_The cabin of SHEMUS RUA. The TWO MERCHANTS are sitting
one at each end of the table, with rolls of parchment
and many little heaps of gold before them. Through an
open door, at the back, one sees into an inner room, in
which there is a bed. On the bed is the body of MAIRE
with candles about it._
FIRST MERCHANT.
The woman may keep robbing us no more,
For there are only mice now in her coffers.
SECOND MERCHANT.
Last night, closed in the image of an owl,
I hurried to the cliffs of Donegal,
And saw, creeping on the uneasy surge,
Those ships that bring the woman grain and meal;
They are five days from us.
FIRST MERCHANT.
I hurried East,
A gray owl flitting, flitting in the dew,
And saw nine hundred oxen toil through Meath
Driven on by goads of iron; they, too, brother,
Are full five days from us.
SECOND MERCHANT.
Five days for traffic.
[_While they have been speaking the peasants have come
in, led by TEIG and SHEMUS, who take their stations,
one on each side of the door, and keep them marshalled
into rude order and encourage them from time to time
with gestures and whispered words._
Here throng they; since the drouth they go in throngs,
Like autumn leaves blown by the dreary winds.
Come, deal—come, deal.
FIRST MERCHANT.
Who will come deal with us?
SHEMUS.
They are out of spirit, sir, with lack of food,
Save four or five. Here, sir, is one of these;
The others will gain courage in good time.
A MIDDLE-AGED MAN.
I come to deal if you give honest price.
FIRST MERCHANT.
[_Reading in a parchment._]
John Maher, a man of substance, with dull mind,
And quiet senses and unventurous heart.
The angels think him safe. Two hundred crowns,
All for a soul, a little breath of wind.
THE MAN.
I ask three hundred crowns. You have read there,
That no mere lapse of days can make me yours.
FIRST MERCHANT.
There is something more writ here—often at night
He is wakeful from a dread of growing poor.
There is this crack in you—two hundred crowns.
[_THE MAN takes them and goes._
SECOND MERCHANT.
Come, deal—one would half think you had no souls.
If only for the credit of your parishes,
Come, deal, deal, deal, or will you always starve?
Maire, the wife of Shemus, would not deal,
She starved—she lies in there with red wallflowers,
And candles stuck in bottles round her bed.
A WOMAN.
What price, now, will you give for mine?
FIRST MERCHANT.
Ay, ay,
Soft, handsome, and still young—not much, I think.
[_Reading in the parchment._
She has love letters in a little jar
On the high shelf between the pepper-pot
And wood-cased hour-glass.
THE WOMAN.
O, the scandalous parchment!
FIRST MERCHANT [_reading_].
She hides them from her husband, who buys horses,
And is not much at home. You are almost safe.
I give you fifty crowns. [_She turns to go._
A hundred, then.
[_She takes them, and goes into the crowd._
Come—deal, deal, deal; it is for charity
We buy such souls at all; a thousand sins
Made them our master’s long before we came.
Come, deal—come, deal. You seem resolved to starve
Until your bones show through your skin. Come, deal,
Or live on nettles, grass, and dandelion.
Or do you dream the famine will go by?
The famine is hale and hearty; it is mine
And my great master’s; it shall no wise cease
Until our purpose end: the yellow vapour
That brought it bears it over your dried fields
And fills with violent phantoms of the lost,
And grows more deadly as day copies day.
See how it dims the daylight. Is that peace
Known to the birds of prey so dread a thing?
They, and the souls obedient to our master,
And those who live with that great other spirit
Have gained an end, a peace, while you but toss
And swing upon a moving balance beam.
[_ALEEL enters; the wires of his harp are broken._
ALEEL.
Here, take my soul, for I am tired of it;
I do not ask a price.
FIRST MERCHANT [_reading_].
A man of songs:
Alone in the hushed passion of romance,
His mind ran all on sidheoges and on tales
Of Fenian labours and the Red Branch kings,
And he cared nothing for the life of man:
But now all changes.
ALEEL.
Ay, because her face,
The face of Countess Cathleen, dwells with me:
The sadness of the world upon her brow:
The crying of these strings grew burdensome,
Therefore I tore them; see; now take my soul.
FIRST MERCHANT.
We cannot take your soul, for it is hers.
ALEEL.
Ah, take it; take it. It nowise can help her,
And, therefore, do I tire of it.
FIRST MERCHANT.
No; no.
We may not touch it.
ALEEL.
Is your power so small,
Must I then bear it with me all my days?
May scorn close deep about you!
FIRST MERCHANT.
Lead him hence;
He troubles me.
[_TEIG and SHEMUS lead ALEEL into the crowd._
SECOND MERCHANT.
His gaze has filled me, brother,
With shaking and a dreadful fear.
FIRST MERCHANT.
Lean forward
And kiss the circlet where my master’s lips
Were pressed upon it when he sent us hither:
You will have peace once more.
[_The SECOND MERCHANT kisses the gold circlet that is
about the head of the FIRST MERCHANT._
SHEMUS.
He is called Aleel,
And has been crazy now these many days;
But has no harm in him: his fits soon pass,
And one can go and lead him like a child.
FIRST MERCHANT.
Come, deal, deal, deal, deal, deal; you are all dumb?
SHEMUS.
They say you beat the woman down too low.
FIRST MERCHANT.
I offer this great price: a thousand crowns
For an old woman who was always ugly.
[_An old peasant woman comes forward, and he takes up a parchment and
reads._]
There is but little set down here against her;
She stole fowl sometimes when the harvest failed,
But always went to chapel twice a week,
And paid her dues when prosperous. Take your money.
THE OLD PEASANT WOMAN [_curtseying_].
God bless you, sir. [_She screams._
O, sir, a pain went through me.
FIRST MERCHANT.
That name is like a fire to all damned souls.
Begone. [_She goes._] See how the red gold pieces glitter.
Deal: do you fear because an old hag screamed?
Are you all cowards?
A PEASANT.
Nay, I am no coward.
I will sell half my soul.
FIRST MERCHANT.
How half your soul?
THE PEASANT.
Half my chance of heaven.
FIRST MERCHANT.
It is writ here
This man in all things takes the moderate course,
He sits on midmost of the balance beam,
And no man has had good of him or evil.
Begone, we will not buy you.
SECOND MERCHANT.
Deal, come, deal.
FIRST MERCHANT.
What, will you keep us from our ancient home,
And from the eternal revelry? Come, deal,
And we will hence to our great master again.
Come, deal, deal, deal.
THE PEASANTS SHOUT.
The Countess Cathleen comes!
CATHLEEN [_entering_].
And so you trade once more?
FIRST MERCHANT.
In spite of you.
What brings you here, saint with the sapphire eyes?
CATHLEEN.
I come to barter a soul for a great price.
FIRST MERCHANT.
What matter if the soul be worth the price?
CATHLEEN.
The people starve, therefore the people go
Thronging to you. I hear a cry come from them,
And it is in my ears by night and day;
And I would have five hundred thousand crowns,
That I may feed them till the dearth go by;
And have the wretched spirits you have bought
For your gold crowns released and sent to God.
The soul that I would barter is my soul.
A PEASANT.
Do not, do not; the souls of us poor folk
Are not precious to God as your soul is.
O! what would heaven do without you, lady?
ANOTHER PEASANT.
Look how their claws clutch in their leathern gloves.
FIRST MERCHANT.
Five hundred thousand crowns; we give the price,
The gold is here; the spirits, while you speak,
Begin to labour upward, for your face
Sheds a great light on them and fills their hearts
With those unveilings of the fickle light,
Whereby our heavy labours have been marred
Since first His spirit moved upon the deeps
And stole them from us; even before this day
The souls were but half ours, for your bright eyes
Had pierced them through and robbed them of content.
But you must sign, for we omit no form
In buying a soul like yours; sign with this quill;
It was a feather growing on the cock
That crowed when Peter dared deny his Master,
And all who use it have great honour in Hell.
[_CATHLEEN leans forward to sign._
ALEEL.
[_Rushing forward and snatching the parchment from her._]
Leave all things to the builder of the heavens.
CATHLEEN.
I have no thoughts: I hear a cry—a cry.
ALEEL.
[_Casting the parchment on the ground._]
I had a vision under a green hedge,
A hedge of hips and haws—men yet shall hear
The archangels rolling Satan’s empty skull
Over the mountain-tops.
FIRST MERCHANT.
Take him away.
[_TEIG and SHEMUS drag him roughly away so that he
falls upon the floor among the peasants. CATHLEEN picks
up the parchment and signs, and then turns towards the
peasants._
CATHLEEN.
