’ll knock it back at one gulp. They do so. Piss all for the chaplain, the old bigot. And now, what would you like for dinner, my darling?

  EILIF: A bit of meat, why not?

  THE GENERAL: Cook! Meat!

  THE COOK: And then he goes and brings guests when there’s nowt there.

  Mother Courage silences him so she can listen.

  EILIF: Hungry job cutting down peasants.

  MOTHER COURAGE: Jesus Christ, it’s my Eilif.

  T
HE COOK: Your what?

  MOTHER COURAGE: My eldest boy. It’s two years since I lost sight of him, they pinched him from me on the road, must think well of him if the general’s asking him to dinner, and what kind of a dinner can you offer? Nowt. You heard what the visitor wishes to eat: meat. Take my tip, you settle for the capon, it’ll be a florin.

  THE GENERAL has sat down with Eilif, and bellows: Food, Lamb, you foul cook, or I’ll have your hide.

  THE COOK: Give it over, dammit, this is blackmail.

  MOTHER COURAGE: Didn’t someone say it was a miserable bird?

  THE COOK: Miserable; give it over, and a criminal price, fifty hellers.

  MOTHER COURAGE: A florin, I said. For my eldest boy, the general’s guest, no expense is too great for me.

  THE COOK gives her the money: You might at least pluck it while I see to the fire.

  MOTHER COURAGE sits down to pluck the fowl: He won’t half be surprised to see me. He’s my dashing clever son. Then I got a stupid one too, he’s honest though. The girl’s nowt. One good thing, she don’t talk.

  THE GENERAL: Drink up, my son, this is my best Falernian; only got a barrel or two left, but that’s nothing to pay for a sign that there’s still true faith to be found in my army. As for that shepherd of souls he can just look on, because all he does is preach, without the least idea how it’s to be carried out. And now, my son Eilif, tell us more about the neat way you smashed those yokels and captured the twenty oxen. Let’s hope they get here soon.

  EILIF: A day or two at most.

  MOTHER COURAGE: Thoughtful of our Eilif not to bring the oxen in till tomorrow, else you lot wouldn’t have looked twice at my capon.

  EILIF: Well, it was like this, see. I’d heard peasants had been driving the oxen they’d hidden, out of the forest into one particular wood, on the sly and mostly by night. That’s where people from the town were s’posed to come and pick them up. So I holds off and lets them drive their oxen together, reckoning they’d be better than me at finding ‘em. I had my blokes slavering after the meat, cut their emergency rations even further for a couple of days till their mouths was watering at the least sound of any word beginning with ‘me-’, like ‘measles’ say.

  THE GENERAL: Very clever of you.

  EILIF: Possibly. The rest was a piece of cake. Except that the peasants had cudgels and outnumbered us three to one and made a murderous attack on us. Four of ‘em shoved me into a thicket, knocked my sword from my hand and bawled out ‘Surrender!’ What’s the answer, I wondered; they’re going to make mincemeat of me.

  THE GENERAL: What did you do?

  EILIF: I laughed.

  THE GENERAL: You did what?

  EILIF: Laughed. So we got talking. I put it on a business footing from the start, told them ‘Twenty florins a head’s too much. I’ll give you fifteen’. As if I was meaning to pay. That threw them, and they began scratching their heads. In a flash I’d picked up my sword and was hacking ‘em to pieces. Necessity’s the mother of invention, eh, sir?

  THE GENERAL: What is your view, pastor of souls?

  THE CHAPLAIN: That phrase is not strictly speaking in the Bible, but when Our Lord turned the five loaves into five hundred there was no war on and he could tell people to love their neighbours as they’d had enough to eat. Today it’s another story.

  THE GENERAL laughs: Quite another story. You can have a swig after all for that, you old Pharisee. To Eilif: Hacked ‘em to pieces, did you, so my gallant lads can get a proper bite to eat? What do the Scriptures say? ‘Whatsoever thou doest for the least of my brethren, thou doest for me’. And what did you do for them? Got them a good square meal of beef, because they’re not accustomed to mouldy bread, the old way was to fix a cold meal of rolls and wine in your helmet before you went out to fight for God.

  EILIF: Aye, in a flash I’d picked up my sword and was hacking them to pieces.

  THE GENERAL: You’ve the makings of a young Caesar. You ought to see the King.

  EILIF: I have from a distance. He kind of glows. I’d like to model myself on him.

  THE GENERAL: You’ve got something in common already. I appreciate soldiers like you, Eilif, men of courage. Somebody like that I treat as I would my own son. He leads him over to the map. Have a look at the situation, Eilif; it’s a long haul still.