Take up the money; and now come with me.
When we are far from this polluted place
I will give everybody money enough.
[_She goes out, the peasants crowding round her and
kissing her dress. ALEEL and the TWO MERCHANTS are left
alone._
SECOND MERCHANT.
Now are our days of heavy labour done.
FIRST MERCHANT.
We have a precious jewel for Satan’s crown.
SECOND MERCHANT.
We must away, and wait until she dies,
Sitting above her tower as two gray owls,
Watching as many years as may be, guarding
Our precious jewel; waiting to seize her soul.
FIRST MERCHANT.
We need but hover over her head in the air,
For she has only minutes: when she came
I saw the dimness of the tomb in her,
And marked her walking as with leaden shoes
And looking on the ground as though the worms
Were calling her, and when she wrote her name
Her heart began to break. Hush! hush! I hear
The brazen door of Hell move on its hinges,
And the eternal revelry float hither
To hearten us.
SECOND MERCHANT.
Leap, feathered, on the air
And meet them with her soul caught in your claws.
[_They rush out. ALEEL crawls into the middle of the
room. The twilight has fallen and gradually darkens
as the scene goes on. There is a distant muttering of
thunder and a sound of rising storm._
ALEEL.
The brazen door stands wide, and Balor comes
Borne in his heavy car, and demons have lifted
The age-weary eyelids from the eyes that of old
Turned gods to stone; Barach the traitor comes;
And the lascivious race, Cailitin,
That cast a druid weakness and decay
Over Sualtam’s and old Dectora’s child;
And that great king Hell first took hold upon
When he killed Naisi and broke Deirdre’s heart;
And all their heads are twisted to one side,
For when they lived they warred on beauty and peace
With obstinate, crafty, sidelong bitterness.
[_OONA enters, but remains standing by the door. ALEEL
half rises, leaning upon one arm and one knee._]
Crouch down, old heron, out of the blind storm.
OONA.
Where is the Countess Cathleen? All this day
She has been pale and weakly: when her hand
Touched mine over the spindle her hand trembled,
And now I do not know where she has gone.
ALEEL.
Cathleen has chosen other friends than us,
And they are rising through the hollow world.
[_He points downwards._
First, Orchil, her pale beautiful head alive,
Her body shadowy as vapour drifting
Under the dawn, for she who awoke desire
Has but a heart of blood when others die;
About her is a vapoury multitude
Of women, alluring devils with soft laughter;
Behind her a host heat of the blood made sin,
But all the little pink-white nails have grown
To be great talons.
[_He seizes OONA and drags her into the middle of the
room and points downwards with vehement gestures. The
wind roars._]
They begin a song
And there is still some music on their tongues.
OONA.
[_Casting herself face downwards on the floor._]
O maker of all, protect her from the demons,
And if a soul must needs be lost, take mine.
[_ALEEL kneels beside her, but does not seem to hear
her words; he is gazing down as if through the earth.
The peasants return. They carry the COUNTESS CATHLEEN
and lay her upon the ground before OONA and ALEEL. She
lies there as if dead._]
O that so many pitchers of rough clay
Should prosper and the porcelain break in two!
[_She kisses the hands of the COUNTESS CATHLEEN._
A PEASANT.
We were under the tree where the path turns
When she grew pale as death and fainted away,
And while we bore her hither, cloudy gusts
Blackened the world and shook us on our feet:
Draw the great bolt, for no man has beheld
So black, bitter, blinding, and sudden a storm.
[_One who is near the door draws the bolt._
OONA.
Hush, hush, she has awakened from her swoon.
CATHLEEN.
O hold me, and hold me tightly, for the storm
Is dragging me away!
[_OONA takes her in her arms. A woman begins to wail._
A PEASANT.
Hush.
ANOTHER PEASANT.
Hush.
A PEASANT WOMAN.
Hush.
ANOTHER PEASANT WOMAN.
Hush.
CATHLEEN [_half rising_].
Lay all the bags of money at my feet.
[_They lay the bags at her feet._
And send and bring old Neal when I am dead,
And bid him hear each man and judge and give:
He doctors you with herbs, and can best say
Who has the less and who the greater need.
A PEASANT WOMAN.
[_At the back of the crowd._]
And will he give enough out of the bags
To keep my children till the dearth go by?
ANOTHER PEASANT WOMAN.
O Queen of Heaven and all you blessed Saints,
Let us and ours be lost, so she be shriven.
CATHLEEN.
Bend down your faces, Oona and Aleel:
I gaze upon them as the swallow gazes
Upon the nest under the eave, before
He wander the loud waters: do not weep
Too great a while, for there is many a candle
On the high altar though one fall. Aleel,
Who sang about the people of the raths,
That know not the hard burden of the world,
Having but breath in their kind bodies, farewell!
And farewell, Oona, who spun flax with me
Soft as their sleep when every dance is done:
The storm is in my hair and I must go.
[_She dies._
OONA.
Bring me the looking-glass.
[_A woman brings it to her out of the inner room. OONA holds the glass
over the lips of the COUNTESS CATHLEEN. All is silent for a moment; and
then she speaks in a half scream._]
O, she is dead!
A PEASANT WOMAN.
She was the great white lily of the world.
ANOTHER PEASANT WOMAN.
She was more beautiful than the pale stars.
AN OLD PEASANT WOMAN.
The little plant I loved is broken in two.
[_ALEEL takes the looking-glass from OONA and flings it
upon the floor so that it is broken in many pieces._
ALEEL.
I shatter you in fragments, for the face
That brimmed you up with beauty is no more:
And die, dull heart, for she whose mournful words
Made you a living spirit has passed away
And left you but a ball of passionate dust;
And you, proud earth and plumy sea, fade out,
For you may hear no more her faltering feet,
But are left lonely amid the clamorous war
Of angels upon devils.
[_He stands up; almost everyone is kneeling, but it has grown so dark
that only confused forms can be seen._]
And I who weep
Call curses on you, Time and Fate and Change,
And have no excellent hope but the great hour
When you shall plunge headlong through bottomless space.
[_A flash of lightning followed immediately by thunder._
A PEASANT WOMAN.
Pull him upon his knees before his curses
Have plucked thunder and lightning on our heads.
ALEEL.
Angels and devils clash in the middle air,
And brazen swords clang upon brazen helms:
[_A flash of lightning followed immediately by thunder._]
Yonder a bright spear, cast out of a sling,
Has torn through Balor’s eye, and the dark clans
Fly screaming as they fled Moytura of old.
[_Everything is lost in darkness._
AN OLD MAN.
The Almighty, wrath at our great weakness and sin,
Has blotted out the world and we must die.
[_The darkness is broken by a visionary light. The
peasants seem to be kneeling upon the rocky slope of a
mountain, and vapour full of storm and ever-changing
light is sweeping above them and behind them. Half in
the light, half in the shadow, stand armed Angels.
Their armour is old and worn, and their drawn swords
dim and dinted. They stand as if upon the air in
formation of battle and look downward with stern faces.
The peasants cast themselves on the ground._
ALEEL.
Look no more on the half-closed gates of Hell,
But speak to me, whose mind is smitten of God,
That it may be no more with mortal things;
And tell of her who lies here.
[_He seizes one of the Angels._] Till you speak
You shall not drift into eternity.
THE ANGEL.
The light beats down: the gates of pearl are wide,
And she is passing to the floor of peace,
And Mary of the seven times wounded heart
Has kissed her lips, and the long blessed hair
Has fallen on her face; the Light of Lights
Looks always on the motive, not the deed,
The Shadow of Shadows on the deed alone.
[_ALEEL releases the Angel and kneels._
OONA.
Tell them who walk upon the floor of peace
That I would die and go to her I love;
The years like great black oxen tread the world,
And God the herdsman goads them on behind,
And I am broken by their passing feet.
[_A sound of far-off horns seems to come from the heart
of the light. The vision melts away, and the forms of
the kneeling peasants appear faintly in the darkness._]
THE LAND OF HEART’S DESIRE
‘O Rose, thou art sick.’—_William Blake._
TO FLORENCE FARR
_PERSONS IN THE PLAY_
MAURTEEN BRUIN
SHAWN BRUIN
FATHER HART
BRIDGET BRUIN
MAIRE BRUIN
A FAERY CHILD
_The scene is laid in the Barony of Kilmacowen, in the County of Sligo,
and the characters are supposed to speak in Gaelic. They wear the
costume of a century ago._
THE LAND OF HEART’S DESIRE
_The kitchen of MAURTEEN BRUIN’S house. An open grate
with a turf fire is at the left side of the room, with
a table in front of it. There is a door leading to the
open air at the back, and another door a little to its
left, leading into an inner room. There is a window, a
settle, and a large dresser on the right side of the
room, and a great bowl of primroses on the sill of
the window. MAURTEEN BRUIN, FATHER HART, and BRIDGET
BRUIN are sitting at the table. SHAWN BRUIN is setting
the table for supper. MAIRE BRUIN sits on the settle
reading a yellow manuscript._
BRIDGET BRUIN.
Because I bade her go and feed the calves,
She took that old book down out of the thatch
And has been doubled over it all day.
We would be deafened by her groans and moans
Had she to work as some do, Father Hart,
Get up at dawn like me, and mend and scour;
Or ride abroad in the boisterous night like you,
The pyx and blessed bread under your arm.
SHAWN BRUIN.
You are too cross.
BRIDGET BRUIN.
The young side with the young.
MAURTEEN BRUIN.
She quarrels with my wife a bit at times,
And is too deep just now in the old book,
But do not blame her greatly; she will grow
As quiet as a puff-ball in a tree
When but the moons of marriage dawn and die
For half a score of times.
FATHER HART.
Their hearts are wild
As be the hearts of birds, till children come.
BRIDGET BRUIN.
She would not mind the griddle, milk the cow,
Or even lay the knives and spread the cloth.
FATHER HART.
I never saw her read a book before;
What may it be?
MAURTEEN BRUIN.
I do not rightly know;
It has been in the thatch for fifty years.
My father told me my grandfather wrote it,
Killed a red heifer and bound it with the hide.
But draw your chair this way—supper is spread.
And little good he got out of the book,
Because it filled his house with roaming bards,
And roaming ballad-makers and the like,
And wasted all his goods.—Here is the wine:
The griddle bread’s beside you, Father Hart.
Colleen, what have you got there in the book
That you must leave the bread to cool? Had I,
Or had my father, read or written books
There were no stocking full of silver and gold
To come, when I am dead, to Shawn and you.
FATHER HART.
You should not fill your head with foolish dreams.
What are you reading?
MAIRE BRUIN.
How a Princess Edain,
A daughter of a King of Ireland, heard
A voice singing on a May Eve like this,
And followed, half awake and half asleep,
Until she came into the land of faery,
Where nobody gets old and godly and grave,
Where nobody gets old and crafty and wise,
Where nobody gets old and bitter of tongue;
And she is still there, busied with a dance,
Deep in the dewy shadow of a wood,
Or where stars walk upon a mountain-top.
MAURTEEN BRUIN.
Persuade the colleen to put by the book:
My grandfather would mutter just such things,
And he was no judge of a dog or horse,
And any idle boy could blarney him:
Just speak your mind.
FATHER HART.
Put it away, my colleen.
God spreads the heavens above us like great wings,
And gives a little round of deeds and days,
And then come the wrecked angels and set snares,
And bait them with light hopes and heavy dreams,
Until the heart is puffed with pride and goes,
Half shuddering and half joyous, from God’s peace:
And it was some wrecked angel, blind from tears,
Who flattered Edain’s heart with merry words.
My colleen, I have seen some other girls
Restless and ill at ease, but years went by
And they grew like their neighbours and were glad
In minding children, working at the churn,
And gossiping of weddings and of wakes;
For life moves out of a red flare of dreams
Into a common light of common hours,
Until old age bring the red flare again.
SHAWN BRUIN.
Yet do not blame her greatly, Father Hart,
For she is dull while I am in the fields,
And mother’s tongue were harder still to bear,
But for her fancies: this is May Eve too,
When the good people post about the world,
And surely one may think of them to-night.
Maire, have you the primroses to fling
Before the door to make a golden path
For them to bring good luck into the house?
Remember, they may steal new-married brides
After the fall of twilight on May Eve.
[_MAIRE BRUIN goes over to the window and takes flowers
from the bowl and strews them outside the door._
FATHER HART.
You do well, daughter, because God permits
Great power to the good people on May Eve.
SHAWN BRUIN.
They can work all their will with primroses;
Change them to golden money, or little flames
To burn up those who do them any wrong.
MAIRE BRUIN [_in a dreamy voice_].
I had no sooner flung them by the door
Than the wind cried and hurried them away;
And then a child came running in the wind
And caught them in her hands and fondled them:
Her dress was green: her hair was of red gold;
Her face was pale as water before dawn.
FATHER HART.
Whose child can this be?
MAURTEEN BRUIN.
No one’s child at all.
She often dreams that someone has gone by
When there was nothing but a puff of wind.
MAIRE BRUIN.
They will not bring good luck into the house,
For they have blown the primroses away;
Yet I am glad that I was courteous to them,
For are not they, likewise, children of God?
FATHER HART.
Colleen, they are the children of the Fiend,
And they have power until the end of Time,
When God shall fight with them a great pitched battle
And hack them into pieces.
MAIRE BRUIN.
He will smile,
Father, perhaps, and open His great door,
And call the pretty and kind into His house.
FATHER HART.
Did but the lawless angels see that door,
They would fall, slain by everlasting peace;
And when such angels knock upon our doors
Who goes with them must drive through the same storm.
[_A knock at the door. MAIRE BRUIN opens it and then
goes to the dresser and fills a porringer with milk and
hands it through the door and takes it back empty and
closes the door._
MAIRE BRUIN.
A little queer old woman cloaked in green,
Who came to beg a porringer of milk.
BRIDGET BRUIN.
The good people go asking milk and fire
Upon May Eve.—Woe on the house that gives,
For they have power upon it for a year.
I knew you would bring evil on the house.
MAURTEEN BRUIN.
Who was she?
MAIRE BRUIN.
Both the tongue and face were strange.
MAURTEEN BRUIN.
Some strangers came last week to Clover Hill;
She must be one of them.
BRIDGET BRUIN.
I am afraid.
MAURTEEN BRUIN.
The priest will keep all harm out of the house.
FATHER HART.
The cross will keep all harm out of the house
While it hangs there.
MAURTEEN BRUIN.
Come, sit beside me, colleen,
And put away your dreams of discontent,
For I would have you light up my last days
Like a bright torch of pine, and when I die
I will make you the wealthiest hereabout:
For hid away where nobody can find
I have a stocking full of silver and gold.
BRIDGET BRUIN.
You are the fool of every pretty face,
And I must pinch and pare that my son’s wife
May have all kinds of ribbons for her head.
MAURTEEN BRUIN.
Do not be cross; she is a right good girl!
The butter is by your elbow, Father Hart.
My colleen, have not Fate and Time and Change
Done well for me and for old Bridget there?
We have a hundred acres of good land,
And sit beside each other at the fire,
The wise priest of our parish to our right,
And you and our dear son to left of us.
To sit beside the board and drink good wine
And watch the turf smoke coiling from the fire
And feel content and wisdom in your heart,
This is the best of life; when we are young
We long to tread a way none trod before,
But find the excellent old way through love
And through the care of children to the hour
For bidding Fate and Time and Change good-bye.
[_A knock at the door. MAIRE BRUIN opens it and then
takes a sod of turf out of the hearth in the tongs and
passes it through the door and closes the door and
remains standing by it._
MAIRE BRUIN.
A little queer old man in a green coat,
Who asked a burning sod to light his pipe.
BRIDGET BRUIN.
You have now given milk and fire, and brought,
For all you know, evil upon the house.
Before you married you were idle and fine,
And went about with ribbons on your head;
And now you are a good-for-nothing wife.
SHAWN BRUIN.
Be quiet, mother!
MAURTEEN BRUIN.
You are much too cross!
MAIRE BRUIN.
What do I care if I have given this house,
Where I must hear all day a bitter tongue,
Into the power of faeries!
BRIDGET BRUIN.
You know well
How calling the good people by that name
Or talking of them over-much at all
May bring all kinds of evil on the house.
MAIRE BRUIN.
Come, faeries, take me out of this dull house!
Let me have all the freedom I have lost;
Work when I will and idle when I will!
Faeries, come, take me out of this dull world,
For I would ride with you upon the wind,
Run on the top of the dishevelled tide,
And dance upon the mountains like a flame!
FATHER HART.
You cannot know the meaning of your words.
MAIRE BRUIN.