  MOTHER COURAGE who has been listening and now angrily plucks the fowl: That must be a rotten general.

  THE COOK: He’s ravenous all right, but why rotten?

  MOTHER COURAGE: Because he’s got to have men of courage, that’s why. If he knew how to plan a proper campaign what would he be needing men of courage for? Ordinary ones would do. It’s always the same; whenever there’s a load of special virtues around it means something stinks.

  THE COOK: I thought it meant things is all right.

  MOTHER COURAGE: No, that they stink. Look, s’pose some general or king is bone stupid and leads his men up shit creek, then those men’ve got to be fearless, there’s another virtue for you. S’pose he’s stingy and hires too few soldiers, then they got to be a crowd of Hercules’s. And s’pose he’s slapdash and don’t give a bugger, then they got to be clever as monkeys else their number’s up. Same way they got to show exceptional loyalty each time he gives them impossible jobs. Nowt but virtues no proper country and no decent king or general would ever need. In decent countries folk don’t have to have virtues, the whole lot can be perfectly ordinary, average intelligence, and for all I know cowards.

  THE GENERAL: I’ll wager your father was a soldier.

  EILIF: A great soldier, I been told. My mother warned me about it. There’s a song I know.

  THE GENERAL: Sing it to us. Roars: When’s that dinner coming?

  EILIF: It’s called The Song of the Girl and the Soldier.

  He sings it, dancing a war dance with his sabre:

  The guns blaze away, and the bay’nit’ll slay

  And the water can’t hardly be colder.

  What’s the answer to ice? Keep off’s my advice!

  That’s what the girl told the soldier.

  Next thing the soldier, wiv’ a round up the spout

  Hears the band playing and gives a great shout:

  Why, it’s marching what makes you a soldier!

  So it’s down to the south and then northwards once more:

  See him catching that bay’nit in his naked paw!

  That’s what his comrades done told her.

  Oh, do not despise the advice of the wise

  Learn wisdom from those that are older

  And don’t try for things that are out of your reach –

  That’s what the girl told the soldier.

  Next thing the soldier, his bay’nit in place

  Wades into the river and laughs in her face

  Though the water comes up to his shoulder.

  When the shingle roof glints in the light o’ the moon

  We’ll be wiv’ you again, not a moment too soon!

  That’s what his comrades done told her.

  MOTHER COURAGE takes up the song in the kitchen, beating on a pot with her spoon:

  You’ll go out like a light! And the sun’ll take flight

  For your courage just makes us feel colder.

  Oh, that vanishing light! May God see that it’s right! –

  That’s what the girl told the soldier.

  EILIF: What’s that?

  MOTHER COURAGE continues singing:

  Next thing the soldier, his bay’nit in place

  Was caught by the current and went down without trace

  And the water couldn’t hardly be colder.

  The shingle roof froze in the light o’ the moon

  As both soldier and ice drifted down to their doom –

  And d’you know what his comrades done told her?

  He went out like a light. And the sunshine took flight

  For his courage just made ‘em feel colder.

  Oh, do not despise the advice of the wise!

  T
hat’s what the girl told the soldier.

  THE GENERAL: The things they get up to in my kitchen these days.

  EILIF has gone into the kitchen. He flings his arms round his mother: Fancy seeing you again, ma! Where’s the others?

  MOTHER COURAGE in his arms: Snug as a bug in a rug. They made Swiss Cheese paymaster of the Second Finnish; any road he’ll stay out of fighting that way, I couldn’t keep him out altogether.

  EILIF: How’s the old feet?

  MOTHER COURAGE: Bit tricky getting me shoes on of a morning.

  THE GENERAL has joined them: So you’re his mother, I hope you’ve got plenty more sons for me like this one.

  EILIF: Ain’t it my lucky day? You sitting out there in the kitchen, ma, hearing your son commended …

  MOTHER COURAGE: You bet I heard. Slaps his face.

  EILIF holding his cheek: What’s that for? Taking the oxen?

  MOTHER COURAGE: No. Not surrendering when those four went for you and wanted to make mincemeat of you. Didn’t I say you should look after yourself? You Finnish devil! The general and the chaplain stand in the doorway laughing.

  3

  Three years later Mother Courage is taken prisoner along with elements of a Finnish regiment. She manages to save her daughter, likewise her covered cart, but her honest son is killed

  Military camp.

  Afternoon. A flagpole with the regimental flag. From her cart, festooned now with all kinds of goods, Mother Courage has stretched a washing line to a large cannon, across which she and Kattrin are folding the washing. She is bargaining at the same time with an armourer over a sack of shot. Swiss Cheese, now wearing a paymaster’s uniform, is looking on.