Father, I am right weary of four tongues:
A tongue that is too crafty and too wise,
A tongue that is too godly and too grave,
A tongue that is more bitter than the tide,
And a kind tongue too full of drowsy love,
Of drowsy love and my captivity.
[_SHAWN BRUIN comes over to her and leads her to the
settle._
SHAWN BRUIN.
Do not blame me; I often lie awake
Thinking that all things trouble your bright head—
How beautiful it is—such broad pale brows
Under a cloudy blossoming of hair!
Sit down beside me here—these are too old,
And have forgotten they were ever young.
MAIRE BRUIN.
O, you are the great door-post of this house,
And I, the red nasturtium, climbing up.
[_She takes SHAWN’S hand, but looks shyly at the priest
and lets it go._
FATHER HART.
Good daughter, take his hand—by love alone
God binds us to Himself and to the hearth
And shuts us from the waste beyond His peace,
From maddening freedom and bewildering light.
SHAWN BRUIN.
Would that the world were mine to give it you
With every quiet hearth and barren waste,
The maddening freedom of its woods and tides,
And the bewildering light upon its hills.
MAIRE BRUIN.
Then I would take and break it in my hands
To see you smile watching it crumble away.
SHAWN BRUIN.
Then I would mould a world of fire and dew
With no one bitter, grave, or over-wise,
And nothing marred or old to do you wrong;
And crowd the enraptured quiet of the sky
With candles burning to your lonely face.
MAIRE BRUIN.
Your looks are all the candles that I need.
SHAWN BRUIN.
Once a fly dancing in a beam of the sun,
Or the light wind blowing out of the dawn,
Could fill your heart with dreams none other knew,
But now the indissoluble sacrament
Has mixed your heart that was most proud and cold
With my warm heart for ever; and sun and moon
Must fade and heaven be rolled up like a scroll;
But your white spirit still walk by my spirit.
[_A VOICE sings in the distance._
MAIRE BRUIN.
Did you hear something call? O, guard me close,
Because I have said wicked things to-night;
And seen a pale-faced child with red-gold hair,
And longed to dance upon the winds with her.
A VOICE [_close to the door_].
_The wind blows out of the gates of the day,
The wind blows over the lonely of heart,
And the lonely of heart is withered away,
While the faeries dance in a place apart,
Shaking their milk-white feet in a ring,
Tossing their milk-white arms in the air;
For they hear the wind laugh, and murmur and sing
Of a land where even the old are fair,
And even the wise are merry of tongue;
But I heard a reed of Coolaney say,
‘When the wind has laughed and murmured and sung,
The lonely of heart is withered away!’_
MAURTEEN BRUIN.
I am right happy, and would make all else
Be happy too. I hear a child outside,
And will go bring her in out of the cold.
[_He opens the door. A CHILD dressed in pale green and
with red-gold hair comes into the house._
THE CHILD.
I tire of winds and waters and pale lights!
MAURTEEN BRUIN.
You are most welcome. It is cold out there;
Who’d think to face such cold on a May Eve?
THE CHILD.
And when I tire of this warm little house
There is one here who must away, away,
To where the woods, the stars, and the white streams
Are holding a continual festival.
MAURTEEN BRUIN.
O listen to her dreamy and strange talk.
Come to the fire.
THE CHILD.
I will sit upon your knee,
For I have run from where the winds are born,
And long to rest my feet a little while.
[_She sits upon his knee._
BRIDGET BRUIN.
How pretty you are!
MAURTEEN BRUIN.
Your hair is wet with dew!
BRIDGET BRUIN.
I will warm your chilly feet.
[_She takes THE CHILD’S feet in her hands._
MAURTEEN BRUIN.
You must have come
A long, long way, for I have never seen
Your pretty face, and must be tired and hungry;
Here is some bread and wine.
THE CHILD.
The wine is bitter.
Old mother, have you no sweet food for me?
BRIDGET BRUIN.
I have some honey!
[_She goes into the next room._
MAURTEEN BRUIN.
You are a dear child;
The mother was quite cross before you came.
[_BRIDGET returns with the honey, and goes to the
dresser and fills a porringer with milk._
BRIDGET BRUIN.
She is the child of gentle people; look
At her white hands and at her pretty dress.
I have brought you some new milk, but wait awhile,
And I will put it by the fire to warm,
For things well fitted for poor folk like us
Would never please a high-born child like you.
THE CHILD.
Old mother, my old mother, the green dawn
Brightens above while you blow up the fire;
And evening finds you spreading the white cloth.
The young may lie in bed and dream and hope,
But you work on because your heart is old.
BRIDGET BRUIN.
The young are idle.
THE CHILD.
Old father, you are wise,
And all the years have gathered in your heart
To whisper of the wonders that are gone.
The young must sigh through many a dream and hope,
But you are wise because your heart is old.
MAURTEEN BRUIN.
O, who would think to find so young a child
Loving old age and wisdom?
[_BRIDGET gives her more bread and honey._
THE CHILD.
No more, mother.
MAURTEEN BRUIN.
What a small bite! The milk is ready now;
What a small sip!
THE CHILD.
Put on my shoes, old mother,
For I would like to dance now I have eaten.
The reeds are dancing by Coolaney lake,
And I would like to dance until the reeds
And the white waves have danced themselves to sleep.
[_BRIDGET having put on her shoes, she gets off the old
man’s knees and is about to dance, but suddenly sees
the crucifix and shrieks and covers her eyes._]
What is that ugly thing on the black cross?
FATHER HART.
You cannot know how naughty your words are!
That is our Blessed Lord!
THE CHILD.
Hide it away!
BRIDGET BRUIN.
I have begun to be afraid, again!
THE CHILD.
Hide it away!
MAURTEEN BRUIN.
That would be wickedness!
BRIDGET BRUIN.
That would be sacrilege!
THE CHILD.
The tortured thing!
Hide it away!
MAURTEEN BRUIN.
Her parents are to blame.
FATHER HART.
That is the image of the Son of God.
[_THE CHILD puts her arm round his neck and kisses him._
THE CHILD.
Hide it away! Hide it away!
MAURTEEN BRUIN.
No! no!
FATHER HART.
Because you are so young and little a child
I will go take it down.
THE CHILD.
Hide it away,
And cover it out of sight and out of mind.
[_FATHER HART takes it down and carries it towards the
inner room._
FATHER HART.
Since you have come into this barony,
I will instruct you in our blessed faith:
Being a clever child, you will soon learn.
[_To the others._] We must be tender with all budding things.
Our Maker let no thought of Calvary
Trouble the morning stars in their first song.
[_Puts the crucifix in the inner room._
THE CHILD.
Here is level ground for dancing. I will dance.
The wind is blowing on the waving reeds,
The wind is blowing on the heart of man.
[_She dances, swaying about like the reeds._
MAIRE [_to SHAWN BRUIN_].
Just now when she came near I thought I heard
Other small steps beating upon the floor,
And a faint music blowing in the wind,
Invisible pipes giving her feet the time.
SHAWN BRUIN.
I heard no step but hers.
MAIRE BRUIN.
Look to the bolt!
Because the unholy powers are abroad.
MAURTEEN BRUIN [_to THE CHILD_].
Come over here, and if you promise me
Not to talk wickedly of holy things
I will give you something.
THE CHILD.
Bring it me, old father!
[_MAURTEEN BRUIN goes into the next room._
FATHER HART.
I will have queen cakes when you come to me!
[_MAURTEEN BRUIN returns and lays a piece of money on
the table. THE CHILD makes a gesture of refusal._
MAURTEEN BRUIN.
It will buy lots of toys; see how it glitters!
THE CHILD.
Come, tell me, do you love me?
MAURTEEN BRUIN.
I love you!
THE CHILD.
Ah, but you love this fireside!
FATHER HART.
I love you.
THE CHILD.
But you love Him above.
BRIDGET BRUIN.
She is blaspheming.
THE CHILD [_to MAIRE_].
And do you love me?
MAIRE BRUIN.
I—I do not know.
THE CHILD.
You love that great tall fellow over there:
Yet I could make you ride upon the winds,
Run on the top of the dishevelled tide,
And dance upon the mountains like a flame!
MAIRE BRUIN.
Queen of the Angels and kind Saints, defend us!
Some dreadful fate has fallen: a while ago
The wind cried out and took the primroses,
And she ran by me laughing in the wind,
And I gave milk and fire, and she came in
And made you hide the blessed crucifix.
FATHER HART.
You fear because of her wild, pretty prattle;
She knows no better.
[_To THE CHILD_] Child, how old are you?
THE CHILD.
When winter sleep is abroad my hair grows thin,
My feet unsteady. When the leaves awaken
My mother carries me in her golden arms.
I’ll soon put on my womanhood and marry
The spirits of wood and water, but who can tell
When I was born for the first time? I think
I am much older than the eagle cock
That blinks and blinks on Ballygawley Hill,
And he is the oldest thing under the moon.
FATHER HART.
She is of the faery people.
THE CHILD.
I am Brig’s daughter.
I sent my messengers for milk and fire,
And then I heard one call to me and came.
[_They all except MAIRE BRUIN gather about the priest
for protection. MAIRE BRUIN stays on the settle in a
stupor of terror. THE CHILD takes primroses from the
great bowl and begins to strew them between herself and
the priest and about MAIRE BRUIN. During the following
dialogue SHAWN BRUIN goes more than once to the brink
of the primroses, but shrinks back to the others
timidly._
FATHER HART.
I will confront this mighty spirit alone.
[_They cling to him and hold him back._
THE CHILD [_while she strews the primroses_].
No one whose heart is heavy with human tears
Can cross these little cressets of the wood.
FATHER HART.
Be not afraid, the Father is with us,
And all the nine angelic hierarchies,
The Holy Martyrs and the Innocents,
The adoring Magi in their coats of mail,
And He who died and rose on the third day,
And Mary with her seven times wounded heart.
[_THE CHILD ceases strewing the primroses, and kneels
upon the settle beside MAIRE and puts her arms about
her neck._]
Cry, daughter, to the Angels and the Saints.
THE CHILD.
You shall go with me, newly-married bride,
And gaze upon a merrier multitude;
White-armed Nuala and Aengus of the birds,
And Feacra of the hurtling foam, and him
Who is the ruler of the western host,
Finvarra, and their Land of Heart’s Desire,
Where beauty has no ebb, decay no flood,
But joy is wisdom, Time an endless song.
I kiss you and the world begins to fade.
FATHER HART.
Daughter, I call you unto home and love!
THE CHILD.
Stay, and come with me, newly-married bride,
For, if you hear him, you grow like the rest:
Bear children, cook, be mindful of the churn,
And wrangle over butter, fowl, and eggs,
And sit at last there, old and bitter of tongue,
Watching the white stars war upon your hopes.
FATHER HART.
Daughter, I point you out the way to heaven.
THE CHILD.
But I can lead you, newly-married bride,
Where nobody gets old and crafty and wise,
Where nobody gets old and godly and grave,
Where nobody gets old and bitter of tongue,
And where kind tongues bring no captivity,
For we are only true to the far lights
We follow singing, over valley and hill.
FATHER HART.
By the dear name of the One crucified,
I bid you, Maire Bruin, come to me.
THE CHILD.
I keep you in the name of your own heart!
[_She leaves the settle, and stooping takes up a mass
of primroses and kisses them._]
We have great power to-night, dear golden folk,
For he took down and hid the crucifix.
And my invisible brethren fill the house;
I hear their footsteps going up and down.
O, they shall soon rule all the hearts of men
And own all lands; last night they merrily danced
About his chapel belfry! [_To MAIRE_] Come away,
I hear my brethren bidding us away!
FATHER HART.
I will go fetch the crucifix again.
[_They hang about him in terror and prevent him from
moving._
BRIDGET BRUIN.
The enchanted flowers will kill us if you go.
MAURTEEN BRUIN.
They turn the flowers to little twisted flames.
SHAWN BRUIN.
The little twisted flames burn up the heart.
THE CHILD.
I hear them crying, ‘Newly-married bride,
Come to the woods and waters and pale lights.’
MAIRE BRUIN.
I will go with you.
FATHER HART.
She is lost, alas!
THE CHILD [_standing by the door_].
Then, follow: but the heavy body of clay
And clinging mortal hope must fall from you,
For we who ride the winds, run on the waves,
And dance upon the mountains, are more light
Than dewdrops on the banners of the dawn.
MAIRE BRUIN.
Then take my soul. [_SHAWN BRUIN goes over to her._
SHAWN BRUIN.
Beloved, do not leave me!
Remember when I met you by the well
And took your hand in mine and spoke of love.
MAIRE BRUIN.
Dear face! Dear voice!
THE CHILD.
Come, newly-married bride!
MAIRE BRUIN.
I always loved her world—and yet—and yet—
[_Sinks into his arms._
THE CHILD [_from the door_].
White bird, white bird, come with me, little bird.
MAIRE BRUIN.
She calls my soul!
THE CHILD.
Come with me, little bird!
MAIRE BRUIN.
I can hear songs and dancing!
SHAWN BRUIN.
Stay with me!
MAIRE BRUIN.
I think that I would stay—and yet—and yet—
THE CHILD.
Come, little bird with crest of gold!
MAIRE BRUIN [_very softly_].
And yet—
THE CHILD.
Come, little bird with silver feet!
[_MAIRE dies, and THE CHILD goes._
SHAWN BRUIN.
She is dead!
BRIDGET BRUIN.
Come from that image there: she is far away:
You have thrown your arms about a drift of leaves
Or bole of an ash-tree changed into her image.
FATHER HART.
Thus do the spirits of evil snatch their prey
Almost out of the very hand of God;
And day by day their power is more and more,
And men and women leave old paths, for pride
Comes knocking with thin knuckles on the heart.
A VOICE [_singing outside_].
_The wind blows out of the gates of the day,
The wind blows over the lonely of heart,
And the lonely of heart is withered away
While the faeries dance in a place apart,
Shaking their milk-white feet in a ring,
Tossing their milk-white arms in the air;
For they hear the wind laugh, and murmur and sing
Of a land where even the old are fair,
And even the wise are merry of tongue;
But I heard a reed of Coolaney say,
‘When the wind has laughed and murmured and sung,
The lonely of heart is withered away.’_
[_The song is taken up by many voices, who sing loudly,
as if in triumph. Some of the voices seem to come from
within the house._]
THE UNICORN FROM THE STARS
_PERSONS IN THE PLAY_
FATHER JOHN
THOMAS HEARNE, _a coachbuilder_
ANDREW HEARNE, _his brother_
MARTIN HEARNE, _his nephew_
JOHNNY BACACH }
PAUDEEN } _beggars_
BIDDY LALLY }
NANNY }
THE UNICORN FROM THE STARS
ACT I.
_Interior of a coachbuilder’s workshop. Parts of a
gilded coach, among them an ornament representing a
lion and unicorn. THOMAS working at a wheel. FATHER
JOHN coming from door of inner room._
FATHER JOHN.
I have prayed over Martin. I have prayed a long time, but there is no
move in him yet.
THOMAS.
You are giving yourself too much trouble, Father. It’s as good for you
to leave him alone till the doctor’s bottle will come. If there is any
cure at all for what is on him, it is likely the doctor will have it.
FATHER JOHN.
I think it is not doctor’s medicine will help him in this case.
THOMAS.
It will, it will. The doctor has his business learned well. If Andrew
had gone to him the time I bade him and had not turned again to bring
yourself to the house, it is likely Martin would be walking at this
time. I am loth to trouble you, Father, when the business is not of
your own sort. Any doctor at all should be able and well able to cure
the falling sickness.
FATHER JOHN.
It is not any common sickness that is on him now.
THOMAS.
I thought at the first it was gone to sleep he was. But when shaking
him and roaring at him failed to rouse him, I knew well it was the
falling sickness. Believe me, the doctor will reach it with his drugs.
FATHER JOHN.
Nothing but prayer can reach a soul that is so far beyond the world as
his soul is at this moment.
THOMAS.
You are not saying that the life is gone out of him!
FATHER JOHN.
No, no, his life is in no danger. But where he himself, the spirit, the
soul, is gone, I cannot say. It has gone beyond our imaginings. He is
fallen into a trance.
THOMAS.
He used to be queer as a child, going asleep in the fields, and coming
back with talk of white horses he saw, and bright people like angels or
whatever they were. But I mended that. I taught him to recognise stones
beyond angels with a few strokes of a rod. I would never give in to
visions or to trances.
FATHER JOHN.
We who hold the faith have no right to speak against trance or vision.
Saint Elizabeth had them, Saint Benedict, Saint Anthony, Saint
Columcille. Saint Catherine of Siena often lay a long time as if dead.
THOMAS.
That might be so in the olden time, but those things are gone out
of the world now. Those that do their work fair and honest have no
occasion to let the mind go rambling. What would send my nephew, Martin
Hearne, into a trance, supposing trances to be in it, and he rubbing
the gold on the lion and unicorn that he had taken in hand to make a
good job of for the top of the coach?
FATHER JOHN [_taking up ornament_].
It is likely it was that sent him off. The flashing of light upon
it would be enough to throw one that had a disposition to it into a
trance. There was a very saintly man, though he was not of our church;
he wrote a great book called _Mysterium Magnum_ was seven days in
a trance. Truth, or whatever truth he found, fell upon him like a
bursting shower, and he a poor tradesman at his work. It was a ray of
sunlight on a pewter vessel that was the beginning of all. [_Goes to
the door and looks in._] There is no stir in him yet. It is either the
best thing or the worst thing can happen to anyone, that is happening
to him now.
THOMAS.
And what in the living world can happen to a man that is asleep on his
bed?
FATHER JOHN.
There are some would answer you that it is to those who are awake that
nothing happens, and it is they that know nothing. He is gone where all
have gone for supreme truth.
THOMAS.
[_Sitting down again and taking up tools._]
Well, maybe so. But work must go on and coachbuilding must go on,
and they will not go on the time there is too much attention given
to dreams. A dream is a sort of a shadow, no profit in it to anyone
at all. A coach, now, is a real thing and a thing that will last for
generations and be made use of to the last, and maybe turn to be a
hen-roost at its latter end.
FATHER JOHN.
I think Andrew told me it was a dream of Martin’s that led to the
making of that coach.
THOMAS.
Well, I believe he saw gold in some dream, and it led him to want to
make some golden thing, and coaches being the handiest, nothing would
do him till he put the most of his fortune into the making of this
golden coach. It turned out better than I thought, for some of the
lawyers came looking at it at Assize time, and through them it was
heard of at Dublin Castle ... and who now has it ordered but the Lord
Lieutenant! [_FATHER JOHN nods._] Ready it must be and sent off it must
be by the end of the month. It is likely King George will be visiting
Dublin, and it is he himself will be sitting in it yet.
FATHER JOHN.
Martin has been working hard at it, I know.
THOMAS.
You never saw a man work the way he did, day and night, near ever since
the time six months ago he first came home from France.
FATHER JOHN.
I never thought he would be so good at a trade. I thought his mind was
only set on books.
THOMAS.
He should be thankful to myself for that. Any person I will take in
hand, I make a clean job of them the same as I would make of any other
thing in my yard—coach, half-coach, hackney-coach, ass-car, common-car,
post-chaise, calash, chariot on two wheels, on four wheels. Each one
has the shape Thomas Hearne put on it, and it in his hands; and what I
can do with wood and iron, why would I not be able to do it with flesh
and blood, and it in a way my own?
FATHER JOHN.
Indeed, I know you did your best for Martin.
THOMAS.
Every best. Checked him, taught him the trade, sent him to the
monastery in France for to learn the language and to see the wide
world; but who should know that if you did not know it, Father John,
and I doing it according to your own advice?
FATHER JOHN.
I thought his nature needed spiritual guidance and teaching, the best
that could be found.
THOMAS.
I thought myself it was best for him to be away for a while. There are
too many wild lads about this place. He to have stopped here, he might
have taken some fancies, and got into some trouble, going against the
Government maybe the same as Johnny Gibbons that is at this time an
outlaw, having a price upon his head.
FATHER JOHN.
That is so. That imagination of his might have taken fire here at home.
It was better putting him with the Brothers, to turn it to imaginings
of heaven.
THOMAS.
Well, I will soon have a good hardy tradesman made of him now that will
live quiet and rear a family, and be maybe appointed coachbuilder to
the Royal Family at the last.
FATHER JOHN [_at window_].
I see your brother Andrew coming back from the doctor; he is stopping
to talk with a troop of beggars that are sitting by the side of the
road.
THOMAS.
There, now, is another that I have shaped. Andrew used to be a bit wild
in his talk and in his ways, wanting to go rambling, not content to
settle in the place where he was reared. But I kept a guard over him;
I watched the time poverty gave him a nip, and then I settled him into
the business. He never was so good a worker as Martin, he is too fond
of wasting his time talking vanities. But he is middling handy, and
he is always steady and civil to customers. I have no complaint worth
while to be making this last twenty years against Andrew.
[_ANDREW comes in._]
ANDREW.
Beggars there outside going the road to the Kinvara fair. They were
saying there is news that Johnny Gibbons is coming back from France on
the quiet; the king’s soldiers are watching the ports for him.
THOMAS.
Let you keep now, Andrew, to the business you have in hand. Will the
doctor be coming himself or did he send a bottle that will cure Martin?
ANDREW.
The doctor can’t come, for he’s down with the lumbago in the back. He
questioned me as to what ailed Martin, and he got a book to go looking
for a cure, and he began telling me things out of it, but I said I
could not be carrying things of that sort in my head. He gave me the
book then, and he has marks put in it for the places where the cures
are ... wait now.... [_Reads_] ‘Compound medicines are usually taken
inwardly, or outwardly applied; inwardly taken, they should be either
liquid or solid; outwardly, they should be fomentations or sponges wet
in some decoctions.’
THOMAS.
He had a right to have written it out himself upon a paper. Where is
the use of all that?
ANDREW.
I think I moved the mark maybe ... here, now, is the part he was
reading to me himself.... ‘The remedies for diseases belonging to the
skins next the brain, headache, vertigo, cramp, convulsions, palsy,
incubus, apoplexy, falling sickness.’
THOMAS.
It is what I bid you to tell him that it was the falling sickness.
ANDREW [_dropping book_].
O, my dear, look at all the marks gone out of it! Wait, now, I partly
remember what he said ... a blister he spoke of ... or to be smelling
hartshorn ... or the sneezing powder ... or if all fails, to try
letting the blood.
FATHER JOHN.
All this has nothing to do with the real case. It is all waste of time.
ANDREW.
That is what I was thinking myself, Father. Sure it was I was the first
to call out to you when I saw you coming down from the hill-side, and
to bring you in to see what could you do. I would have more trust in
your means than in any doctor’s learning. And in case you might fail
to cure him, I have a cure myself I heard from my grandmother—God rest
her soul!—and she told me she never knew it to fail. A person to have
the falling sickness, to cut the top of his nails and a small share of
the hair of his head, and to put it down on the floor, and to take a
harry-pin and drive it down with that into the floor and to leave it
there. ‘That is the cure will never fail,’ she said, ‘to rise up any
person at all having the falling sickness.’
FATHER JOHN [_hand on ear_].
I will go back to the hill-side, I will go back to the hill-side; but
no, no, I must do what I can. I will go again, I will wrestle, I will
strive my best to call him back with prayer.
[_Goes in and shuts door._
ANDREW.
It is queer Father John is sometimes, and very queer. There are times
when you would say that he believes in nothing at all.
THOMAS.
If you wanted a priest, why did you not get our own parish priest that
is a sensible man, and a man that you would know what his thoughts are?
You know well the bishop should have something against Father John to
have left him through the years in that poor mountainy place, minding
the few unfortunate people that were left out of the last famine. A man
of his learning to be going in rags the way he is, there must be some
good cause for that.
ANDREW.
I had all that in mind and I bringing him. But I thought he would have
done more for Martin than what he is doing. To read a Mass over him
I thought he would, and to be convulsed in the reading it, and some
strange thing to have gone out with a great noise through the doorway.
THOMAS.
It would give no good name to the place such a thing to be happening in
it. It is well enough for labouring-men and for half-acre men. It would
be no credit at all such a thing to be heard of in this house, that is
for coachbuilding the capital of the county.
ANDREW.
If it is from the devil this sickness comes, it would be best to put it
out whatever way it would be put out. But there might no bad thing be
on the lad at all. It is likely he was with wild companions abroad, and
that knocking about might have shaken his health. I was that way myself
one time.
THOMAS.
Father John said that it was some sort of a vision or a trance, but I
would give no heed to what he would say. It is his trade to see more
than other people would see, the same as I myself might be seeing a
split in a leather car hood that no other person would find out at all.
ANDREW.
If it is the falling sickness is on him, I have no objection to
that—a plain, straight sickness that was cast as a punishment on the
unbelieving Jews. It is a thing that might attack one of a family, and
one of another family, and not to come upon their kindred at all. A
person to have it, all you have to do is not to go between him and the
wind, or fire, or water. But I am in dread trance is a thing might run
through the house the same as the cholera morbus.
THOMAS.
In my belief there is no such thing as a trance. Letting on people do
be to make the world wonder the time they think well to rise up. To
keep them to their work is best, and not to pay much attention to them
at all.
ANDREW.
I would not like trances to be coming on myself. I leave it in my will
if I die without cause, a holly-stake to be run through my heart the
way I will lie easy after burial, and not turn my face downwards in my
coffin. I tell you I leave it on you in my will.
THOMAS.
Leave thinking of your own comforts, Andrew, and give your mind to the
business. Did the smith put the irons yet on to the shafts of this
coach?
ANDREW.
I will go see did he.
THOMAS.
Do so, and see did he make a good job of it. Let the shafts be sound
and solid if they are to be studded with gold.
ANDREW.
They are, and the steps along with them—glass sides for the people to
be looking in at the grandeur of the satin within—the lion and the
unicorn crowning all. It was a great thought Martin had the time he
thought of making this coach!
THOMAS.
It is best for me to go see the smith myself and leave it to no other
one. You can be attending to that ass-car out in the yard wants a new
tyre in the wheel—out in the rear of the yard it is. [_They go to
door._] To pay attention to every small thing, and to fill up every
minute of time shaping whatever you have to do, that is the way to
build up a business.
[_They go out._
FATHER JOHN [_bringing in MARTIN_].
They are gone out now—the air is fresher here in the workshop—you can
sit here for a while. You are now fully awake, you have been in some
sort of a trance or a sleep.
MARTIN.
Who was it that pulled at me? Who brought me back?
FATHER JOHN.
It is I, Father John, did it. I prayed a long time over you and brought
you back.
MARTIN.
You, Father John, to be so unkind! O leave me, leave me alone!
FATHER JOHN.
You are in your dream still.
MARTIN.
It was no dream, it was real. Do you not smell the broken fruit—the
grapes? the room is full of the smell.
FATHER JOHN.
Tell me what you have seen, where you have been?
MARTIN.
There were horses—white horses rushing by, with white shining
riders—there was a horse without a rider, and someone caught me up and
put me upon him and we rode away, with the wind, like the wind—
FATHER JOHN.
That is a common imagining. I know many poor persons have seen that.
MARTIN.
We went on, on, on. We came to a sweet-smelling garden with a gate
to it, and there were wheatfields in full ear around, and there were
vineyards like I saw in France, and the grapes in bunches. I thought
it to be one of the townlands of heaven. Then I saw the horses we were
on had changed to unicorns, and they began trampling the grapes and
breaking them. I tried to stop them but I could not.
FATHER JOHN.
That is strange, that is strange. What is it that brings to mind? I
heard it in some place, _monoceros de astris_, the unicorn from the
stars.
MARTIN.
They tore down the wheat and trampled it on stones, and then they tore
down what were left of grapes and crushed and bruised and trampled
them. I smelt the wine, it was flowing on every side—then everything
grew vague. I cannot remember clearly, everything was silent; the
trampling now stopped, we were all waiting for some command. Oh! was it
given! I was trying to hear it; there was someone dragging, dragging me
away from that. I am sure there was a command given, and there was a
great burst of laughter. What was it? What was the command? Everything
seemed to tremble round me.
FATHER JOHN.
Did you awake then?
MARTIN.
I do not think I did, it all changed—it was terrible, wonderful! I saw
the unicorns trampling, trampling, but not in the wine troughs. Oh, I
forget! Why did you waken me?
FATHER JOHN.
I did not touch you. Who knows what hands pulled you away? I prayed,
that was all I did. I prayed very hard that you might awake. If I had
not, you might have died. I wonder what it all meant? The unicorns—what
did the French monk tell me?—strength they meant, virginal strength, a
rushing, lasting, tireless strength.
MARTIN.
They were strong. Oh, they made a great noise with their trampling.
FATHER JOHN.
And the grapes, what did they mean? It puts me in mind of the psalm,
_Et calix meus inebrians quam præclarus est_. It was a strange vision,
a very strange vision, a very strange vision.
MARTIN.
How can I get back to that place?
FATHER JOHN.
You must not go back, you must not think of doing that. That life of
vision, of contemplation, is a terrible life, for it has far more of
temptation in it than the common life. Perhaps it would have been best
for you to stay under rules in the monastery.
MARTIN.
I could not see anything so clearly there. It is back here in my own
place the visions come, in the place where shining people used to laugh
around me, and I a little lad in a bib.
FATHER JOHN.
You cannot know but it was from the Prince of this world the vision
came. How can one ever know unless one follows the discipline of the
Church? Some spiritual director, some wise learned man, that is what
you want. I do not know enough. What am I but a poor banished priest,
with my learning forgotten, my books never handled and spotted with the
damp!
MARTIN.
I will go out into the fields where you cannot come to me to awake me.
I will see that townland again; I will hear that command. I cannot
wait, I must know what happened, I must bring that command to mind
again.
FATHER JOHN.
[_Putting himself between MARTIN and the door._]
You must have patience as the saints had it. You are taking your own
way. If there is a command from God for you, you must wait His good
time to receive it.
MARTIN.
Must I live here forty years, fifty years ... to grow as old as my
uncles, seeing nothing but common things, doing work ... some foolish
work?
FATHER JOHN.
Here they are coming; it is time for me to go. I must think and I must
pray. My mind is troubled about you. [_To THOMAS as he and ANDREW come
in._] Here he is; be very kind to him for he has still the weakness of
a little child. [_Goes out._
THOMAS.
Are you well of the fit, lad?
MARTIN.
It was no fit. I was away—for awhile—no, you will not believe me if I
tell you.
ANDREW.
I would believe it, Martin. I used to have very long sleeps myself and
very queer dreams.
THOMAS.
You had, till I cured you, taking you in hand and binding you to the
hours of the clock. The cure that will cure yourself, Martin, and will
waken you, is to put the whole of your mind on to your golden coach; to
take it in hand and to finish it out of face.
MARTIN.
Not just now. I want to think—to try and remember what I saw, something
that I heard, that I was told to do.
THOMAS.
No, but put it out of your mind. There is no man doing business that
can keep two things in his head. A Sunday or a holy-day, now, you might
go see a good hurling or a thing of the kind, but to be spreading out
your mind on anything outside of the workshop on common days, all
coachbuilding would come to an end.
MARTIN.
I don’t think it is building I want to do. I don’t think that is what
was in the command.
THOMAS.
It is too late to be saying that, the time you have put the most of
your fortune in the business. Set yourself now to finish your job, and
when it is ended maybe I won’t begrudge you going with the coach as far
as Dublin.
ANDREW.
That is it, that will satisfy him. I had a great desire myself, and
I young, to go travelling the roads as far as Dublin. The roads are
the great things, they never come to an end. They are the same as the
serpent having his tail swallowed in his own mouth.
MARTIN.
It was not wandering I was called to. What was it? what was it?
THOMAS.
What you are called to, and what everyone having no great estate is
called to, is to work. Sure the world itself could not go on without
work.
MARTIN.
I wonder if that is the great thing, to make the world go on? No, I
don’t think that is the great thing—what does the Munster poet call
it?—‘this crowded slippery coach-loving world.’ I don’t think I was
told to work for that.
ANDREW.
I often thought that myself. It is a pity the stock of the Hearnes to
be asked to do any work at all.
THOMAS.
Rouse yourself, Martin, and don’t be talking the way a fool talks. You
started making that golden coach, and you were set upon it, and you had
me tormented about it. You have yourself wore out working at it, and
planning it, and thinking of it, and at the end of the race, when you
have the winning-post in sight, and horses hired for to bring it to
Dublin Castle, you go falling into sleeps and blathering about dreams,
and we run to a great danger of letting the profit and the sale go by.
Sit down on the bench now, and lay your hands to the work.
MARTIN [_sitting down_].
I will try. I wonder why I ever wanted to make it; it was no good dream
set me doing that. [_He takes up wheel._] What is there in a wooden
wheel to take pleasure in it? Gilding it outside makes it no different.
THOMAS.
That is right, now. You had some good plan for making the axle run
smooth.
MARTIN.
[_Letting wheel fall and putting his hands to his
head._]
It is no use. [_Angrily._] Why did you send the priest to awake me? My
soul is my own and my mind is my own. I will send them to where I like.
You have no authority over my thoughts.
THOMAS.
That is no way to be speaking to me. I am head of this business.
Nephew, or no nephew, I will have no one come cold or unwilling to the
work.
MARTIN.
I had better go; I am of no use to you. I am going—I must be alone—I
will forget if I am not alone. Give me what is left of my money and I
will go out of this.
THOMAS.
[_Opening a press and taking out a bag and throwing it
to him._]
There is what is left of your money! The rest of it you have spent on
the coach. If you want to go, go, and I will not have to be annoyed
with you from this out.
ANDREW.
Come now with me, Thomas. The boy is foolish, but it will soon pass
over. He has not my sense to be giving attention to what you will say.
Come along now, leave him for awhile; leave him to me I say, it is I
will get inside his mind.
[_He leads THOMAS out. MARTIN bangs door angrily after
them and sits down, taking up lion and unicorn._
MARTIN.
I think it was some shining thing I saw. What was it?
ANDREW.
[_Opening door and putting in his head._]
Listen to me, Martin.
MARTIN.
Go away, no more talking; leave me alone.
ANDREW.
O, but wait. I understand you. Thomas doesn’t understand your thoughts,
but I understand them. Wasn’t I telling you I was just like you once?
MARTIN.
Like me? Did you ever see the other things, the things beyond?
ANDREW.
I did. It is not the four walls of the house keep me content. Thomas
doesn’t know. Oh, no, he doesn’t know.
MARTIN.
No, he has no vision.
ANDREW.
He has not, nor any sort of a heart for a frolic.
MARTIN.
He has never heard the laughter and the music beyond.
ANDREW.
He has not, nor the music of my own little flute. I have it hidden in
the thatch outside.
MARTIN.
Does the body slip from you as it does from me? They have not shut your
window into eternity?
ANDREW.
Thomas never shut a window I could not get through. I knew you were one
of my own sort. When I am sluggish in the morning, Thomas says, ‘Poor
Andrew is getting old.’ That is all he knows. The way to keep young is
to do the things youngsters do. Twenty years I have been slipping away,
and he never found me out yet!
MARTIN.
That is what they call ecstasy, but there is no word that can tell out
very plain what it means. That freeing of the mind from its thoughts,
those wonders we know when we put them into words; the words seem as
little like them as blackberries are like the moon and sun.
ANDREW.
I found that myself the time they knew me to be wild, and used to be
asking me to say what pleasure did I find in cards, and women, and
drink.
MARTIN.
You might help me to remember that vision I had this morning, to
understand it. The memory of it has slipped from me. Wait, it is coming
back, little by little. I know that I saw the unicorns trampling, and
then a figure, a many-changing figure, holding some bright thing.
I knew something was going to happen or to be said, something that
would make my whole life strong and beautiful like the rushing of the
unicorns, and then, and then—
JOHNNY BACACH’S _voice at window_.
A poor person I am, without food, without a way, without portion,
without costs, without a person or a stranger, without means, without
hope, without health, without warmth—
ANDREW [_looking towards window_].
It is that troop of beggars. Bringing their tricks and their thieveries
they are to the Kinvara Fair.
MARTIN [_impatiently_].
There is no quiet—come to the other room. I am trying to remember.
[_They go to door of inner room, but ANDREW stops him._
ANDREW.
They are a bad-looking fleet. I have a mind to drive them away, giving
them a charity.
MARTIN.
Drive them away or come away from their voices.
ANOTHER VOICE.
I put under the power of my prayer
All that will give me help.
Rafael keep him Wednesday,
Sachiel feed him Thursday,
Hamiel provide him Friday,
Cassiel increase him Saturday.
Sure giving to us is giving to the Lord and laying up a store in the
treasury of heaven.
ANDREW.
Whisht! He is entering by the window!
[_JOHNNY climbs up._
JOHNNY.
That I may never sin, but the place is empty.
PAUDEEN.
Go in and see what can you make a grab at.
JOHNNY [_getting in_].
That every blessing I gave may be turned to a curse on them that left
the place so bare! [_He turns things over._] I might chance something
in this chest if it was open.
[_ANDREW begins creeping towards him._
NANNY [_outside_].
Hurry on, now, you limping crabfish you! We can’t be stopping here
while you’ll boil stirabout!
JOHNNY.
[_Seizing bag of money and holding it up high in both
hands._]
Look at this, now, look!
[_ANDREW comes behind, seizes his arm._
JOHNNY [_letting bag fall with a crash_].
Destruction on us all!
MARTIN.
[_Running forward, seizes him. Heads disappear._]
That is it! O, I remember. That is what happened. That is the command.
Who was it sent you here with that command?
JOHNNY.
It was misery sent me in, and starvation, and the hard ways of the
world.
NANNY [_outside_].
It was that, my poor child, and my one son only. Show mercy to him now
and he after leaving gaol this morning.
MARTIN [_to ANDREW_].
I was trying to remember it—when he spoke that word it all came back to
me. I saw a bright many-changing figure; it was holding up a shining
vessel [_holds up arms_]; then the vessel fell and was broken with a
great crash; then I saw the unicorns trampling it. They were breaking
the world to pieces—when I saw the cracks coming I shouted for joy! And
I heard the command ‘Destroy, destroy, destruction is the life-giver!
destroy!’
ANDREW.
What will we do with him? He was thinking to rob you of your gold.
MARTIN.
How could I forget it or mistake it? It has all come upon me now; the
reasons of it all, like a flood, like a flooded river.
JOHNNY [_weeping_].
It was the hunger brought me in and the drouth.
MARTIN.
Were you given any other message? Did you see the unicorns?
JOHNNY.
I saw nothing and heard nothing; near dead I am with the fright I got
and with the hardship of the gaol.
MARTIN.
To destroy, to overthrow all that comes between us and God, between
us and that shining country. To break the wall, Andrew, to break the
thing—whatever it is that comes between, but where to begin—
ANDREW.
What is it you are talking about?
MARTIN.
It may be that this man is the beginning. He has been sent—the poor,
they have nothing, and so they can see heaven as we cannot. He and his
comrades will understand me. But how to give all men high hearts that
they may all understand?
JOHNNY.
It’s the juice of the grey barley will do that.
ANDREW.
To rise everybody’s heart, is it? Is it that was your meaning all the
time? If you will take the blame of it all, I’ll do what you want. Give
me the bag of money then. [_He takes it up._] O, I’ve a heart like your
own. I’ll lift the world, too. The people will be running from all
parts. O, it will be a great day in this district.
JOHNNY.
Will I go with you?
MARTIN.
No, you must stay here; we have things to do and to plan.
JOHNNY.
Destroyed we all are with the hunger and the drouth.
MARTIN.
Go, then, get food and drink, whatever is wanted to give you strength
and courage. Gather your people together here, bring them all in. We
have a great thing to do. I have to begin—I want to tell it to the
whole world. Bring them in, bring them in, I will make the house ready.
[_He stands looking up as if in ecstasy; ANDREW and
JOHNNY BACACH go out._
ACT II
_The same workshop. MARTIN seen arranging mugs and
bread, etc., on a table. FATHER JOHN comes in, knocking
at open door as he comes; his mind intensely absorbed._
MARTIN.
Come in, come in, I have got the house ready. Here is bread and
meat—everybody is welcome.
[_Hearing no answer, turns round._
FATHER JOHN.
Martin, I have come back. There is something I want to say to you.
MARTIN.
You are welcome, there are others coming. They are not of your sort,
but all are welcome.
FATHER JOHN.
I have remembered suddenly something that I read when I was in the
seminary.
MARTIN.
You seem very tired.
FATHER JOHN [_sitting down_].
I had almost got back to my own place when I thought of it. I have run
part of the way. It is very important; it is about the trance that you
have been in. When one is inspired from above, either in trance or in
contemplation, one remembers afterwards all that one has seen and read.
I think there must be something about it in St. Thomas. I know that
I have read a long passage about it years ago. But, Martin, there is
another kind of inspiration, or rather an obsession or possession. A
diabolical power comes into one’s body, or overshadows it. Those whose
bodies are taken hold of in this way, jugglers, and witches, and the
like, can often tell what is happening in distant places, or what is
going to happen, but when they come out of that state they remember
nothing. I think you said—
MARTIN.
That I could not remember.
FATHER JOHN.
You remembered something, but not all. Nature is a great sleep; there
are dangerous and evil spirits in her dreams, but God is above Nature.
She is a darkness, but He makes everything clear; He is light.
MARTIN.
All is clear now. I remember all, or all that matters to me. A poor man
brought me a word, and I know what I have to do.
FATHER JOHN.
Ah, I understand, words were put into his mouth. I have read of such
things. God sometimes uses some common man as his messenger.
MARTIN.
You may have passed the man who brought it on the road. He left me but
now.
FATHER JOHN.